The Perfect Husband's Darkest Secret novel · Chapter 18 of 24
Chapter 18: The Old Way
The old way was a sheet of paper.
Dalton laid it on the boardroom table on Tuesday morning and smiled.
"Directors," he said, "my wife's competency petition was dismissed on a technicality. Her proxy was not."
I stood at the foot of the table with the court order in my hand.
Ansel stood beside me.
My lawyer had her briefcase open.
"This is a proxy assignment signed on Sunday," Dalton said, and tapped the page. "Mrs. Reeve gave me her twenty-nine percent for the next twelve months. It was witnessed by her own sister."
Camille sat at his elbow, in gray again, with her hands folded.
She did not look at me.
"On Sunday I was in my kitchen with two detectives and my lawyer," I said.
"Then someone copied your signature."
"Someone did."
I laid a second sheet on the glass.
It was the photocopy of the pharmacy slip, with the pharmacist's statement stapled behind it.
I laid a third sheet beside it.
It was the transfer of my father's shares, in my own plain hand.
*Emmeline W. Reeve.* Upright, small, no flourishes.
"Madam Chair," I said. "Would you compare the three."
The chair of the board put on her glasses.
She slid the pharmacy slip next to Dalton's proxy.
On both pages the signature began with a big looping *J* that curled under the whole name.
The loop was the same, and so was the slant.
So was the little hook on the last *e*.
The director who had watched me fall asleep in the coat room leaned over and looked.
"They're identical," she said.
"Of course they are," said Dalton. "My wife signs the same way every time."
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