Twilight Romance: Flash Marriage to Mature Tycoon – Episode 51
The celebration ended with lanterns still glowing and dinner untouched. Jocelyn listened as the community organizer explained that a court officer had posted a temporary freeze on the trust house. Summer stood on the porch beside an attorney and a man claiming rights through Harry’s late father.
Ray wanted to leave immediately, but Jocelyn asked the organizer to photograph every page first. A midnight confrontation would give Summer the scene she wanted. Preserving the documents mattered more than arriving in anger.
The petition alleged that Jocelyn’s first husband had paid for half the house before his death. It further claimed he had fathered another child before marrying her, creating an heir with an interest equal to Harry’s. A copied birth certificate supported the allegation.
Jocelyn felt the accusation as both fraud and desecration. Her late husband had been young, poor, and open about his life. She could not prove every moment before they met, but nothing in his letters suggested another child.
Harry arrived with Caleb after reading the filing. He was less concerned about property than the possibility of a sibling hidden for decades. Jocelyn refused to dismiss his uncertainty merely because Summer had introduced it.
“We verify the facts,” she said. “We do not let her decide what we believe.” Ray watched mother and son face the claim without allowing fear to become certainty.
The next morning, they traveled to the hometown courthouse. Reporters crowded the steps, summoned by Summer before Jocelyn received the papers. The alleged heir remained hidden beneath a coat and cap.
Summer announced that she was protecting a forgotten family member from Astor intimidation. Jocelyn asked why a dispute involving her first husband concerned Ray’s ex-wife. Summer replied that injustice concerned anyone brave enough to expose it.
Inside, Jocelyn’s lawyer challenged the emergency order. The house had belonged to her parents before her marriage, and county records showed no payment from her husband. Even if another heir existed, he could not inherit property the deceased never owned.
Summer’s attorney presented a handwritten agreement claiming Jocelyn’s father transferred half the house in exchange for repairs. The signature resembled her father’s but appeared on paper produced years after his death.
The judge preserved the freeze long enough for forensic review, refusing to decide authenticity from the bench. Community programs could continue, but no permanent transfer or renovation could proceed. Summer smiled as though delay itself were victory.
Jocelyn requested independent testing of every document. Harry asked the claimant to complete a DNA test. The man looked toward Summer before agreeing, a glance that revealed dependence rather than family certainty.
Outside, Ray offered no threats. He stated publicly that Astor Group would not influence the court and that Jocelyn’s family deserved verifiable answers. His restraint denied Summer the image of a billionaire crushing a powerless claimant.
The claimant approached Harry away from the cameras. He apologized for the attention and said he had grown up believing his father abandoned him. Harry asked what memory connected him to the man they supposedly shared.
The answer came from a typed biography supplied by Summer’s investigator. He knew dates and workplaces but no private detail. Harry recognized facts copied from the letters stolen earlier.
Still, he agreed to the DNA test. Jocelyn supported him because uncertainty could not be healed by ridicule. The claimant’s cooperation would either establish a relationship or expose whoever had manufactured one.
Ray arranged a laboratory only after both parties selected it independently. Chain-of-custody observers represented Harry, the claimant, and the court. No Astor employee handled the samples.
That evening, Jocelyn found the claimant alone near the motel. He admitted Summer had paid his travel and legal fees. He insisted that financial help did not make the story false.
Jocelyn asked who first told him Harry’s father was his own. The man hesitated before naming a private genealogy service that contacted him weeks earlier. He had never searched for the family himself.
When Jocelyn requested the service’s name, he showed her an email. The company address matched the shell corporation Summer used in the forged property sale—and the claimant realized he might have been deceived too.