Chương 3
"Grant has been inside this office."
"So have half the contractors I've hired."
"Exactly."
I stared at him.
"Where should they go?"
"My office tomorrow."
I nodded.
He closed the safe.
"Now tell me about Grant's employer."
"Holloway Restoration Group."
"That's his family's company?"
"No."
"He isn't related to the owners?"
"No."
"I assumed from the name."
"Different Holloways."
"What does he do?"
"Regional project director."
Marcus typed.
"What projects?"
"Hotels, restaurants, historic properties."
"Salary?"
"I don't know exactly."
"You don't know?"
"He said around one seventy-five with bonuses."
Marcus's fingers stopped.
"You've seen a pay stub?"
"No."
"Tax return?"
"No."
"We were going to combine finances after the wedding."
I heard the defensiveness in my own voice.
Marcus did not react to it.
"Any debt you know about?"
"Car."
"What kind?"
"Mercedes."
"Balance?"
"I don't know."
"Credit cards?"
"He has them."
"Mara."
"What?"
"You've been preparing to marry someone whose financial life you know almost nothing about."
My face went hot.
"I know."
"No, you didn't."
"I know now."
The distinction hurt.
He closed the laptop halfway.
"I am not saying that to humiliate you."
"It worked anyway."
"You trusted the man you planned to marry."
"I also sign contracts for a living."
"Those are not the same skill."
"I warn clients about hidden costs."
"Clients don't kiss you."
"Thank you for that sophisticated legal insight."
"You're welcome."
For the first time that night, we both laughed.
It lasted perhaps five seconds.
Then my eyes filled unexpectedly.
I turned away.
Marcus did not touch me.
That was why I had called him.
He had always understood that comfort sometimes made me cry harder.
"I really loved him," I said.
Marcus looked at the closed kitchen door.
"That doesn't make you stupid."
"I didn't say stupid."
"You were thinking it loudly."
I wiped under one eye with my thumb.
"He was good with them."
"Sometimes."
"Most of the time."
"Mara."
"He was."
"I know."
"He remembered Maisie's recital dates."
Marcus nodded.
"He helped Caleb with that science project."
"I remember."
"He came to June's parent conference when I was stuck in Baltimore."
Marcus's mouth tightened.
I looked at him.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"That wasn't nothing."
"He did good things."
"But?"
"But doing good things does not erase doing harmful ones."
I turned the cardboard coffee sleeve over in my hands.
"You don't have to make every memory false because tonight was real."
That landed somewhere deeper than I wanted it to.
I folded the sleeve flat.
"How do we find out what he meant about his company?"
"Carefully."
"You said we couldn't prove what I heard."
"We can't prove the call."
"So?"
"So we don't accuse anyone."
Marcus reopened the laptop.
"We check public records first."
Grant had no recent civil judgments under his name.
No bankruptcy filing appeared in federal records.
That should have comforted me.
Instead, I remembered his words.
They'll get paid.
Marcus searched county dockets.
There were several traffic violations, one old contractor dispute, nothing extraordinary.
Then he asked for Grant's home address before he moved most of his belongings into my house.
I gave it to him.
The townhouse was rented.
His Mercedes was leased.
His social media made him look wealthier than I had ever considered.
Trips.
Restaurants.
Watches.
A golf club membership.
I had known about all of those things separately.
Together, on the laptop screen, they looked different.
"People can afford nice things," I said.
"They can."
"You think I'm defending him."
"You are."
"I don't mean to."
"Doesn't matter."
Marcus clicked through another search.
"You spent three years building an explanation for who he is."
"Two and a half."
"Fine."
He looked at me.
"Your brain isn't going to delete the explanation because of one ugly phone call."
I looked toward the staircase.
"You believe me about the call, though."
"Completely."
"Even without proof?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because you called me instead of him."
I frowned.
Marcus shrugged.
"If you were inventing a reason to escape the wedding, you'd have called him first and created a war."
"That's an oddly specific diagnosis."
"I've known you twenty-two years."
My phone vibrated.
A message from Grant appeared.
Sleep, bride.
Another came seconds later.
Tomorrow is ours.
I turned the phone facedown again.
Marcus's expression changed.
"What?"
"I found something."
He rotated the laptop toward me.
It was not a criminal case.
It was a lien connected to a consulting company I had never heard of.
Holloway Strategic Projects LLC.
Grant was listed as the organizer.
The filing was recent.
The amount was just over sixty-two thousand dollars.
"What's that?" I asked.
"Debt."
"To whom?"
"Private lender."
"Why would he have a consulting company?"
"Good question."
I stared at the screen.
The address registered to the company was a mailbox service outside Harrisburg.
Marcus opened another record.
Then another.
Grant had formed the company eighteen months earlier.
There were no employees listed in the state filings.
No website I could find.
No projects he had ever mentioned.
"Maybe it's legitimate."
"Maybe."
"Could be side work."
"Could be."
Marcus never rushed to agree when I offered Grant an innocent explanation.
That somehow made each explanation sound weaker.
I looked at the clock.
12:47 a.m.
Tomorrow had already begun.
"What happens if I cancel the wedding now?"
Marcus did not answer immediately.
"Socially?"
"Everything."
"The deposits are mostly gone."
"I know."
"Guests will be upset and confused."
"I know."
"Grant will demand a reason."
"I know."
"The kids will demand one too."
I rubbed both hands over my face.
"And if I don't cancel?"
"You buy time."
"By marrying him?"
"No."
He said it so sharply that I looked up.
Marcus leaned forward.
"You do not need to marry him to investigate him."
"The wedding is Saturday."
"Then Saturday can change."
I looked toward the hallway where the garment bag was visible through the open bedroom door upstairs.
"Everyone's coming."
"That is not a reason to marry someone."
"I didn't say it was."
May you like
"You were about to."
I hated him a little again.
