Chương 4
He had not looked at her since they entered.
That hurt more than she expected.
“You knew something about my father’s company.”
Marcus looked at the floor.
“Yes.”
The answer came too quickly.
Ava folded her arms.
“How long?”
Marcus stayed silent.
“Marcus.”
“Three months.”
She stared at him.
“Three months?”
“I didn’t know the full connection at first.”
“But you knew there was something.”
“Yes.”
Ava laughed quietly.
It was not because anything was funny.
It was because anger sometimes arrived before tears.
“You let me sit across from you every night.”
“I was trying to figure out if I was wrong.”
“And if you weren’t?”
Marcus finally looked at her.
His eyes were tired.
“If I wasn’t wrong, I was trying to figure out how to tell you without destroying everything.”
Ava looked around the office.
“Destroying everything.”
She repeated the words.
“That’s interesting.”
Marcus frowned.
“What?”
“You keep saying things like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like my life is something you can damage.”
The room went quiet.
Lena looked away.
Marcus opened his mouth, but Ava continued.
“You weren’t protecting me.”
Her voice became softer.
“You were protecting yourself from being the person who hurt me.”
The accusation landed because it was close enough to something true.
Marcus sat down slowly.
For a moment, he looked less like the confident man everyone at the wedding expected and more like someone who had been carrying a weight alone for too long.
“I found the connection by accident.”
Ava did not move.
“I was reviewing a merger proposal for Whitmore Development.”
“Why?”
“Because my company was considering investing in one of their projects.”
“That’s your company.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t think that mattered?”
“I didn’t know.”
Ava shook her head.
“No.”
She walked toward the desk.
“You don’t get to use not knowing as an excuse.”
Marcus looked at her.
“I’m not.”
“Then what are you using?”
He had no answer.
Lena stepped between them.
“Marcus is telling the truth about one thing.”
Ava looked at her.
“What?”
“He didn’t know about your father when he met you.”
The statement surprised her.
Because she believed Lena.
She did not know why.
Maybe because Lena had no reason to protect Ava.
Maybe because the woman standing in front of her had just lost her wedding day and still seemed more interested in the truth than revenge.
“How do you know?”
“Because I looked into it.”
Marcus looked up.
“Lena.”
“I did.”
Her voice sharpened.
“You were not the only one investigating.”
Ava watched them.
Another piece.
Another thing nobody had told her.
“When?”
Lena walked toward the bookshelf.
“After I found the files.”
She removed a folder from behind a row of books.
Ava noticed the movement.
Not because it was dramatic.
Because it was practiced.
The folder had been hidden there before.
Lena placed it on the desk.
“My father doesn’t know I have this.”
Marcus stood.
“What exactly is in there?”
“Things he forgot I could access.”
Lena opened the folder.
Inside were copies of contracts, financial records, and printed emails.
Ava picked up the first page.
The company name was familiar.
Bennett Manufacturing.
Her father’s business.
Her fingers stopped moving.
She had not seen that name printed anywhere in years.
The company had existed before everything collapsed.
Before the lawsuits.
Before the bank notices.
Before her father stopped answering calls from people who wanted money he no longer had.
Ava read the page carefully.
The document showed a transfer agreement.
A debt purchase.
A private acquisition.
A company she did not recognize had purchased her father’s debt.
Then another company had purchased that company.
And another.
A trail designed to disappear.
“Who signed this?”
Marcus moved closer.
Ava held up a hand.
Not yet.
She looked at the signature.
Her heart slowed.
Because she knew it.
Not personally.
But from memory.
From documents she had reviewed after her father died.
Ava looked at Marcus.
“This signature.”
He nodded.
“I know.”
“Say it.”
Marcus hesitated.
“It belongs to Daniel Vale.”
The name sat between them.
Ava stared.
“Your father.”
Marcus nodded.
The room became smaller.
She put the paper down carefully.
Almost carefully enough to pretend her hands were not shaking.
“Your father bought my father’s debt.”
“Yes.”
“And you knew.”
“I knew his name was connected.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.”
Marcus looked exhausted.
“It isn’t.”
Ava turned away.
She walked to the window.
Outside, the wedding continued falling apart.
Guests were leaving slowly.
Some were whispering.
Some were pretending nothing unusual had happened.
A child ran across the grass near the ceremony area before being pulled back by a parent who suddenly realized the mood had changed.
Life continuing.
Ava hated that.
She hated that the world could keep moving while hers had stopped.
“My father spent the last year of his life believing he failed.”
Marcus said nothing.
“He thought he made bad decisions.”
Ava looked at the reflection of herself in the glass.
“He thought he was the reason my mother had to sell the house.”
Her voice became quieter.
“He apologized to me for things he didn’t even do.”
Marcus looked down.
“I’m sorry.”
Ava turned.
“No.”
The word surprised him.
“You don’t get to say that yet.”
Marcus accepted it.
That almost made her angrier.
She wanted him to fight.
She wanted him to defend himself.
She wanted him to become the version of him she had prepared herself to hate.
Instead, he just stood there.
Human.
Complicated.
Which was worse.
Lena closed the folder.
“There’s more.”
Ava looked at her.
“What?”
Lena pulled out another document.
“This is why I was going to confront my father tonight.”
Marcus looked at the page.
His expression changed.
Ava noticed.
“What is it?”
Marcus took the document.
For several seconds, he did not speak.
Then he handed it to Ava.
The paper was dated eight years earlier.
The same year her father’s company collapsed.
May you like
At the bottom was a payment record.
A large transfer.
