“You can’t prove that,” he hissed.
“Oh, I can,” Marcus said coolly. “The signature analysis is already in. And these…” He pulled out the bank statements. “This forgery trail leads straight to your personal shell company in the Caymans. It’s a bad look.”
My mother’s face drained of all color. “Victor? Victor, what is he talking about? A shell company?”
“He stole from Grandpa’s estate for years, Mom,” I said, my voice softening as I looked at her. “He’s been bleeding you all dry. You married a thief.”
That’s when Victor lunged. He lunged across the table, scattering plates and glasses, his face a mask of primal rage.
But Marcus was ready. He stepped between us, holding up a hand. “I’d think twice about that, Mr. Wallace,” he said. “Assaulting a property owner in her own home is a felony. And you already have one assault charge pending from two days ago.” He tapped his own cheek, a clear reference to mine.
Victor froze. The business partners were all standing, backing away.
I stepped closer, around the table, until I was whispering, just loud enough for him and my mother to hear.
“You took everything from me once, Victor. My peace. My home. My mother. Now, I’m taking it all back.”
His jaw clenched. “You think you’ve won?”
“Oh,” I said, pulling out the official eviction notice and placing it on his plate. “I haven’t even started. You have 24 hours to vacate. Tenant.”
The Confession
I didn’t hear from them for the rest of the night. The next day, I received a call from my mother. She was using a burner phone. She wanted to meet, privately, at a diner near the old train station.
I almost didn’t go. But curiosity, and a small, stupid flicker of hope, made me go.
When I arrived, she was sitting in a booth, looking broken. Her eyes were red, her hands trembling. She looked, for the first time in a decade, like my mother.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, her voice a raw whisper.
“I tried, Mom. For years. Would you have believed me?”
She shook her head, a tear dropping into her coffee. “No. I… I didn’t want to. I thought he loved me. He told me you were ungrateful. That you were jealous. He told me Grandpa left everything to him because you abandoned us.”
“He lied, Mom,” I said, my voice flat. “He used you.”
“I know,” she whispered. Tears streamed down her face. “I know. I went through his private files last night, after you left. You were right. You were right about everything.”
Then, she did something I never expected. She slid a small flash drive across the table.
“What’s this?”
“I… I confronted him,” she said, her voice shaking. “I recorded his confession. He… he admitted to it all.” She took a ragged breath. “He admitted how he got Arthur’s signature on all those forged papers. How he… how he poisoned your grandfather. Slowly. Over the last year. Just enough to make him ‘confused’ and ‘sick.’ Just enough to gain control of the estate before he finally… passed.”
I froze. The diner sounds faded. My blood ran cold.
He didn’t just steal. He killed him. He murdered my grandfather.
“Yes,” she said, reading my face. “And he was planning to transfer everything into a shell company this week. To flee the country. You stopped him just in time.”
For the first time in eleven years, I saw genuine remorse in her eyes. “I’ll testify,” she whispered, pushing the drive toward me. “I… I have to make this right. I can’t bring Arthur back, but I can… I can stop this. I want to stop him.”
My anger didn’t vanish. But in that moment, it found a new, sharper purpose. Revenge was no longer about making Victor suffer. It was about giving Grandpa justice.
UPDATE (Six Months Later)
Hey, Reddit. It’s been half a year since my life imploded and reformed. The support I got from my original post was… unexpected. People DMed me with legal advice, support, and a lot of (justified) rage on my behalf.
So, here’s what happened.
The following week, the police—armed with my mother’s flash drive, the original deed, Marcus’s forensic accounting, and a new warrant—arrested Victor. They did it publicly, just as he was attempting to check in for a flight to Zurich at JFK. The fraud, the forgery… those were just the appetizers. The main charge was first-degree murder.
The flash drive was the nail in his coffin. A 45-minute, rage-fueled confession to my mother (who he thought was still on his side), detailing the specific un-traceable, slow-acting poison he’d used, how he’d bribed the nurse, and how he’d planned to get rid of my mother next.
