Chapter 7 - The Anonymous Letter
Two weeks later, the morning mail brought something unexpected among the standard utility bills and catalog flyers—a heavy, cream-colored envelope bearing no return address, addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Mark Vance in shaky, unfamiliar handwriting.
I opened it in the kitchen while Mark was upstairs in his home office. Inside was a single sheet of vintage stationary and a faded black-and-white photograph.
I looked down at the photo, and my breath caught in my throat.
It was a picture of a much younger Diane Vance—perhaps in her late twenties—holding a baby swaddled in a hospital blanket. But standing beside her wasn't Mark’s father. It was a man I had never seen before, a man with striking, dark features and a cold, calculating smile.
On the vintage stationary, a short message was scrawled in ink:
*“You think Diane built the Vance empire on her own? Ask her about the night of November 14th, and who really inherited the original fortune before the bodies were buried. You haven't won yet.”*
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My hands began to shake slightly. I flipped the photo over. Stamped on the back was the name of a private maternity clinic in upstate New York, dated three years before Mark was even born.
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