Chương 6
Curtis froze.
The tired man with the wedding ring flashed through my mind.
“Derek?” I said.
Samuel nodded.
“He submitted an invoice describing the assignment.”
Curtis stared at him.
Samuel read from the copy.
“Residential standby during removal of spouse from property.”
The words settled over the table.
I looked down at my hands.
A small crescent of coffee had dried beside my cup.
For some reason, that was what I focused on.
Not fifty percent of seventy-five million dollars.
Not Curtis’s face.
A brown stain on polished wood.
I rubbed it with my thumb.
It disappeared.
Curtis sank back into his chair.
“This is ridiculous.”
Nobody answered.
Then he looked at me again.
His expression changed.
The fear remained, but something softer appeared around it.
Something practiced.
Something I had once mistaken for vulnerability.
“Nessa.”
He had not called me that in years.
My stomach turned.
“We can fix this,” he said.
I watched him carefully.
“How?”
“Withdraw the divorce.”
Melissa stared at him.
“Curtis.”
“We reconcile.”
He said it quickly now, building the idea as he spoke.
“She moves back home.”
I felt cold all over.
“We tell Samuel it was a misunderstanding.”
Samuel said nothing.
Curtis leaned toward me.
“We’ve had problems before.”
“No, we haven’t.”
“Every marriage does.”
“You threw me into the rain.”
“I made a mistake.”
Three weeks earlier, I would have given almost anything to hear those words.
Now they sounded like a man reaching for a fire extinguisher after discovering the flames had reached his money.
“You called me excess baggage.”
“I was angry.”
“You weren’t angry.”
His mouth closed.
“You were happy,” I said.
That finally silenced him.
Curtis looked down at the table as if the wood might offer him another version of what had happened.
His hands, which had always been steady when he negotiated contracts or signed restaurant checks, moved restlessly now.
He adjusted the cuff on his left wrist.
Then he adjusted it again.
Melissa noticed.
So did I.
“Samuel,” she said, “I want copies of every operative document, including the codicil, execution affidavits, witness information, and any medical competency records associated with both signing dates.”
“You’ll have them.”
“I also want confirmation of whether the suspension has already been triggered or whether the trustee is making a discretionary determination.”
Samuel folded his hands.
“The provision is triggered by documented conduct, not by my preference.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No distribution to Curtis will occur while the triggering facts are under formal review.”
Curtis lifted his head.
“How long?”
“That depends partly on whether you challenge the provision.”
“Of course I’m challenging it.”
Melissa turned toward him.
“We’re not deciding that in this room.”
“You work for me.”
“I advise you.”
“Then advise me.”
She stared at him for a moment.
“Stop making admissions.”
The air went still again.
Curtis leaned back.
His breathing had become shallow.
I had seen him angry before.
I had seen him sulk for two days over a contractor missing a deadline and refuse to speak to me because I had called his response excessive.
I had never seen panic strip away so much of him so quickly.
Samuel pulled another envelope from the folder.
“This is for Vanessa.”
Curtis’s gaze fixed on it.
“What is it?”
Samuel ignored him.
He pushed the envelope across the table toward me.
My name was written on the front in Arthur’s hand.
The letters leaned slightly to the right.
Near the end of his illness, his handwriting had become smaller, as if even words required more energy than he could spare.
I touched the corner of the envelope.
The paper felt heavier than it should have.
“Do I read it now?”
“That was his instruction.”
Curtis laughed once under his breath.
“Unbelievable.”
Melissa gave him a warning look.
I opened the envelope.
Inside were four handwritten pages.
For several seconds, I could not begin.
Arthur’s handwriting pulled me backward too quickly.
The first line blurred.
I blinked and tried again.
Vanessa, if Samuel is giving you this, then I was right about at least one thing and wrong about another.
My throat tightened.
I kept reading.
I was right that Curtis would confuse inheritance with freedom.
I hope I was wrong about how badly he hurt you before someone stopped him.
My eyes moved to Curtis without meaning to.
He was watching my face.
“What does it say?”
I looked back at the page.
Arthur wrote that he had watched the marriage change over the final three years.
Not because I became difficult.
Not because Curtis became busy.
Because illness had revealed who showed up when there was nothing enjoyable to gain.
He admitted he had allowed me to carry too much.
He admitted he had sometimes called for me when he could have called a nurse because he trusted me more.
The sentence made me angry.
That surprised me.
For weeks after Arthur died, I had protected the memory of him as though death had made him flawless.
Now, reading his own admission, I wanted to argue with a dead man.
I turned the page.
He wrote that he had not changed his will because I asked.
I never had.
He wrote that I had once told him to leave everything to Curtis if that was what he wanted because family money had already caused enough trouble.
I remembered the conversation.
Arthur had been sitting by the upstairs window with a blanket around his shoulders.
He had asked whether I thought Curtis could manage Bennett Residential Group.
I had told him Curtis was smarter than people gave him credit for.
Arthur had stared at me for so long that I got irritated.
“You keep grading him on a curve,” he had said.
I had laughed and told him he was impossible.
The letter continued.
Arthur said he did not believe money should reward cruelty.
He also did not believe money should become revenge.
May you like
That was why he had created the charitable alternative.
If Curtis treated me decently after Arthur’s death, Curtis would receive most of the estate and I would receive a significant but smaller share.
