Chapter 5: The Solicitor on Fenwick Street
Rose showed the message to Arthur without a word.
He read it, set the phone down, and looked at Eleanor.
"How quickly can Victoria move?" Rose asked.
"Faster than most people expect," Eleanor said.
"She has been managing this family's affairs for six years.
She knows every account, every contact, every pressure point." A pause.
"She learned from her mother."
Arthur was already on his feet.
"Then we move tonight.
Not tomorrow.
Tonight."
They left the restaurant together, Eleanor's hand tucked inside Rose's arm.
The evening air was cool.
The street was ordinary — taxis, a couple walking a dog, a newsagent pulling down his shutters.
Nothing that looked like a threat.
That did not mean there was none.
The attorney's name on Arthur's card was Patricia Hale.
She answered on the second ring.
"Arthur," she said.
"I wondered when you would finally call."
"You knew about this?" Rose asked.
"Arthur told me about the letter three years ago," Patricia said.
"I told him that without the audio recordings and a living witness, it would be very difficult to proceed.
I told him to call me when something changed." A brief pause.
"I assume something has changed."
"Significantly," Arthur said.
"Come to my office.
I will be there in forty minutes."
Patricia Hale's office was on the fourth floor of a narrow building on Fenwick Street, the kind of office that had good carpet and no reception desk after hours and smelled faintly of old paper and strong coffee.
She was in her late fifties, compact and precise, and she shook Rose's hand the way someone shakes a hand when they have already decided to take the case.
"Tell me everything," she said.
"From the beginning."
Rose told her.
Arthur filled in the gaps.
Eleanor sat beside Rose and did not let go of her hand.
When they finished, Patricia sat back and looked at the items spread across her desk — the photograph, the discharge record, Diane's letter, the USB drive.
"The letter and the recordings are strong," she said.
"The discharge record supports the timeline.
The bracelet and the photograph establish identity in a way that will be very hard to argue against." She looked at Rose.
"We will need a DNA test.
That is non-negotiable.
It will be the first thing Victoria's team demands, and we want to demand it first."
"Fine," Rose said.
"The solicitor Arthur mentioned — the one who drew up the inheritance document.
His name is Gerald Foss.
He is still practicing on this street, as it happens.
Two buildings down." Patricia's expression was carefully neutral.
"I have had professional dealings with Gerald Foss.
He is not a good man, but he is a careful one.
He will have kept records.
Careful men always keep records, because records are leverage."
"Can we compel him to produce them?" Eleanor asked.
"We can," Patricia said.
"But I would rather approach him before we file anything.
A man like Foss, when he understands that the recordings exist and that we are prepared to go to court, may decide that cooperation is preferable to exposure." She paused.
"He is seventy-three years old.
He does not want to end his career in a courtroom."
Rose's phone buzzed again.
She looked at the screen.
Same unknown number.
This time a photograph.
It showed the exterior of a building Rose recognized — the block of flats where she rented a room.
Taken recently.
The timestamp read forty minutes ago.
Her chest tightened.
She turned the phone to show Patricia.
Patricia looked at it for three full seconds.
Then she picked up her own phone.
"I am calling a colleague who handles harassment and intimidation cases," she said.
"This number needs to be traced tonight.
And you —" she looked at Rose — "are not going back to that flat."
"I have nowhere else to go," Rose said.
Eleanor's hand tightened around hers.
"Yes you do," Eleanor said.
"You are coming home with me."
Victoria would have anticipated that.
Rose could see it in the way Arthur's expression shifted — the same thought crossing his face.
Eleanor's house was the obvious place.
Victoria knew it too.
"Is your home secure?" Patricia asked Eleanor.
"It has a gate, a security system, and a housekeeper who has worked for me for thirty years and does not open the door to anyone she does not recognize," Eleanor said.
"It will do for tonight."
Patricia nodded.
"Go.
I will have something ready for Gerald Foss by nine tomorrow morning." She looked at Rose one more time.
"I want you to understand what the next few weeks will look like.
Victoria will fight this.
She will fight it hard and she will fight it without restraint.
There will be moments when it feels like she is winning."
"Will she win?" Rose asked.
Patricia looked at the USB drive on her desk.
"Not if that recording says what Arthur tells me it says," she said.
"No.
She will not win."
Rose stood up.
She picked up the hospital bracelet from the desk and held it for a moment before sliding it carefully into her jacket pocket.
Outside on Fenwick Street, a car moved slowly past the building.
It did not stop.
But it did not accelerate either.
Arthur watched it until it turned the corner.
"Tomorrow," he said quietly, "everything changes."
May you like
He was right.
But not in the way any of them expected.
