Chương 13
I heard one of the boys shouting in the background.
Samantha covered the phone and said something muffled.
Then she returned.
“I have to make lunch.”
“What are they eating?”
“Grilled cheese.”
“Both?”
“Noah wants the sandwich cut into squares.”
“And Lucas?”
“Triangles.”
“That matters?”
“Apparently at constitutional level.”
I smiled.
“What are you eating?”
“Whatever they don’t.”
The answer bothered me.
“Samantha.”
“Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was going to ask if you needed groceries.”
“You were about to become helpful.”
“That sounds criminal.”
“With you, it can become exhausting.”
I rubbed my jaw.
“Okay.”
There was another shout.
Samantha sighed.
“Lucas, cheese does not belong on the dog.”
I sat up.
“You have a dog?”
“No.”
I waited.
She laughed despite herself.
“Exactly.”
Then the line went quiet for a second.
“He dropped cheese out the window.”
“That makes more sense.”
“Not enough.”
She lowered her voice.
“Read the rest.”
“And don’t call Halpern.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“You were absolutely going to.”
I looked at the number I had already found for their human resources department.
“Maybe.”
“Ethan.”
“Fine.”
We hung up.
I read the remaining documents.
The most interesting one was not part of the investigation.
It was an email Samantha had sent to Halpern’s HR director after being cleared.
She asked to return to her senior position.
They offered a different role instead, lower in responsibility and pay, citing “reputational concerns within the client group.”
She declined.
Three months later, she took a bookkeeping job with a medical supply company.
That company closed during restructuring the following year.
After that came contract work, tax preparation, temporary office jobs, and finally airport maintenance.
Her career had not collapsed in one dramatic event.
It had eroded.
That somehow made it worse.
The anonymous complaint had not destroyed her life.
It had shoved her onto a slope while she was raising twins alone.
My phone buzzed.
Patricia.
This time I answered.
“Hi.”
“You finally remember I exist.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“I heard.”
“From Mom?”
“Your mother currently communicates through sighing.”
I looked at the report on my laptop.
“What do you want?”
“To see if you ate.”
I almost laughed.
“You and Mom really are sisters.”
“Don’t insult me.”
“I ate.”
“What?”
I glanced at an empty bag of pretzels.
“Food.”
“That answer means garbage.”
“I’m thirty-six.”
“And yet.”
I rubbed my eyes.
“Patricia, did Samantha ever talk to you about losing her job?”
A pause.
“Once.”
“When?”
“Maybe three years ago.”
“What did she say?”
“That somebody accused her of stealing.”
“Did she think Mom was involved?”
“No.”
“What about Chloe?”
“I didn’t even know Chloe had spoken to her.”
“Did Mom ever mention Samantha’s job?”
Another pause.
“Why?”
“Because I need to know.”
“She mentioned Samantha wasn’t at Halpern anymore.”
“When?”
“I don’t remember exactly.”
“Before or after the accusation?”
“I don’t know.”
“Try.”
Patricia became quiet.
“I think after.”
“Did Mom know why?”
“She said Samantha had gotten herself into trouble.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“Those exact words?”
“Something close.”
“How would she know?”
“I assumed gossip.”
“From whom?”
“Ethan, people talk.”
“Not about internal accounting investigations.”
“No.”
She sounded less certain now.
“Do you think Elaine had something to do with it?”
“I don’t know.”
That was becoming the most dangerous sentence in my life.
Patricia continued.
“You need to be careful.”
“With Mom?”
“With yourself.”
I closed my eyes.
“Samantha already gave me that speech.”
“Then apparently two women have independently identified the same problem.”
“Wonderful.”
“You’re angry.”
“Yes.”
“You like anger because it feels cleaner than grief.”
I opened my eyes.
“Please don’t become insightful today.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
She sighed.
“Your father did the same thing.”
That stopped me.
“No, he didn’t.”
“He absolutely did.”
“He barely raised his voice.”
“Anger has more than one volume.”
I looked at Noah’s rock.
Patricia went on.
“When he got scared, he started solving things.”
“That sounds terrible.”
“It was, if you happened to be the thing he decided needed solving.”
I said nothing.
“You have two little boys now.”
The words still felt strange.
“Maybe.”
“No maybe.”
She corrected herself.
“Fine, biologically pending, emotionally obvious.”
I smiled despite myself.
“You need to decide what kind of man they meet next week.”
“That’s unfair.”
“Parenthood is largely unfair.”
“Did Samantha recruit you?”
“No, but I like her more than I like you at the moment.”
“That tracks.”
We ended the call after she made me promise to eat something containing a vegetable.
I showered, changed, and drove to a diner two blocks from the hotel.
I ordered soup because I could not think of anything else.
Halfway through, Chloe walked in.
I saw her before she saw me.
For one cowardly second, I considered leaving through the kitchen.
Then she spotted me.
She stopped beside the hostess stand.
Her hair was tied back, and she wore jeans and the old gray coat she had owned before our life became tailored suits and wedding appointments.
She looked younger without makeup.
She also looked exhausted.
“Can I sit?”
I looked at the empty booth across from me.
“You found me.”
“Your mother told me which hotel.”
“Of course she did.”
“I saw your car.”
I gestured to the seat.
She sat.
A waitress approached.
Chloe ordered coffee.
Neither of us spoke until it arrived.
She wrapped both hands around the mug.
“I’m not here to ask you to forgive me.”
“Good.”
“I need to tell you something before you hear it somewhere else.”
My appetite disappeared.
“About Samantha’s job?”
Chloe’s face changed.
That was enough.
I put down my spoon.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“Did you make the complaint?”
“No.”
The answer came fast but not panicked.
I watched her.
“Did you know who did?”
“I think so.”
“Who?”
She looked at the coffee.
“My brother.”
I stared at her.
“Daniel?”
“Yes.”
May you like
I had met Daniel Mercer perhaps twenty times.
He was charming, loud, and perpetually involved in some new consulting venture.
