Chương 5
“What kind of invoice?”
“A strategic advisory retainer.”
“To whom?”
Martin hesitated.
Then he said, “Northline Advisory.”
The name meant nothing to me.
“It was approved through Vanessa’s department.”
“How much?”
“Two hundred forty thousand dollars over eighteen months.”
I closed my eyes.
“Who owns Northline?”
“That’s the problem.”
“Martin.”
“The registered manager is Daniel Cross.”
I waited.
“And?”
“He’s Vanessa’s brother.”
For a moment I heard nothing except the faint hum of the refrigerator.
“Does Adrian know?”
“I don’t know.”
“You called me before asking him?”
“I called you because the review exists because of your trust, and because once I ask Adrian, I can’t unask him.”
I looked at the stack of mail on the counter, the bowl of lemons, Noah’s birthday card still propped beside the toaster.
“What did Northline do for the money?”
“We’re still trying to establish that.”
“That sounds like nothing.”
“It might be something.”
“Or?”
“Or we paid a quarter of a million dollars to the CEO’s girlfriend’s brother for work nobody can clearly explain.”
The word girlfriend landed harder than mistress ever had.
Girlfriend sounded ordinary.
Established.
Real.
I pushed the coffee away.
“What happens now?”
“Now I ask Adrian.”
“And if he approved it?”
Martin did not answer immediately.
When he finally spoke, his voice was tired.
“Then your divorce is no longer the board’s biggest problem.”
I did not call Adrian.
Martin did not call me again that morning either, which told me more than a second phone call would have.
At eleven, I packed two suitcases.
I started with the practical things, because practical things did not ask for explanations.
Jeans.
Sweaters.
Running shoes I had not used in four months.
My grandmother’s gold bracelet.
The medication I took for migraines.
A framed photograph of Noah and Sophie standing ankle-deep in Lake Michigan when they were twelve and fifteen.
I left our wedding album on the shelf.
I left the silver picture frame from our twentieth anniversary.
I left the blue cashmere robe Adrian had bought me in London because it suddenly felt like something from a museum exhibit about people who no longer existed.
When I carried the first suitcase downstairs, I found Sophie in the kitchen.
She was sitting on the counter eating crackers directly from the box.
“Please tell me that means you’re leaving him and not going on some horrifying couples retreat.”
I set the suitcase by the back door.
“Good morning to you too.”
“It’s almost noon.”
“That explains the crackers.”
She shook the box.
“Lunch.”
Sophie had always used sarcasm when she was frightened.
At nine, she had used it when the pediatrician stitched her chin after she fell off a scooter.
At sixteen, she had used it before auditions for a school play.
Now she chewed without looking at me.
“Dad called me.”
I took a glass from the cabinet.
“What did he say?”
“That you’re destroying his company because he cheated.”
I filled the glass with water.
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
“I figured.”
“He also told you not to choose sides?”
Her eyes lifted.
“He said this was between you two.”
“Which is another way of asking you to choose his side quietly.”
“Basically.”
I drank half the water.
Sophie put the cracker box aside.
“Is he in trouble?”
“I don’t know.”
“Mom.”
“I really don’t.”
“Then why is Uncle Martin calling people at eight in the morning?”
“Martin isn’t your uncle.”
“He bought me a bicycle.”
“That apparently creates permanent kinship.”
“It was a very expensive bicycle.”
I smiled despite myself.
Then she stopped joking.
“What happened?”
I pulled out a chair and sat.
“There are questions about company expenses.”
“Like the Napa thing?”
“That’s part of it.”
“What else?”
I hesitated.
She noticed.
She always did.
“You can’t tell me.”
“Not yet.”
“Because of the divorce?”
“Because information is being reviewed, and repeating something before it’s verified can do damage.”
“To Dad?”
“To everyone.”
Her mouth tightened.
“That sounds like something Grandma would say.”
“My mother has occasionally been right.”
“Don’t tell her I heard you admit that.”
I reached for her hand.
She let me take it, but her fingers were stiff.
“I don’t want you in the middle of this.”
“I’m already in the middle.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
She pulled her hand away.
“He brought Vanessa to Noah’s birthday.”
“I know.”
“He made us all sit there like we were supposed to pretend it was normal.”
“I know.”
“And then he calls me the next day and talks about fairness.”
Her eyes had gone bright.
She hated crying in front of people, including me.
“He’s still my dad.”
“I know.”
“I’m so angry at him.”
“I know.”
“And I don’t want anything terrible to happen to him.”
I nodded.
“That’s allowed.”
She looked at me as if I had said something surprising.
“You don’t have to simplify someone just because they hurt you.”
She stared down at her hands.
“He made it pretty easy.”
“No, he made it tempting.”
We sat quietly.
The refrigerator made a clicking sound it had been making for two years, and I made a mental note to call someone about it before remembering I might no longer be living there.
That thought landed with more force than filing the divorce petition had.
Homes were strange that way.
You could decide to leave a marriage before understanding you were also leaving the drawer where you kept batteries, the squeaky third stair, the mug you automatically reached for each morning.
Sophie glanced at the suitcase.
“Where are you going?”
“Grandma’s apartment.”
She made a face.
“The one with the terrifying white sofa?”
“The very one.”
“She’ll know if you breathe near it.”
“She’ll send me a cleaning invoice.”
“Can I come?”
“You have your own apartment.”
“I know.”
“Then why would you come?”
She looked toward the front hall.
“I don’t know.”
That answer was honest enough that I did not press.
“You can stay whenever you want.”
May you like
She nodded.
My phone rang on the table.
