Chapter 2 - THE ACCIDENT BEFORE THE BOARD MEETING
Rebecca had never trusted Lydia with the company.
James once believed the tension between them came from personality. Rebecca was analytical and cautious. Lydia was forceful, emotional and accustomed to being obeyed.
The real conflict began after Rebecca inherited Holloway Medical Systems from her father.
The company manufactured hospital-monitoring equipment and controlled several valuable medical patents. Rebecca inherited fifty-two percent of its voting shares. James received no automatic authority through their marriage.
He never resented that.
Lydia did.
She repeatedly reminded James that his wife controlled a company carrying his family name. She told him Rebecca treated him like an employee instead of a husband.
James ignored her at first.
Then Lydia began presenting investment proposals.
She wanted the company to purchase a chain of private rehabilitation centers owned by her brother, Victor. Rebecca reviewed the financial records and rejected the deal. The centers were deeply in debt, several faced regulatory investigations, and millions of dollars could not be accounted for.
Lydia called the decision a personal insult.
Rebecca called it fraud.
Two weeks before the hit-and-run, Rebecca discovered that someone had submitted the acquisition documents again using her digital signature.
The board believed she had approved them.
Rebecca immediately ordered an independent audit.
She told James only part of what she found.
“There are forged authorizations inside the company,” she said one night. “Someone close to us is involved.”
James asked whether she suspected his mother.
Rebecca hesitated.
That hesitation angered him.
“My mother may be difficult, but she would never steal from us.”
“I hope you’re right.”
He remembered those words now as police opened Lydia’s briefcase inside a hospital conference room.
The emergency transfer agreement granted James control of Rebecca’s voting shares while she remained medically incapacitated.
His signature already appeared on the final page.
James stared at it.
“I never signed this.”
The detective beside him looked up. “You’re certain?”
“I’ve never seen it before.”
The signature was convincing. Even the slight upward angle of the final letter matched his handwriting.
Attached to the document was a medical declaration stating Rebecca had little chance of meaningful recovery.
Her doctors had written no such thing.
The detective turned another page.
“If this transfer became active, what could you do with her shares?”
“Approve acquisitions. Replace directors. Sell company assets.”
“And would your mother have influence over your decisions?”
James looked through the conference-room window. Emma sat outside with a hospital social worker, clutching her stuffed rabbit.
“Until today, I would have said yes.”
The hospital pharmacist entered with preliminary information about the syringe.
The liquid was not part of Rebecca’s treatment. It contained a concentrated medication that could cause a fatal cardiac emergency in a patient weakened by surgery.
If administered through the IV, Rebecca’s death might have appeared to be a complication from her injuries.
James gripped the edge of the table.
“My mother tried to kill my wife.”
“The laboratory must confirm the result,” the detective said. “But we are treating this as an attempted homicide.”
Lydia continued denying everything.
She claimed she found the syringe near Rebecca’s bed. She said she picked it up only because Emma had entered the room and she feared the child might touch it.
The explanation failed immediately.
Hospital cameras showed Lydia entering a restricted medication room ten minutes earlier using an employee access card.
The card belonged to a nurse named Sandra Cole.
Sandra had not reported it missing.
Police found her in the staff parking garage attempting to leave before the end of her shift.
Under questioning, she admitted Lydia paid her to provide updates on Rebecca’s condition. She insisted she did not know Lydia intended to administer anything.
Then investigators searched her phone.
They found a message from Lydia sent the previous night:
If she wakes before the vote, everything is over.
James read the message twice.
“What vote?”
Rebecca’s independent audit was scheduled to be presented at an emergency board meeting the following morning.
If she remained unconscious, the emergency transfer agreement would place James in her seat.
If he voted with Lydia’s allies, the rehabilitation-center acquisition would be approved before investigators could examine the forged signatures.
Lydia believed James would obey her.
For most of his life, she had been right.
When he returned to Rebecca’s room, Emma was sitting beside the bed.
“She heard Grandma,” the child said.
James stopped.
“What?”
Emma pointed toward Rebecca.
“Mommy moved her fingers when Grandma talked.”
James hurried to the bed.
Rebecca’s hand remained still.
He called the nurse, who checked her reflexes and pupils. The response was small, but different from the previous examination.
Rebecca might have been partially aware.
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She might have heard Lydia standing over her.
And Lydia might have known Rebecca was close to waking.
