Chapter 8: The Box My Father Left
Patricia Hale's office was on the fourteenth floor of a building in downtown Dallas.
Clean lines, no clutter, a single window that looked out over the city.
She stood when I came in.
She was in her mid-fifties, with short gray hair and reading glasses pushed up on her head.
She shook my hand the way people do when they mean it.
"Sit down," she said.
"Coffee?"
"Please."
She poured two cups and set mine in front of me.
Then she opened a folder.
"Before we go through the documents, I want to tell you where we are.
The district attorney's office has been briefed.
They are treating the insurance policy as the most urgent matter — specifically the search records on Ryan's work device.
A detective named Solis will be reaching out to you today.
She handles financial crjmes with a secondary focus on domestic cases.
She's good."
"Okay."
"Gerald Holt brought the safety deposit box contents to my office yesterday afternoon.
I want to walk you through them with you present, because some of what's in here is going to be difficult."
She laid four documents on the desk between us.
The first was a copy of a birth certificate.
Robert Allen Greer.
Beaumont, Texas.
The second was a court record.
A fraud conviction from twelve years ago.
The name of the victim was a woman named Carol Simmons, age sixty-one.
She had lost her savings — two hundred and thirty thousand dollars — to a property investment scheme that Robert Greer had constructed and then dissolved.
I read the victim's name twice.
"He's done this before," I said.
"Carol Simmons was not the first.
We've identified two prior cases.
One in Louisiana, one in Mississippi.
Both women, both older, both widows or recently bereaved.
Both targeted through a trusted introduction — a neighbor, a church contact, a family friend." Patricia looked at me steadily.
"Your father was not naive, Emily.
He was manipulated by someone who had been practicing for years."
The third document was a property record.
A parcel of land in East Texas, registered in the name of a company called Greer Holdings LLC.
Purchased four years ago.
The purchase price was listed as three hundred and twelve thousand dollars.
"That money came from your father's estate," Patricia said.
"Routed through the fraudulent joint account.
Ryan bought land with your inheritance and registered it under a company name that traces back to his original identity."
"Can we get it back?"
"The land has already been flagged in the asset freeze.
Yes."
The fourth document was a photograph.
Older than the others — printed on paper that had gone slightly soft at the edges.
It showed a younger Ryan, maybe twenty-five, standing outside a courthouse.
Beside him was a woman in her sixties, her face turned slightly away from the camera.
She looked like she had been crying.
"Carol Simmons," I said.
"Yes.
We believe your father obtained this from the investigator he hired.
He kept it."
I looked at the photograph for a long time.
"He wanted me to see his face," I said.
"My father.
He wanted me to see what Ryan looked like when he was doing it to someone else."
Patricia didn't say anything.
She let that sit.
My phone buzzed.
A text from an unknown number: *You should ask your lawyer what happens to women who go up against people with resources.
Think carefully, Emily.*
I showed it to Patricia.
She read it.
Her expression didn't change.
"Forward that to Mr.
Crawford and to me.
That's a threat.
It goes into the file." She set the phone on the desk.
"He's scared.
Scared people make mistakes.
This is a mistake."
"He said last night that this wasn't over."
"He's right.
It isn't.
But not in the way he means." She closed the folder.
"Emily, I want to ask you something.
The woman, Diana.
She has two children with him.
She's been cooperating with us.
She's also in a difficult position financially — he was moving money through her accounts and she didn't fully understand what she was signing."
"She didn't know about me," I said.
"No.
She thought she was in a long-distance relationship with a man who traveled for work."
I thought about the photograph.
The birthday party.
The little girl with the candles.
"What does she need?"
Patricia looked at me carefully.
"Right now?
A lawyer.
Someone to help her separate her finances from his before the full freeze affects accounts she legitimately needs."
"Can your firm help her?"
"We can refer her."
"Do it," I said.
"She didn't do this to me.
He did."
Patricia made a note.
My phone buzzed again.
This time it was a number I recognized.
Ryan.
I declined the call.
Thirty seconds later, a voicemail appeared.
I pressed play and held the phone between us so Patricia could hear.
*Emily.
I know you're with your lawyer.
I know what they're telling you.
But there are things in that box that can hurt people who don't deserve to be hurt.
People close to you.
I'm asking you — as someone who loved you — to think about what you're starting before you can't stop it.
Call me back.*
The message ended.
Patricia reached over and pressed a button on her desk phone.
"Grace, can you come in?"
Her assistant appeared in the doorway.
"I need this voicemail documented and added to the file.
Mrs.
Bennett is going to forward it from her phone." Patricia looked at me.
"That's his second attempt to intimidate you in twelve hours.
The DA will want both."
I forwarded the voicemail.
"He said people close to me," I said.
"What does that mean?"
"It means he's looking for leverage he doesn't have." Patricia folded her hands on the desk.
"Emily.
I've been doing this for twenty-two years.
When someone starts making vague threats about unnamed people, it usually means they have nothing specific.
He's trying to make you hesitate."
"Is Lily safe?"
"She's with your sister.
He doesn't know where.
And frankly, threatening a child would be the worst thing he could do for his own case." She paused.
"But if you want, I can ask Mr.
Crawford to have someone watch your sister's address tonight."
"Yes.
Please."
She nodded and made another note.
I looked out the window at the city.
Somewhere out there, Ryan was in a car or a hotel room or a borrowed office, working his phone, calling in whatever he thought he had left.
He had threatened me twice before nine in the morning.
May you like
That meant he was running out of time and he knew it.
Good.
