“The requests started in October.”
“They came on my letterhead forms, filled out in perfect order, with notarized signatures.”
“A man answered every phone call.”
“He said he was your husband, and that you were resting.”
“I left nine voicemails on the number he gave me.”
“I mailed fourteen letters.”
“Not one of them was answered by you.”
“By the tenth, I asked to meet you in person.”
“He said you were on bed rest.”
Judith straightened her glasses.
“Last Friday, I froze the account until I could verify you personally.”
“Your husband called me that afternoon at ten to five.”
Detective Ostrowski turned a page in her notebook.
“The notary who stamped all eleven requests is a man named Greg Dolan,” she said.
“He keeps no journal.”
“He is paid in cash by the same person every time.”
“And he has never once met you.”
I looked at the pages laid out in a row.
Eleven signatures.
Eleven long, confident loops.
“I would like to press charges,” I said.
“I understand,” Ostrowski said.
“But I need something more than paper.”
“A man who forg*s eleven documents will say they were your idea.”
“I need to hear him say it.”
“Your husband emailed my office twenty minutes ago.”
She turned her laptop around.
Dear Ms. Abbott, my wife will sign a document ratifying all prior distributions and releasing the trustee. She is under monitoring at Lakeview Medical Center and cannot travel. Please allow our notary, Mr. Dolan, to witness it there tomorrow at seven. Sincerely, Nicholas Keller.
“How does he know I’m being monitored?”
“I texted him this morning,” I said.
“Elaine asked me to keep it ordinary.”
“I wrote that I had a bl*od-pressure check at Lakeview at six-thirty tomorrow.”
“Then he’s coming,” she said.
“If you sign it, it erases eleven forg*ries.”
“And he’ll say whatever he has to say to get it.”
I laid one over my stomach, and Nora rolled against my palm.
It would be easy to say no, to let the police handle it somewhere far from my own body.
But I had spent the weekend being told I was dramatic, tired, confused.
I wanted him to look at me and say it out loud.
“What do you need me to do?” I asked.
