Chapter 6 - A Dead Woman's Signature

For several minutes Gabriel said nothing.

Then he asked Nadia to show him the original bank record, not the summary. Sarah saw the effort it took for him to keep his voice even.

Nadia placed the papers on the table. “Elena Rossi isn't listed as the account owner. Her name appears in the vendor's internal authorization field. It's an identification label, not a verified signature.”

“Who entered it?”

“We don't know yet.”

Gabriel studied the entry. “Vincent told me he closed every account connected to Elena after the fire.”

“He may have copied her name from older records,” Nadia said. “It's also possible somebody wanted you to see it and draw exactly the wrong conclusion.”

Sarah looked at the line of letters. The dead woman's name carried a weight that none of the numbers had held.

“Does the date mean anything?” she asked.

Nadia pointed to it. “The first payment carrying her name occurred seventeen months ago. It doesn't imply she was alive then.”

Gabriel nodded, but his eyes stayed on the page.

After Nadia left, he remained motionless beside Sarah's window. She watched him from her chair, where rehabilitation had left her aching and exhausted.

“Tell me about Elena,” she said softly.

He didn't turn around.

“She hated the way people made decisions about her before she entered a room.”

Sarah waited.

“She wanted Leo to have a childhood that didn't belong to my business. We argued about security. She thought I was using it to keep them both inside the house.”

“Was she right?”

“Yes.”

He turned then, and Sarah saw a grief that hadn't diminished with time.

“The day she died, she was going to meet someone about money missing from one of our companies. Vincent said the appointment had been canceled. She drove anyway.”

“Was it connected to the car fire?”

“I never proved it.”

“You believed someone caused it.”

“I believed many things. Believing didn't bring her back.”

Sarah didn't offer comfort she couldn't make honest. Instead she asked what he intended to do with the new document.

“Investigate it without deciding the answer first,” he said.

That answer mattered.

Sarah's recovery continued in small humiliating increments. She could walk the length of the rehabilitation corridor, but she couldn't fasten her hair without assistance. Her left shoulder remained stiff; deep breaths brought a familiar ache beneath her ribs. Maria reminded her that feeling stronger did not mean the tissue had finished healing.

Gabriel brought the promised written agreement. The Rossi organization would cover treatment and rehabilitation regardless of her employment. She would receive her accumulated wages and paid medical leave. She could decline any further work and could have an independent lawyer review the document.

Sarah read every line.

“Why not just call it a reward?” she asked.

“Because you asked for no strings.”

She requested a few changes to the wording. Gabriel accepted them without argument.

It was the first contract she'd ever negotiated with a man who could buy the building around her.

Nadia's investigation meanwhile became more unsettling. A retired accountant who had worked with Elena before her death confirmed that she had been investigating purchases made through maintenance vendors. Elena's records had contained handwritten references to “repeated gate charges” and “duplicate approvals.”

“Did anyone know?” Sarah asked.

“Vincent knew she was checking,” Gabriel said. “He told me she was worried over routine errors.”

“Did you believe him then?”

“I wanted to.”

The accountant had preserved a copy of Elena's notes because she had asked him to reconcile them. He had not understood their significance until the news of the attack on Leo revived his concern.

Nadia laid the notes beside the recent invoices. The patterns matched: exaggerated repair bills, duplicate security expenses, and vendor authorizations using codes that bypassed normal approval.

“Someone's been using the same method for years,” she said.

“But why use Elena's name now?” Sarah asked.

“Possibly to make the scheme look like an old family expense. Possibly to frighten Gabriel if it was discovered.”

Gabriel ran a hand over his face. “Vincent handled the records after her death. He could have preserved the code.”

Nadia agreed. But there was more.

Peter Voss had been located. He was alive and had contacted a lawyer through a neighboring state's police department. He claimed he'd been paid to provide radio frequencies and a shift schedule, not told that a child would be targeted.

“Do you believe him?” Sarah asked.

“His account needs corroboration,” Nadia answered. “He also says he never met the person giving orders. He communicated through a number registered to Hudson Property Services.”

Vincent's vendor.

The evidence was tightening, but it wasn't complete.

That evening Leo visited again. He sat beside Sarah and showed her a new drawing: a small blue train moving between two dark lines. Gabriel stood back, letting the boy speak for himself.

“Who's in the train?” Sarah asked.

Leo touched the paper. “You.”

“And who else?”

“Me. Dad.”

Gabriel looked away quickly.

After the visit Sarah asked him not to bring Leo into the investigation, even as an innocent witness to remembered routines.

“He already knows what danger feels like,” she said. “Let adults find the proof.”

Gabriel agreed.

Nadia called late that night. A recovered vendor phone had transmitted a message shortly before the attack containing the words WEST GLASS and 3:15. The sender had used a number repeatedly contacted by Vincent's private office phone.

She was careful about what it proved.

“It establishes a direct connection between his office and the operation,” she said. “We're obtaining the device records now.”

Gabriel listened without speaking.

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Sarah looked at the drawing of the train lying on her bedside table.

The question was no longer whether someone had betrayed the estate. It was whether the man entrusted with its money had helped arrange the shooting, and whether Elena had encountered his scheme years before.