Chương 9
“I was terrified.”
“Those feelings can coexist, can’t they?”
“Yes.”
“What did you intend to do with the information?”
“At seven that morning? I intended to breathe.”
The court reporter looked down quickly, hiding something that might have been a smile.
Two weeks after Naomi left, Trevor filed for divorce.
His petition accused her of abandoning the marital residence and improperly taking confidential business information. He sought temporary exclusive use of the penthouse, control of certain joint accounts and an order preventing Naomi from disseminating company records.
Lenora filed a response documenting the affair, the asset transfers and the forged business records. She did not attach the most sensitive evidence publicly.
A judge issued a temporary preservation order covering marital assets and confidential documents. Trevor could not move funds outside ordinary business operations. Naomi could share records with her attorneys, the board committee and law enforcement but not the media.
The order protected her.
It also froze much of the money she had assumed would support her.
ValeRow’s lenders tightened credit. Investors delayed commitments. The company laid off twenty-three employees from projects that stalled.
Naomi read the names in an internal notice Darius obtained through a former colleague. She recognized fourteen.
One was a woman named Cecily who had brought her newborn to the office holiday party because childcare fell through. Naomi had held the baby while Cecily ate.
“I did this,” Naomi said.
Darius sat across from her in the borrowed apartment, eating noodles from a paper carton.
“Trevor did.”
“I released the information.”
“You handed a doctor an X-ray. You didn’t grow the tumor.”
“That is exactly the kind of line people say when consequences belong to someone else.”
Darius set down his fork. “You want me to tell you there was a way to expose fraud without hurting anyone?”
“I want there to have been one.”
“There wasn’t.”
Naomi looked at the ceramic rabbit on the windowsill. She had turned it toward the room days earlier. The partner who owned the apartment might return and wonder why.
Darius said, “I lost twelve people when Trevor pushed me out.”
“You lost a job.”
“I lost friends, health insurance and most of my savings defending myself. My father died believing I stole from the company.”
Naomi’s anger collapsed under the weight of his voice.
“I didn’t know.”
“You didn’t ask.”
He stood and carried the empty cartons to the trash.
At the door, he paused. “You were married to him. I know that made the truth expensive. But don’t ask me to pretend your silence was free.”
After he left, Naomi called Lena.
Her sister answered cautiously.
“I was cruel,” Naomi said.
“Yes.”
“I need you not to enjoy being right this quickly.”
Lena laughed despite herself, then cried again.
This time Naomi let her.
Trevor requested a private meeting through counsel.
Lenora advised against it. Ellis said a controlled mediation might reveal what Trevor believed Naomi possessed. Naomi agreed on the condition that both attorneys remain nearby.
They met in a conference suite at a hotel near Grand Central.
Trevor entered wearing a navy suit Naomi had selected for him three years earlier. He looked thinner. The skin beneath his eyes had turned gray.
For a moment, grief struck her with embarrassing force. Six years of mornings existed in the shape of his shoulders.
He sat across from her.
“You look tired,” he said.
“So do you.”
“I’m sleeping at the apartment.”
“I assumed.”
“The closet looks ridiculous.”
Naomi almost asked which one.
Trevor folded his hands. “We don’t have to do this.”
“We’re already doing it.”
“You know what I mean.”
“No. I know what you usually mean after someone else has done the unpleasant part.”
His expression tightened. “Darius wrote that for you?”
“No.”
“He’s using you.”
“Probably.”
Trevor seemed unprepared for the answer.
Naomi continued. “That doesn’t make the documents false.”
“I was restructuring assets.”
“You forged my signature.”
“I did not forge anything.”
“Then who did?”
He looked toward the closed door leading to the attorneys’ room.
“You don’t understand the structures.”
“Explain them.”
“They’re project entities. Temporary.”
“Why am I listed as the owner?”
“It was a placeholder.”
“For what?”
“Compliance.”
“With a dead woman notarizing it?”
Trevor’s fingers separated.
There it was. A small change, but enough. He had not expected her to know about Elaine Porter.
Naomi leaned back.
“Who prepared the document?”
“I’d have to review it.”
“You already did.”
“You’re making assumptions based on stolen files and Darius’s version of events.”
“Why did you use my signature from the home-equity papers?”
Trevor’s face remained still.
Naomi saw the exact moment he understood how much Priya had found.
He looked down at his hands. “I was trying to protect our position.”
“Whose position?”
“Ours.”
“You transferred money into a Miami condominium for Sienna.”
“That property was an investment.”
“She was going to live there.”
“She told you that?”
“She didn’t need to.”
Trevor stood, walked to the window and adjusted his cuff. The movement was so ordinary that Naomi remembered doing it for him in elevators.
“I made mistakes,” he said. “I’m not denying that.”
“You’re denying every specific one.”
“I let things get out of control.”
“You designed them.”
He turned. “Do you want the truth about Sienna?”
“No.”
The answer startled him.
“I ended it.”
“I don’t care.”
“You do.”
Naomi looked at the carpet between them. “I care that you gave her the version of you I spent years trying to bring home. I care that you discussed my loyalty like a defective appliance. I care that you planned to make me financially smaller before telling me I was alone. But whether you love her is no longer useful information.”
Trevor sat again.
“I never planned to leave you with nothing.”
“Only less.”
“I built ValeRow before we married.”
“And I helped you keep it alive after.”
“You hosted dinners.”
May you like
“I kept people in rooms with you after they wanted to leave.”
He looked at her then, truly looked.
