My Best Friend Left Me A Usb Drive After He Died. 60 Days Later, I Watched It And Realized My Wife Is Trying To Kill Me. What Should I Do?

The Surveillance Trap

Over the next week, I became an actor in my own life. I smiled at Vanessa over breakfast and took the fake vitamins, grimacing like they tasted bad.

I complained about feeling tired. I let her fuss over me and suggest I see a doctor, all while Jake’s team worked.

The pills came back positive for digitalis, enough to cause heart problems or maybe death over time. The bank records were analyzed; Vanessa had stolen $230,000.

The insurance policies were confirmed forgeries, with my signature expertly faked. But we needed Torres.

Jake proposed a plan. We’d set up surveillance in my house, then I’d leave for what Vanessa thought was a weekend trip to visit my daughter from my first marriage who lived in Seattle.

Instead, I’d stay at a hotel nearby. If Marcus’s information was correct, Torres would make his move while I was supposedly gone.

“It’s risky,”

Jake warned.

“If something goes wrong—”

“Marcus risked his last weeks alive to protect me,”

I interrupted.

“I’m not walking away now.”

I told Vanessa I was flying to Seattle Friday morning. She seemed excited and encouraged me to stay the whole weekend to spend time with my daughter.

Kyle happened to drop by that Thursday night, which was unusual for him. They were both very solicitous and very concerned about my health.

Friday morning, I drove to the airport, parked, then took an Uber to a hotel 10 miles from my house. Jake had installed cameras in every room and hidden microphones.

We sat in a surveillance van watching. Vanessa moved fast; by noon, Torres was in my house.

Jake’s camera caught everything. Vanessa was handing him cash and showing him where my bedroom was.

They discussed how to make it look like a burglary. Torres was a large man, tattooed and cold-eyed.

He walked through my home like he was planning a military operation.

“We do it tomorrow night,”

Vanessa said.

“He’ll be tired from the trip back. Kyle will establish an alibi; he’ll be at a party with 50 witnesses.”

“I’ll be at dinner with my book club. Raymond, you come in through the back door around 10:00. Make it look like you were searching for valuables.”

“He surprised you. You panicked. Just make sure he doesn’t suffer. I don’t hate him; he’s just in the way.”

Torres laughed.

“Lady, for 200 grand, I’d make it look like an accident if you want.”

“No, it needs to be a burglary. Clean. Simple.”

I watched this woman I’d shared a bed with for three years discuss my murder like she was planning a dinner party. Jake’s hand was on my shoulder.

“Steady. We have enough,”

He said quietly.

“More than enough.”

Lights in the Dark

That afternoon, Jake contacted Detective Sarah Morrison, a homicide detective he’d worked with before. By evening, we had a plan.

Saturday evening, I returned from Seattle. Vanessa greeted me with a kiss and asked about my daughter.

I told her about the wonderful weekend I’d had and showed her photos my daughter had actually sent from Seattle. She didn’t know she was providing my alibi for a trap.

At 9:30, I told Vanessa I was exhausted and going to bed early. She encouraged it and brought me tea.

I poured it into the plant in my bedroom, then lay down in the dark. At 9:55, I heard the back door open and footsteps.

Torres was moving through my house. Jake had positioned plainclothes officers in the house next door and in a panel van on the street.

Detective Morrison was listening to every sound. Torres climbed the stairs.

I heard him breathing outside my bedroom door. My heart was pounding so hard I thought he might hear it.

The door opened. He was carrying a crowbar.

“Thomas Brennan,”

He said softly.

That’s when the lights blazed on and Detective Morrison stepped out of my closet with her gun drawn.

“Police! Don’t move!”

The next hours were chaos. Torres was arrested and read his rights, and officers flooded my house.

Vanessa arrived home to find police cars in the driveway. Her face when she saw me alive, standing in the living room, was shock, then calculation, then fear.

Kyle was picked up at his party. They brought him to the house in handcuffs.

In my study, Detective Morrison played the recordings for both of them. Vanessa’s face drained of color.

Kyle started crying, blaming his mother and saying it was all her idea. She sat silent and composed, even then.

“I want my lawyer,”

Was all she said.

Justice and a New Purpose

The next weeks unfolded like a nightmare in reverse. The DA charged Vanessa and Kyle with conspiracy to commit murder, attempted murder, insurance fraud, theft, and forgery.

Torres, facing life in prison, made a deal and testified about everything. He told how Vanessa had found him through connections from her past.

He explained how she’d paid him to kill her first husband, too, though they could never prove it. The investigation into Vanessa’s previous husbands was reopened.

What they found was chilling. Four marriages: two dead husbands, both with suspicious circumstances, and two divorces where she’d walked away with substantial settlements.

She was a predator, patient and methodical, and I’d been her next mark. Kyle’s testimony revealed that he’d known about his mother’s plans all along and had participated willingly for his share of the money.

He was 22 years old and had helped plan my murder as casually as someone might plan a vacation. At the trial six months later, Jake Rodriguez testified about his investigation.

The digitalis pills were entered as evidence and the audio recordings played for the jury. Marcus’s video was shown, his dying warning that had saved my life.

Vanessa showed no emotion until the verdict was read: guilty on all counts. Kyle wept and Torres just shrugged.

Vanessa got life without parole. Kyle got 25 years, and Torres got life plus 30.

After it was over, I went to visit Linda, Marcus’s widow. She was in her garden tending the roses Marcus had loved.

She was 70, elegant even in grief.

“He knew he was dying,”

She said quietly.

“But he spent his last good weeks protecting you instead of resting. That’s who he was.”

We stood there in the September sunshine, exactly one year after Marcus’s death, and I cried for my friend. I cried for the brother who’d saved my life when he couldn’t save his own.

I sold the house. I couldn’t live there anymore, couldn’t walk through rooms where my murder had been planned.

I bought a smaller place and donated most of Vanessa’s stolen money to cancer research in Marcus’s name. The rest I used to set up a foundation: the Marcus Webb Justice Fund.

It is dedicated to helping victims of financial elder abuse. My daughter flew in from Seattle and stayed with me for weeks.

We talked about my loneliness after her mother died and how I’d been vulnerable. We talked about how predators like Vanessa target people like me.

She helped me heal, but the real healing came from purpose. The foundation grew, and we helped dozens of people who’d been scammed by romantic partners, family members, and caregivers.

We funded investigations, provided legal support, and ran education programs. Every person we helped, I thought of Marcus.