Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN WHO HELPED BUILD THE TRAP
“Sophie, did you know my death would give you control of my husband's company?”
She was sitting across from me in Helen Price's conference room.
For the first time, I saw her without perfect makeup, expensive clothes, or the confident smile she'd worn beside Michael.
She looked exhausted.
But I wasn't there to pity her.
“I didn't know it was your death,” she said.
I stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
Sophie gripped her purse.
“Michael told me the ownership transfer depended on an old investor's interest being extinguished.”
“An investor?”
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you the investor was me?”
“Not until after the fire.”
I looked at Helen.
She remained silent.
Sophie continued.
“When I found out, I asked him why he hadn't told me. He said it was complicated. He said you'd signed away your interest years ago.”
“Then why would my death matter?”
Sophie's eyes filled.
“That's what I asked.”
“What did he say?”
“He told me to stop asking questions.”
I leaned back.
Seven years of Michael telling me the same thing.
Stop asking.
Stop worrying.
Stop making problems.
Sophie wasn't innocent.
But I was beginning to see how Michael had used different lies for each of us.
I opened the photograph from my necklace.
“Did you write this?”
Sophie stared.
Her expression changed.
“Where did you get that?”
“It was inside a pendant Michael gave me.”
She picked it up carefully.
“Oh, my God.”
“What?”
“This photograph isn't from seven years ago.”
I frowned.
“The date says—”
“I know what the date says. It's a reprint from a photo booth at Pike Place Market. We took the original before he proposed to you.”
I waited.
“Why would someone reprint it?”
Sophie turned it over.
“When this is over, you promised we'll finally have our life.”
She touched the handwriting.
“That's mine.”
“I know.”
“But I didn't write that recently.”
“You're sure?”
“Yes.”
She looked at me.
“Michael took the original from me years ago. I haven't seen it since.”
Helen leaned forward.
“Miss Lane, when was the last time you saw Mr. Bennett handling Mrs. Bennett's necklace?”
Sophie frowned.
“The morning before the fire.”
My stomach tightened.
“He had my necklace?”
“He was sitting at his office desk. He had a small silver heart open in his hand. I asked what it was.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he was fixing something for you.”
I remembered the morning before the fire.
Michael had been unusually affectionate.
He'd made coffee.
Kissed my forehead.
Told me I looked tired.
I'd gone to shower while he stayed in the office.
A gesture I'd mistaken for tenderness.
Helen made a note.
“Sophie, why would Michael put that photograph inside the pendant?”
Sophie shook her head.
“I don't know.”
I looked at her.
“Then tell me what you do know.”
She took a deep breath.
And began.
Seven years earlier, Michael and Sophie had been together for almost three years.
They were young.
Ambitious.
And deeply in debt.
Michael wanted to start a development company.
Sophie had contacts.
But neither had money.
Then Michael met me.
I was twenty-seven.
Working in accounting.
Recently orphaned.
And I'd inherited forty-two thousand dollars after my mother died.
“He said you were kind,” Sophie whispered.
“He said you wanted a family.”
I felt sick.
“What else?”
“He said you trusted people too easily.”
The room became unbearably quiet.
Sophie wiped her face.
“I told him not to marry you.”
I almost laughed.
“How generous.”
“I told him it was wrong. He said he really cared about you.”
“And you believed him?”
“I wanted to.”
She looked down.
“He promised he'd repay your inheritance and leave once the company was stable.”
“Seven years later, you were still waiting.”
“Yes.”
I stared at the woman who'd helped destroy my marriage.
There was no satisfying victory in seeing her cry.
Only grief.
So much wasted life.
“Did you know he was taking my money?” I asked.
“At the beginning, yes. I knew you were investing in the company. I believed you understood the risk.”
“And later?”
“I stopped asking where the money came from.”
That admission mattered more than another apology.
She was finally acknowledging her part.
Helen opened another folder.
“Miss Lane, there are records of funds passing through the company you manage. Would you be willing to provide the underlying agreements and accounting records?”
Sophie looked frightened.
“Will I be charged with something?”
“I can't promise you anything about an investigation. You need independent counsel. But preserving records and giving truthful statements matters.”
Sophie nodded slowly.
“I'll cooperate.”
Before she left, I asked one final question.
“Why did Michael save you?”
She stared at me.
“Because he loved me.”
The answer hurt.
But I shook my head.
“No. That's what he wanted you to believe.”
Her expression hardened.
“What are you saying?”
“If he loved you, why did he involve you in a plan that could put you in prison?”
She looked away.
For the first time, she had no answer.
That evening, Samuel called with news.
He had located Arthur Bell, Michael's former accountant.
Arthur had agreed to speak with us.
We met him the next morning at a quiet diner in Olympia.
He was seventy-two, with thinning white hair and a walking cane.
When I introduced myself, his face filled with sadness.
“Claire,” he said, “I hoped I'd never have to tell you this.”
My throat tightened.
“Tell me what?”
Arthur reached into his coat pocket.
He placed a small black notebook on the table.
“I kept records after Michael dismissed me.”
“Why?”
“Because I suspected he was manipulating the ownership accounts.”
I looked at the notebook.
“What did you find?”
Arthur opened it to a marked page.
“Michael didn't just hide your twenty-five percent interest. He tried to make it disappear.”
“Why?”
“Because your mother's investment was the only unrestricted capital the company had when it began.”
He pointed to a handwritten entry.
“Without it, the first project wouldn't have been financed.”
I stared at him.
“Does that mean—”
“It means your ownership may be worth far more than Michael ever told you.”
Samuel leaned forward.
“How much?”
Arthur studied me.
“Depending on the validity of the later transactions and the company's present value, possibly several million dollars.”
I couldn't breathe.
Arthur turned another page.
“And there is something else.”
He pushed a photocopy toward me.
It was an insurance application.
My name.
My birth date.
My address.
Two million dollars in coverage.
At the bottom was a signature.
Claire Bennett.
Except I had never signed it.
Arthur looked at me.
“Michael asked me to witness that signature.”
My hands shook.
“What did you do?”
“I refused.”
“Then who witnessed it?”
Arthur pointed to the name.
Sophie Lane.
But beneath her name was another notation.
A document-preparation date.
October 18.
Two days before the fire.
May you like
And beside it, written in Michael's handwriting, was a single sentence.
CLAIRE MUST NOT BE AVAILABLE TO SIGN THE FINAL RELEASE.
