PART5

Marcus nodded slowly.

“It appears someone supplied him with information about the purchase.”

“Who?”

“We’re still tracing that.”

I looked at the document again.

Then I saw the name of the person who had signed the preliminary agreement on behalf of Voss Development Group.

Nathan.

My younger brother.

The same brother who had stood outside my house holding a pry bar.

But that wasn’t the worst part.

Attached to the agreement was an email from Nathan.

It contained one sentence.

Once we establish residency, Elena won’t have the authority to remove us without a lengthy court process.

I read it twice.

Then a third time.

My brother hadn’t simply come along because Dad asked him to.

He had helped plan the entire thing.

Marcus closed the binder.

“There’s another development. The lender has agreed to provide investigators with the original submission records. We may finally establish who prepared the forged documents.”

I looked toward the dark windows.

Outside, the desert was quiet.

The Christmas lights around the courtyard glowed softly against the stone walls.

I had imagined spending Christmas in this house surrounded by paintings, music, and people who understood what it meant to start over.

Instead, I had spent the first week fighting the people who were supposed to love me.

I thought the worst part was discovering what my father had done.

I was wrong.

Because the next morning, I received a message from an unknown number.

It contained a photograph of an old Christmas card.

The card was addressed to me.

It was dated eleven years earlier.

And written inside, in my father’s handwriting, were the words:

To Elena. We are proud of you. Love, Dad.

I stared at the photograph.

I had never received that card.

I had never even known it existed.

A second message appeared.

Your father told us he delivered it personally. He lied.

Then another message.

If you want to know why your family spent so many years treating you like you didn’t exist, you need to meet me before Christmas.

At the bottom was a name.

Daniel Voss.

My father’s older brother.

The uncle I had been told died when I was twelve.

And beneath his name was an address.

He was alive.

And apparently, he had been waiting eleven years for me to discover the truth.

I read the message seventeen times before I finally believed what I was seeing.

Daniel Voss.

My father’s older brother.

The man I had been told died when I was twelve.

The man whose photograph had once stood on my grandmother’s fireplace.

The man whose name nobody in my family was allowed to mention.

Alive.

I sat at the library desk, holding my phone, while the fire burned lower.

For years, whenever I asked about Uncle Daniel, my father gave the same answer.

“He made some bad decisions. We don’t discuss him.”

When I was twelve, I had asked whether he would ever visit us again.

Dad had put down his newspaper.

“He’s gone, Elena. You need to accept that.”

I had assumed he meant he had died.

Apparently, I had misunderstood something far more deliberate.

I immediately called Marcus.

He arrived twenty minutes later.

When I showed him the messages, he read them carefully.

“Don’t respond yet.”

“Why?”

“Because we don’t know who sent them or what they want. Given everything that has happened, we need to be careful.”

He examined the photograph.

The Christmas card was unmistakable.

My father’s handwriting.

My name.

And a date from eleven years earlier.

“Can you verify Daniel is alive?”

“I’m going to try.”

An hour later, Marcus called me into the library.

He had found something.

Daniel Voss was living in Flagstaff, Arizona.

He had owned a small architectural restoration company and had apparently been involved in a lengthy legal dispute with my father over their late parents’ estate.

He was not dead.

He had simply disappeared from our family’s life.

Marcus found a phone number through a public business record.

I called.

A man answered after the second ring.

“Hello?”

I swallowed.

“Uncle Daniel?”

There was a long silence.

Then I heard him exhale.

“Elena?”

My eyes filled immediately.

“Yes.”

“Oh, sweetheart.”

His voice broke.

“I wondered whether I’d ever hear your voice again.”

I covered my mouth.

“Why did Dad tell me you were dead?”

Another silence.

Then he said something I would remember for the rest of my life.

“Because if you knew I was alive, you might have discovered what he did to your grandmother.”

The next morning, Marcus accompanied me to Flagstaff.

Daniel lived in a modest brick house surrounded by pine trees.

There was an old wooden bench near the entrance and a small workshop behind the property.

When he opened the door, I recognized him immediately.

He was older than the man in my grandmother’s photographs, with silver hair and tired eyes.

But his smile was the same.

He looked at me for several seconds.

Then he opened his arms.

I stepped forward.

He hugged me tightly.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

I didn’t understand.

“Why are you apologizing?”

“Because I should have found you sooner.”

He invited us inside.

The house smelled of coffee and old books.

On a shelf near the living room stood a framed photograph of my grandmother, my father, Daniel, and me as a little girl.

I pointed at it.

“Where did you get that?”

Daniel smiled sadly.

“Your grandmother gave it to me.”

I sat down.

“Tell me everything.”

He took a deep breath.

“Your grandmother left behind two things when she died. A small property portfolio and a trust intended to support her grandchildren.”

I stared at him.

“Grandchildren?”

“Yes. You and Nathan.”

He explained that my grandmother had owned several rental properties and an investment account.

Her intention had been simple.

Each grandchild would receive an equal share when they reached thirty.

Nathan’s portion had been administered through my father because Nathan was younger.

My portion had been placed under independent administration.

But there was a problem.

CONTINUE FOR NEXT PART6…