Chapter 3 - Claire Bennett Never Had a Grave
There was no grave.
Ethan learned that before dessert plates were cleared.
Claire Bennett disappeared twenty-two years earlier.
Robert told family members she died overseas after a long illness.
Margaret entered Robert’s life two years later.
Ethan had been born after their marriage.
At least, that was the family history he knew.
Richard, Robert’s younger brother, remembered Claire differently.
“She didn’t look sick,” he said.
Margaret glared.
Richard ignored her.
Claire had been an attorney who helped Robert build Bennett Development.
Then she vanished.
No funeral.
No death certificate Richard had ever seen.
Robert insisted everything happened abroad.
The family accepted it.
Vanessa finally explained the document.
She had not transferred Harbor House to Claire.
She had signed an acknowledgment that Claire Bennett remained its
beneficial owner.
Margaret stared.
“You met her.”
Vanessa nodded.
“Yesterday.”
Ethan’s chair scraped backward.
“Where?”
“I’m not telling you until she agrees.”
Margaret laughed bitterly.
“You married my son and secretly met his father’s supposedly dead wife?”
Vanessa looked at Ethan.
“I discovered her because I was reviewing Harbor House for refinancing.”
That surprised him.
“Why were you reviewing it?”
Vanessa worked in commercial real estate law.
Six months earlier, Ethan asked her to examine several inherited
properties.
Harbor House appeared in an old trust schedule.
Vanessa traced the ownership.
The property had never legally belonged to Robert.
It belonged to Claire.
Someone had been collecting rent from it for twenty years.
Ethan asked:
“Who?”
May you like
Vanessa looked at Margaret.
“Your mother.”
