Chương 9
Eli did not.
“I know. They already told me.”
The technician smiled.
“Good.”
Nathan went first.
He rubbed the swab inside his cheek, sealed it as instructed, and signed the chain-of-custody form.
Then Eli.
Afterward, Nathan remained seated.
Teresa put on her coat.
“That’s it.”
Nathan looked at Eli.
“Do you want lunch?”
Teresa answered.
“No.”
Nathan nodded.
Eli closed his book.
“What kind?”
Teresa looked at him.
“Eli.”
“What? I’m hungry.”
Nathan almost smiled.
“There’s a diner two blocks away.”
Teresa looked suspicious.
“You eat at diners?”
“Yes.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I have.”
“When?”
Nathan thought.
“Recently?”
“That’s not an answer.”
Eli asked, “Do they have pancakes?”
Nathan looked at Teresa.
She sighed.
Twenty minutes later, Nathan Cross sat in a red vinyl booth under fluorescent lights while Eli poured too much syrup onto three pancakes.
Teresa drank coffee and watched Nathan like a parole officer.
Nathan ordered eggs.
He barely touched them.
Eli examined his suit.
“How much did that cost?”
“Eli,” Teresa said.
Nathan answered.
“Too much.”
“How much?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You remember.”
Nathan looked at Teresa.
She gave him no assistance.
“About six thousand.”
Eli stopped cutting his pancake.
“For clothes?”
“Yes.”
“That’s stupid.”
Nathan laughed.
“It might be.”
“You could buy a car.”
“A bad car.”
“Still.”
Teresa hid a smile behind her coffee.
Nathan took a sip of water.
“What did your mother tell you about me?”
Eli’s fork slowed.
Teresa said, “You don’t have to answer.”
“I know.”
Eli considered.
“She said you were funny when nobody important was around.”
Nathan looked down.
“She said you hated olives but pretended to like them at restaurants because you didn’t want chefs to think you were difficult.”
Teresa looked at Nathan.
“Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“That’s pathetic.”
“Yes.”
Eli continued.
“She said you snored.”
Nathan blinked.
“I do not.”
Teresa laughed.
Eli’s face brightened.
“She said you’d say that.”
Nathan shook his head.
For perhaps thirty seconds, they were simply four people in a diner, except one of them was absent and therefore present in every sentence.
Then Eli’s expression changed.
“She said you picked the company.”
Nathan stopped smiling.
Teresa looked down at her coffee.
Eli pushed a piece of pancake through syrup.
“She said she didn’t know if you picked it because you loved it more or because you were scared of your dad.”
Nathan folded his hands.
“What did she think?”
“She said it didn’t matter after a while.”
That hurt.
Nathan let it.
Eli ate another bite.
“Did you love her?”
Teresa looked up sharply.
Nathan did not avoid the question.
“Yes.”
“Then why didn’t you find her?”
The diner continued around them.
A server dropped silverware into a bin.
Two construction workers argued about the Knicks.
A baby cried near the front window.
Nathan stared at the table.
“I was angry. I was proud. And I believed something because believing it made my life easier.”
Eli frowned.
“That’s dumb.”
“Yes.”
“My mom was mad for nine years because you were dumb?”
Teresa whispered, “Eli.”
Nathan’s eyes filled.
He blinked before the tears could fall.
“Partly.”
Eli thought about this.
“That’s really dumb.”
Nathan laughed once through his nose.
“Yes.”
The lab results came forty-eight hours later.
Probability of paternity greater than 99.99 percent.
Rachel read the report in Nathan’s office.
He stood beside the windows.
She expected him to say something.
He didn’t.
Finally she placed the pages on his desk.
“Do you want me to leave?”
“No.”
She waited.
Nathan looked at the city.
“I have a son.”
“Yes.”
“He’s nine.”
“Yes.”
“I missed everything.”
Rachel did not tell him that there would be future birthdays.
She did not tell him children were resilient.
She did not say there was still time.
Those things might someday be true.
They were not relevant to what had been lost.
“Yes,” she said.
Nathan nodded.
His phone rang.
He ignored it.
“What do I do?”
Rachel looked at him.
“That’s not an assistant question.”
“I don’t know who else to ask.”
“You could ask Eli.”
Nathan turned.
“He’s nine.”
“He’s the person most affected.”
Nathan looked back toward the windows.
The next discovery arrived the same afternoon.
Forensic review of Mara’s box confirmed that the old phone contained messages from Walter Cross.
Some were mundane.
Others were not.
One instructed Mara to leave New York before noon.
Another referenced Teresa’s home address.
A third said:
Nathan has agreed you cannot remain in the company or in his life.
The message did not say Nathan had agreed to threats.
It did not prove Walter had acted without Nathan’s knowledge.
But it showed pressure.
More damaging to Nathan was Mara’s saved screenshot of his own message.
Do not contact me again. My father showed me what you did. Whatever we had is over. Stay away from the company and from me.
There was no mention of the pregnancy.
Rachel read it twice.
“Why didn’t you mention Eli?”
Nathan stood beside her.
“I don’t know.”
“You knew she was pregnant.”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t ask about the baby.”
“No.”
Rachel turned toward him.
“That may be the hardest part for him.”
“I know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I don’t know what else to say.”
“Maybe stop saying it.”
Nathan almost snapped back.
Instead he nodded.
“Okay.”
The Rivergate files were worse.
Mara had copied invoices showing money routed through consulting companies controlled indirectly by Walter’s longtime associate. Whether Walter personally profited remained unclear, but the pattern suggested deliberate fraud and concealment.
Nathan had not signed the suspicious payments.
But several emails showed him resisting Mara’s demand to bring the matter immediately to auditors.
His language was careful.
Delay until we understand exposure.
Keep this internal.
No external communication until legal review.
Corporate phrases.
Nine years later, they read differently.
The board placed Nathan on temporary leave.
The announcement came Friday morning.
Cross Meridian shares fell another six percent.
Nathan’s communications team drafted a statement expressing confidence in the investigation.
May you like
He deleted it.
They drafted another acknowledging a past personal relationship with Mara.
