She Threw His Little Girl From the Balcony—But the Maid Caught Her, and What the Father Discovered Next Destroyed His Marriage

Julian read the note once.

Then again.

"This is wrong," he said.

The trust belonged to Lily's late mother, Ava Mercer. Before she died, Ava placed her forty percent ownership in Mercer Biotech into a trust for Lily. Julian managed the shares until Lily turned eighteen, but the ownership itself belonged to his daughter.

Vivian had always pretended not to care.

"I have my own money," she used to say.

Maya now remembered how often Vivian asked whether Lily's trust could be changed.

Julian called his private estate attorney, not Conrad Pike.

At three in the morning, a sleepy woman named Rachel Kim answered on the second ring.

"Do not send me anything by email," Rachel said after hearing the situation. "Bring the documents to my office. And Julian, listen carefully. Conrad Pike requested a certified copy of Ava's trust six weeks ago."

Julian's hand tightened around the phone.

"Why?"

"He said you authorized a review."

"I did not."

Rachel was silent.

"Then you may have a much bigger problem."

By sunrise, they were in Rachel's office downtown. She compared Darren's copy with the original trust.

Page nineteen was different.

In the original, if Lily died before receiving her shares, the ownership transferred to the Ava Mercer Children's Foundation.

In Darren's copy, the shares transferred to Julian's surviving spouse.

Vivian.

"This page is forged," Rachel said. "The font is slightly different, and Ava's initials are copied. But to someone who did not know the document, it looks convincing."

Julian stared at the fake page.

"Forty percent of Mercer Biotech is worth almost eighty million dollars."

Maya felt her stomach turn.

Eighty million dollars.

A five-year-old child.

A balcony.

Rachel pulled another file from her cabinet.

"There is something else. Conrad filed a notice with the corporate records office last week claiming the trust had a revised contingent beneficiary. I rejected it because he did not have your signature."

Julian stood so quickly his chair rolled backward.

"He knew."

"He either knew," Rachel said, "or he helped create it."

Julian's phone rang.