Chương 4
She stopped.
Nobody rescued her.
Eleanor closed her eyes.
“Victoria,” she said wearily, “go put on some clothes.”
The security officer escorted Eleanor and Victoria into the hallway.
Julian remained by the door.
He looked suddenly older.
“Gen.”
She had once loved that nickname because only three people used it.
Her father had been one of them.
“Don’t.”
Julian rubbed both hands over his face.
“I need five minutes with you.”
“You’ve had eleven years.”
“Without Sarah.”
Sarah leaned against the wall.
“I’m happy to become invisible.”
“This is my marriage.”
Genevieve looked down at Hazel.
The baby had fallen asleep again, her cheek flattened against Genevieve’s gown.
“No,” Genevieve said.
“This is the part after it.”
Julian flinched.
He opened the door.
Before leaving, he looked at Hazel once more.
Genevieve hated that his grief seemed genuine.
It would have been easier if every part of him had turned false at once.
Dr. Patel waited until the door shut.
Then she exhaled.
“Well.”
Sarah looked at the coat Victoria had left buttoned incorrectly in her hurry.
“I’ve attended less complicated depositions.”
Genevieve laughed once.
Pain stabbed across her abdomen.
“Don’t make me laugh.”
“That was not a joke.”
“That makes it worse.”
Dr. Patel lowered the blanket and examined the surgical dressing.
Her hands were warm and careful.
The incision had not opened.
There was some fresh spotting at one edge, but nothing that alarmed her.
She called a nurse to check Genevieve’s blood pressure and requested photographs of the swelling developing across her cheek.
Only after the nurse left did Genevieve ask the question she had been avoiding.
“Can they use the paralysis against me?”
Dr. Patel stopped writing.
“Medically?”
“Custody.”
Sarah answered before the doctor could.
“Temporary physical impairment is not the same thing as being an unfit parent.”
Genevieve stared at her daughter.
“But I can’t get out of bed.”
“Neither can half the women on this floor immediately after complicated deliveries.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes.”
Sarah’s voice softened.
“And I also know you are six hours out from major surgery, frightened, medicated, and trying to solve the next eighteen years before dinner.”
Genevieve looked away.
Outside the window, afternoon had faded toward gray.
A helicopter crossed the distant skyline, small enough to look silent.
“What did you mean about Kessler?”
Sarah did not answer immediately.
She picked up one of the hospital’s plastic water cups, discovered it was empty, and put it down again.
“He represented Vance Development before your father fired him.”
“When?”
“Fourteen years ago.”
Genevieve frowned.
“That was before I came back to the company.”
“Exactly.”
“Why did Dad fire him?”
“I don’t know.”
“You have the files.”
“I have some files.”
Sarah glanced toward the door.
“Your father changed firms twice during that period, and the records we inherited were incomplete.”
Genevieve felt the first cold prickle of something unrelated to Eleanor’s slap.
“Julian shouldn’t even know Kessler.”
“He might not.”
“He named him.”
“He named the person he believes prepared those documents.”
Genevieve studied Sarah’s face.
“You think Eleanor did this.”
“I think assumptions are expensive.”
“That means yes.”
“It means I want facts.”
Sarah reached into her bag and removed a thin folder.
“I also want to know why your husband accessed the company’s secure document server at two seventeen this morning.”
Genevieve stared at her.
“He was here at two seventeen.”
“Was he?”
“He was outside the operating room.”
“Continuously?”
Genevieve tried to reconstruct the night.
Contractions.
Monitors.
A nurse telling Julian to remove his watch before surgery.
Then fear.
Too much fear.
Hazel’s heart rate dropping.
People moving quickly.
Julian kissing Genevieve’s forehead before the doors closed.
There had been perhaps forty minutes before the emergency cesarean.
Maybe longer.
Time had become shapeless.
“He had his laptop.”
Sarah nodded.
“The login came from the hospital network.”
“What did he access?”
“Board resolutions, capitalization records, your employment agreement, and archived trust correspondence.”
Genevieve’s mouth went dry.
“Can he do that?”
“As COO, he can access the corporate documents.”
“The trust correspondence isn’t corporate.”
“No.”
Sarah opened the folder.
“That’s our first serious problem.”
Genevieve stared at the printed access log.
Beside Julian’s credentials were seven filenames.
One contained her father’s initials.
RV_PRIVATE_SETTLEMENT_2012.
She had never seen it.
“What is that?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
Genevieve shook her head.
Sarah’s expression remained neutral, but she tapped the filename with one fingernail.
“Julian downloaded it.”
“Did you open it?”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“The archived copy is encrypted.”
“Then how did Julian download it?”
“That,” Sarah said, “is the question I care about.”
Hazel stirred.
Genevieve instinctively rocked her upper body, an awkward movement because she could not brace herself with her legs.
Sarah reached forward, then stopped before touching the baby.
Genevieve noticed.
“You can.”
Sarah adjusted the blanket around Hazel’s back.
Her hands were unexpectedly gentle.
“I’m terrible with babies.”
“You’re terrible with adults.”
“I have more practice.”
Genevieve almost smiled.
Then she looked again at the filename.
“My father hated secrets.”
Sarah sat back.
“Your father hated other people’s secrets.”
“That’s not funny.”
“I wasn’t joking.”
Genevieve remembered Richard Vance at his desk, eating salted peanuts directly over contracts despite everyone complaining about the crumbs.
She remembered the locked bottom drawer she had never been permitted to open.
After his death, it had been empty.
A knock sounded.
The security officer entered without Julian.
His expression had become more formal.
“Ms. Vance, there’s something you need to know.”
Genevieve tightened her hold on Hazel.
“What happened?”
“Your husband left the maternity floor.”
Sarah stood.
“With whom?”
“His mother.”
“And Ms. Hale?”
“She’s still downstairs giving a statement.”
Genevieve looked at Sarah.
The officer continued.
“Mr. Vance asked security to retrieve his laptop from his vehicle before he left.”
Sarah’s posture changed.
“Did they?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“He retrieved it himself.”
Sarah was already reaching for her phone.
Genevieve understood a second later.
May you like
Julian had not left because he was ashamed.
He had left because he knew exactly what Sarah would look for next.
