Chapter 3 - The Faded Photograph
I stared at the gold pocket watch until my vision blurred with tears.
My father was a union carpenter. He had worked himself to the bone to provide for us. When he was killed crossing a dark intersection in the rain, the police told my mother there were no witnesses. We lost our home three months later.
“Vivienne’s father?” I choked out, tracing the cracked glass. “Arthur Ashford? Why would a billionaire have a life insurance policy on a carpenter?”
“That is exactly what I intend to find out,” Marco said, pulling a dark wool coat over his suit. “Vivienne’s family has been pushing for this marriage for a year. Their shipping company is quietly drowning in debt. They needed my capital. I suspected they were hiding financial ruin, but this...” He gestured to the watch. “This is something much darker.”
He handed me a folded slip of paper.
“Take tomorrow off. Go to this address at noon. It’s an archiving facility my uncle owns. I pulled the Ashford family’s old financial boxes from storage.”
I walked home that night holding the velvet box so tightly my knuckles ached.
When I unlocked the door to our small apartment, my mother was asleep in her recliner, my framed nursing diploma resting on her lap. I draped a blanket over her, my heart aching with a fierce, protective love. I wasn’t just fighting for my dignity anymore. I was fighting for our past.
At noon the next day, I stood in front of a heavy steel door in the industrial district.
Marco was waiting inside, surrounded by stacks of dusty cardboard boxes. He looked out of place in his tailored suit amidst the grime, but his focus was razor-sharp.
“I went through the corporate filings,” Marco said, handing me a faded manila folder. “Arthur Ashford didn’t just collect a life insurance payout when your father died. He absorbed a deed.”
I opened the folder. Inside was a black-and-white photograph from the 1990s.
It was my father, wearing his tool belt, standing in front of a sprawling, half-finished brick estate. Standing next to him, shaking his hand, was a young Arthur Ashford.
“My father helped build the Ashford estate,” I said, recognizing the arched windows of the mansion where I had just spent three years scrubbing floors.
“He didn’t just build it, Claire,” Marco corrected gently. “According to the original zoning permits, your father owned the land. He bought it at a county auction for pennies before the neighborhood was developed. Arthur Ashford partnered with him to build the estate.”
I felt the air leave my lungs. “If my father owned the land, why did my mother and I get evicted when he died?”
Before Marco could answer, his cell phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen, his expression darkening instantly.
May you like
He held the phone up so I could hear. It was a voicenote from Vivienne.
“Marco, darling, I know you’re upset. But if you’re looking into the Bennett girl’s father, you should know her precious mother isn’t as innocent as she claims. Ask her what she sold me the night her husband died.”
