Chapter 10 - The Dead Woman
The emergency hearing began at nine the next morning.
Vivienne arrived in cream-colored designer clothes.
Perfect hair.
Perfect makeup.
Perfect posture.
She looked like the woman magazines had spent two years calling a devoted mother.
Mara wore the same navy dress Rachel had loaned her.
She looked exhausted.
But she stood straight.
Judge Pike did not preside.
Once Benjamin submitted the financial connection, Pike suddenly recused himself.
A different judge took the bench.
Judge Elaine Foster.
She looked at everyone like she had no patience for theater.
That helped.
Vivienne’s attorney went first.
He called Mara emotionally unstable.
Benjamin stood.
“Objection.”
“Sustained.”
He called me reckless.
He described the gala as a planned ambush.
Then he produced the most poisonous document yet.
A death certificate.
Mara Ellis.
Dead.
Four years ago.
Judge Foster stared at it.
Mara stared harder.
I whispered, “What the hell?”
Vivienne’s lawyer spoke calmly.
“Mr. Hart legally married my client after Ms. Ellis was declared deceased.”
Benjamin immediately rose.
“Ms. Ellis and Mr. Hart were never legally married.”
Correct.
We had been engaged.
But that wasn’t the real issue.
The real issue was how a living woman had a death certificate.
Judge Foster leaned forward.
“Ms. Ellis, were you aware that you were legally declared dead?”
Mara let out one stunned laugh.
“No, Your Honor.”
“You appear remarkably alive.”
Even Benjamin almost smiled.
The judge didn’t.
She ordered a recess.
During the break, Benjamin pulled us into a side room.
“This changes everything.”
“How?”
“Vivi didn’t just hide Mara.”
He put the death certificate on the table.
“She erased her.”
I looked at the signature.
A county medical examiner.
Dr. Andrew Cole.
Benjamin frowned.
“I know that name.”
“Who is he?”
“He was on Briar Hill’s board.”
Mara went pale.
Another connection.
I studied the form.
Cause of death:
Motor vehicle accident.
A crash I remembered.
A burned car found outside Denver.
The police had told me identification was inconclusive.
Vivienne later said Mara might have been inside.
I had refused to believe it.
Months later, her supposed letters started arriving from Mexico.
Enough confusion to make me stop asking the right questions.
Benjamin tapped the certificate.
“There’s a digital authorization code.”
“And?”
“It identifies whoever requested the certified copy.”
He entered the number into a government portal available to attorneys.
A name appeared.
We all stared.
Not Vivienne.
Not Cecilia.
Daniel Hart.
My mouth went dry.
“I didn’t request that.”
Benjamin looked worried.
“The authentication used your corporate credentials.”
Mara stared at me.
I saw something in her face I hadn’t seen before.
Doubt.
I shook my head.
“Mara, I swear.”
She stepped backward.
“I want to believe you.”
“You should.”
“I believed everyone once.”
That hurt because she was right.
Benjamin’s phone buzzed.
He read the message.
Then looked at me.
“Daniel, company security just checked the login records.”
“What did they find?”
He turned the screen.
The death-certificate request had been sent from my office.
At 11:42 p.m.
On a night four years earlier.
May you like
A night when I had been in that office.
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