PART 4 — THE BROTHER WHO ATTENDED MY FUNERAL
Nobody in Allison Pierce's office spoke.
Across the street, the black SUV remained parked beneath the streetlight.
Its headlights were off.
Its windows were too dark to see inside.
Yet I knew—with absolute certainty—that whoever was sitting behind that windshield wasn't there by accident.
Allison quietly closed the blinds.
"Don't look at them again."
I turned toward her.
"Why?"
"Because now they know we've noticed them."
She picked up her phone and sent a brief text message.
Within two minutes, two investigators entered through the back door.
One of them placed a folder on the conference table.
"I've already asked them to run the plate number."
He looked at me.
"If they're professionals, it's probably stolen."
"Then why stay?"
He gave a grim smile.
"To remind you they're watching."
Hannah's hands trembled.
"I'm sorry."
I immediately looked at her.
"For what?"
"This is happening because of me."
I knelt beside her chair.
"No."
"This is happening because someone committed crimes."
"You survived them."
"That isn't something to apologize for."
Tears filled her eyes.
For the first time since I'd found her beneath the overpass, she leaned into my shoulder and quietly cried.
Not from fear.
From exhaustion.
Four years of carrying the weight alone had finally become too heavy.
An hour later, one of Allison's investigators returned.
"The SUV belongs to a rental company."
"No surprise."
He nodded.
"But we found something else."
He handed us several photographs.
Security cameras from downtown.
The same SUV.
Different days.
Different locations.
Outside the rehabilitation center.
Near the homeless shelter.
Across from the public library.
Outside the church kitchen.
The earliest image was dated...
Almost eighteen months earlier.
I stared at Hannah.
"They've been following you for a year and a half."
She whispered,
"I thought I was invisible."
Someone had gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure she never disappeared from their sight.
My phone buzzed.
It was Melissa, my executive assistant.
"Nathan..."
Her voice sounded uncertain.
"Luke came to headquarters."
I stopped walking.
"When?"
"This morning."
"He said he wanted to welcome you home."
I almost laughed.
"He didn't know I'd already returned."
"I know."
"He seemed surprised when I told him you hadn't come into the office."
"What did he do?"
"He asked where you were staying."
I exchanged a glance with Allison.
"What did you tell him?"
"Nothing."
"I said I didn't know."
"Good."
Melissa hesitated.
"Nathan..."
"What?"
"He also asked whether anyone had contacted you about your father's estate."
My pulse quickened.
"My father's estate?"
"Yes."
"He specifically mentioned old legal files."
The call ended.
Allison immediately looked at me.
"He's worried."
"About what?"
"He doesn't know which documents you've found."
That evening, we drove to the county archives.
If forged guardianship papers existed, there had to be more.
A clerk brought out six storage boxes connected to my family's legal history.
Most contained ordinary paperwork.
Tax records.
Building permits.
Insurance policies.
Then Robert suddenly stopped.
"Nathan."
He held up a thin manila envelope.
"This shouldn't be here."
Inside was a death certificate.
My death certificate.
I stared at the page.
Name:
Nathan James Ellis
Status:
Presumed deceased.
Date:
Three years earlier.
Cause:
Industrial accident overseas.
The room spun.
"What..."
I whispered.
"...is this?"
Robert looked equally stunned.
"I have absolutely no idea."
Allison carefully took the document.
"This was officially filed."
"That's impossible."
"I'm standing here."
She nodded.
"I know."
"But according to county records..."
"...you died three years ago."
Everything suddenly made terrible sense.
No one overseas had ever contacted me.
No insurance company.
No government office.
Nothing.
Because I had spent those years working under my corporate passport and international contracts.
Meanwhile...
Someone back home had quietly declared me dead.
Dead men don't own houses.
Dead men don't question property transfers.
Dead men don't protect their wives.
Hannah covered her mouth.
"They told everyone..."
She couldn't finish.
"What did they tell everyone?"
She looked at me with tears streaming down her face.
"They said you died."
Silence.
"They held a memorial service."
My heart stopped.
"What?"
"I wasn't allowed to attend."
"Luke said I was too unstable."
"He told everyone I was receiving psychiatric treatment."
I felt physically sick.
"There was..."
She swallowed.
"...a funeral."
The archive clerk quietly excused himself.
No one else in the room spoke.
Finally I asked,
"Who attended?"
Hannah closed her eyes.
"Almost everyone."
"Your employees."
"Your friends."
"Our neighbors."
She hesitated.
"Luke gave the eulogy."
I couldn't breathe.
My own brother had stood before hundreds of mourners...
And buried a man who was still alive.
Allison immediately called the county registrar.
Twenty minutes later she hung up.
Her face was colder than I'd ever seen it.
"The death certificate wasn't a clerical mistake."
"It was supported by sworn affidavits."
"Signed by whom?"
She looked directly at me.
"Luke."
"And Claire."
I laughed once.
A short, empty sound.
"So they killed me..."
"...with paperwork."
She nodded.
"Legally speaking..."
"...yes."
Just as we prepared to leave the archives, Allison's phone rang.
She answered.
Listened silently.
Then her expression changed.
"What happened?"
I asked.
"Our investigators entered Luke's financial records."
"And?"
"They discovered he isn't moving money out of the country."
I frowned.
"So where's it going?"
She slowly turned her laptop toward us.
A series of wire transfers appeared.
Millions of dollars.
All flowing into one account.
The account holder's name made Hannah gasp.
It wasn't Luke.
It wasn't Claire.
It belonged to...
William Ellis.
My father.
The same father who had supposedly died five years earlier.
The same father whose signature had been forged.
The same father whose identity had somehow remained active in the banking system.
I stared at the screen.
Only one thought echoed through my mind.
Either someone had stolen my dead father's identity...
May you like
Or the man we buried five years ago...
Wasn't the man everyone believed him to be.
