“I rescheduled it to noon,” Richard lied. “Go home and sleep. ”
The call clicked dead.
He was lying. A trust officer couldn't reschedule an expedited judicial unsealing over the phone; only the court-appointed personal representative appearing in person could modify the docket.
I sat on a terminal bench, pulled my county records tablet from my tote, and connected to Minnesota’s secure judicial network using my inter-agency credentials.
I brought up Clara’s sealed probate file: File No. 69-PR-24-118.
An emergency petition to unseal had been filed at four-thirty this afternoon under my name. Attached was a forged signature witnessing my consent, stamped by Marcus Hayes—Richard’s business partner.
I scrolled to Clara’s confidential asset disclosure, submitted two weeks before her death:
Box #408 contains dual-custody access. Box key #2 welded inside the steel casing of MedicAlert bracelet #4902. Physical presentation of bracelet required alongside designated executor Elise Morgan.
The bracelet wasn't a keepsake. It was the key.
The scratch Richard had gouged into the hinge months ago wasn't accidental; he had tried to force the cylinder open while Clara lay in hospice, realized the internal lock would shear if broken, and learned from the bank that only the intact medical band, presented by Elise Morgan, would open box #408.
Inside that box lay the encrypted ledger proving Richard had siphoned two million dollars through shell companies before Clara’s kidneys failed. If his proxy reached North Shore Trust at eight tomorrow morning with my name, a forged duplicate license, and that bracelet, the vault would open. She would take the drives, and Richard would burn the evidence before noon.
The next flight to Minneapolis departed at 7:15 a. m. , landing forty-five minutes after the vault opened and two hours south of Duluth.
If I waited for airline fraud investigators, the paperwork wouldn't clear until morning. Clara’s evidence would be gone.
I zipped my bag, slung it over my shoulder, and broke into a fast stride toward the automated train to Economy Lot F. My Subaru was parked on level three, the tank full from my commute from the municipal center.
Four hundred and seventy miles of black interstate stretched between O’Hare and the western tip of Lake Superior. Rain turning to freezing sleet across central Wisconsin. If I drove through the night without stopping for sleep, I had seven hours to reach the glass doors of North Shore Trust before the vault opened.
CHAPTER 2 CONTINUED
I tapped the steering wheel controls and placed a hands-free call to Detective Miller, the Cook County financial crimes investigator who had handled our office’s property fraud seminars. It rang five times before his sleep-thickened voice answered.
“Elise? It’s past ten. What’s going on? ”
“Miller, I’m driving north on ninety,” I said, keeping my eyes fixed on the taillights vanishing into the gray curtain of sleet. “Richard Vance just put an imposter on flight 1184 to Minneapolis under my name. She used a fraudulent paper driver’s license issued in Lombard this afternoon. I have the gate audit slip showing his personal cell number was used for the schedule override. ”
Miller exhaled slowly. “If she boarded an interstate commercial flight using forged state paper, that’s a federal transport issue, Elise. But unless she commits an overt felony after landing, TSA is going to treat it as a ticketing anomaly until business hours tomorrow. Where is she going? ”
“North Shore Trust in Duluth,” I said, turning the wheel hard as a semi-truck threw a wave of brown slush across my hood. “Clara left an asset disclosure in a sealed probate locker, box 408. The unsealing is scheduled for eight o’clock tomorrow morning. The second key to the inner lock is welded inside Clara’s MedicAlert bracelet. Richard told me he buried that bracelet with her ashes. The woman on that plane was wearing it in seat 2A. ”
“Listen to me,” Miller warned, his tone shifting into the cold caution of a veteran cop. “You cannot intercept an identity fraud suspect by yourself. If you try to drag her out of a bank lobby, local police will arrest you on the spot. Call the Duluth precinct. Let them send a squad car to the bank at eight. ”
“If Duluth police show up without a formal warrant, the bank freezes the lobby and postpones the inspection,” I told him. “Under Minnesota probate code, if an estate inspection is contested or unresolved after ninety days, full custodial control defaults to the surviving spouse. That’s Richard. The minute the box is locked under a police hold, Richard petitions the probate court as next of kin to take physical custody of the contents. That box holds the ledger showing he siphoned two million dollars from Clara’s trust accounts while she was dying. He wants the dispute. He wants the freeze. ”