Chapter 4

The scene at the cemetery devolved into chaos. Officer Davis was on his radio, calling for backup. Detectives arrived. Yellow tape was strung up around the graves. My relatives were being questioned one by one, their faces a mixture of shock, confusion, and for some, like my uncle Robert, pure terror.

I was sitting in the back of a police car with a blanket wrapped around my shoulders, playing the part of the traumatized victim. I kept Alex close to me, letting him lean against my side. He was quiet, his small face pale with shock.

They questioned me, of course. I stuck to my story. I had a horrible nightmare. I felt a deep, unexplainable certainty that something was wrong. I was just a hysterical, grieving daughter whose intuition turned out to be horrifyingly correct. They couldn't prove otherwise.

The focus quickly shifted to Mr. Henderson, the funeral director. His story crumbled under questioning within minutes. He confessed that David Miller had paid him ten thousand dollars in cash to sign fraudulent death certificates and stage the funeral. He claimed they said they were entering witness protection and needed to disappear for their own safety. It was a weak lie, and no one bought it.

My uncle Robert was taken in for more intensive questioning about his financial ties to my father. The perfect, somber funeral had turned into a public spectacle and a criminal investigation.

I watched it all unfold from the car window, a cold satisfaction settling in my chest. This was better than I had hoped.

Later that evening, Officer Davis drove me and Alex back to our house. The relatives had been told to leave. The house was an official part of the investigation now.

"Are you going to be okay here tonight, Sarah?" Davis asked, his voice gentle. He was young, but he had kind eyes. In my first life, I never even noticed him.

"I... I don' t know," I whispered, looking at the house. "Everything is a lie."

"We' re going to figure this out," he assured me. "We' re putting out an alert for your parents. David and Mary Miller. They' ve committed a serious crime."

I just nodded, looking down at my hands.

"There' s also the matter of the funeral costs," he added, looking uncomfortable. "And the... compensation for what Henderson did. The town prosecutor is talking to him. Given the circumstances, the fraud, the emotional distress... you and your brother are entitled to a significant settlement from him."

This was it. The opening I was waiting for.

In my past life, I was too overwhelmed to think about money. I just went to work. This time, I knew better. I needed capital.

"Money?" I asked, my voice small and broken. "I can' t even think about that right now. My parents... they' re alive? But they left us?" I started to cry again, perfectly timed tears of confusion and betrayal.

"I know it' s a lot to take in," Davis said sympathetically. "But you and Alex need to be taken care of. You' re only eighteen. Henderson has assets. The prosecutor is going to make sure he pays for what he did."

Over the next few days, my act continued. I was the fragile older sister, trying to hold things together for my little brother. The town was buzzing with the news. The Millers weren' t dead. They were fugitives.

Uncle Robert was released, but his reputation was in tatters. He avoided me like the plague. The prosecutor, eager to make an example of Henderson and close the high-profile case, moved fast.

A week later, I was called into an office downtown. The prosecutor, a stern-looking woman, and Officer Davis were there.

"Mr. Henderson has agreed to a settlement to avoid a harsher sentence," the prosecutor said, sliding a document across the table. "He will pay you and your brother fifty thousand dollars."

Fifty thousand dollars. In my first life, I had worked for years to save a fraction of that for Alex' s college fund. Now, it was being handed to me.

I looked at the paper, then up at them, my eyes wide. "But... what if my parents come back? What if they want the money?"

"This money is for you and your brother," the prosecutor said firmly. "For the damages you' ve suffered. What your parents did was abandon you. They have no claim to this."

I knew why the money came through so fast. It wasn' t just about justice for me. It was about pressure. News of the settlement would get out. David and Mary, wherever they were hiding, would hear about it. They would know that their "grieving daughter" was not only a problem but was now a fifty-thousand-dollar problem. They would know I was the reason their perfect plan had a massive, public hole in it.

I signed the papers.

The money was in my bank account the next day.

I sat on the floor of my bedroom, looking at the bank statement. Fifty thousand dollars. It was my seed money. My war chest.

I knew David and Mary would be furious. They thought they had left me with nothing but debt and a child to raise. They thought I would be crushed under the weight of it all. They never imagined I would turn their own funeral into a payday.

They wanted me gone. They wanted me silent. The speed of the settlement told me they had likely been contacted by Henderson or one of the other co-conspirators. They had probably approved the payment, desperate to make me go away, to stop me from digging any deeper.

Too late.

I wasn' t just digging. I was planting a bomb. And I had just bought the fuse.

My mind was already working, planning the next step. The house. The land. The future.

I looked at the bank statement again and smiled, a real smile this time.

"You wanted to get rid of me, Mom, Dad," I whispered to the empty room. "You' re going to have to pay a lot more than this."