Chapter 10 - THE ACCOUNT IN EMILY'S NAME
We traced the unknown message to a prepaid number.
The sender would not answer calls.
But twenty minutes later, another message came.
Check the custodial account opened in 1998.
Emily was born in 1998.
Martin immediately began searching.
The next morning, he called me before seven.
“I found it.”
“What?”
“An old custodial investment account.”
“In Emily’s name?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“Originally, twelve thousand dollars.”
My shoulders loosened slightly.
Then Martin continued.
“It isn’t twelve thousand anymore.”
I gripped the phone.
“How much?”
“Current estimated value is around nine hundred eighty thousand.”
I sat straight up.
“What?”
“The account contains early shares in a company that appreciated significantly.”
“Whose account is it?”
“That is the problem.”
“What problem?”
“It should have become Emily’s when she reached the statutory transfer age.”
“She never knew it existed.”
“I know.”
“Who controls it?”
“David.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“How?”
“Apparently nobody notified the brokerage properly when Emily reached adulthood.”
“So he left it under custodial control?”
“That’s what it looks like.”
“Can he take the money?”
“Not legally.”
That word had lost its comforting effect.
“What has he done with it?”
“Borrowed against it.”
I closed my eyes.
“How much?”
“About four hundred thousand.”
I felt physically ill.
David had not just taken from Emily’s trust.
He had leveraged nearly a million dollars belonging to her.
When I told Emily, she did not cry.
She sat very still at Anne’s kitchen table.
Ryan stood behind her.
“He stole from me twice.”
I chose my words carefully.
“He misused assets that appear to belong to you.”
“Mom.”
“Yes.”
“Stop making it sound nicer.”
I looked at her.
She was right.
“He stole from you.”
She nodded once.
“Thank you.”
Ryan placed his hand on her shoulder.
“What was the loan used for?”
Martin answered through the speakerphone.
“We are tracing it.”
By noon, we knew.
Part purchased the Dublin property.
Part funded Harrison Property Holdings.
Part went into a private investment partnership.
And sixty-five thousand dollars had been transferred into an account associated with Melissa.
Emily stood so quickly her chair scraped the floor.
“She took my money?”
“We don’t know if she knew where it came from.”
“I don’t care.”
“Emily.”
“No.”
She grabbed her purse.
“Where are you going?”
“To find her.”
Ryan stepped in front of her.
“Not alone.”
“I’m not asking permission.”
I stood.
“Neither am I.”
She looked at me.
“You are not confronting Melissa.”
“She sat in your chair.”
“That is not the biggest issue anymore.”
“I know.”
“Then let the attorneys handle it.”
Her eyes filled.
“She wore a dress he bought with my money.”
The sentence hurt more than it should have.
Because she was probably right.
I crossed the room.
I wrapped my arms around her.
This time, she let me.
“He used us both.”
Her voice cracked against my shoulder.
“For years.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
There was no answer good enough.
Because he thought he could.
Because control became easier than honesty.
Because greed grows quietly when nobody challenges it.
Because some people do not wake up evil.
They simply learn how much they can take without consequences.
That evening, Melissa contacted me again.
She asked to meet.
Rebecca advised against going alone.
So we met in a conference room at her office.
Melissa arrived without makeup.
She looked nothing like the polished woman from the wedding.
She placed a folder on the table.
“I didn’t know.”
“About Emily’s account?”
She nodded.
“The sixty-five thousand?”
Her face crumpled.
“David told me it was a bonus.”
“For what?”
“He said the company had done well.”
“You accepted a sixty-five-thousand-dollar bonus?”
“I closed two major accounts.”
Rebecca interrupted.
“Did the payment come from Bennett Development?”
Melissa looked down.
“No.”
“When did you discover that?”
“Yesterday.”
She pushed the folder toward me.
“I checked everything.”
Inside were bank records.
Messages.
Emails.
One message from David said:
I’m moving some of E’s dormant money.
Nobody watches it.
Emily read the printout.
Her hands began shaking.
There was no misunderstanding left.
No complicated explanation.
No confusion.
David knew the money was hers.
He simply believed nobody was watching.
Melissa continued.
“There’s more.”
Of course there was.
“There is always more,” I said.
She looked at me.
“David has another account.”
“Where?”
“Cayman Islands.”
Rebecca stopped writing.
“What is in it?”
“I don’t know.”
“How do you know it exists?”
Melissa reached into her folder.
“Because David asked me to marry him once the divorce was finished.”
I stared at her.
She slid a printed email across the table.
“And he sent me this to prove we would be financially secure.”
May you like
The attached statement showed a balance.
$2,840,317.
