Chương 4
“She worked with me on the Briarwood project,” he said.
“The project you told me ended two years ago?”
“It became complicated.”
“Are you sleeping with her?”
The orderly looked down.
Mark’s pause answered before he did.
“It isn’t what you think.”
Claire laughed once.
Emily did not.
“How long?”
“Emily, please. Not in a hospital hallway.”
“We’re in a consultation room.”
“You’re upset.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve had a shock.”
“Yes.”
“You’re holding a lottery ticket worth an extraordinary amount of money, and your judgment right now—”
Claire moved so quickly the orderly stepped between her and the wheelchair.
“Finish that sentence,” she said.
Mark’s eyes remained on Emily.
“Your judgment could be affected by emotion,” he said carefully. “We should secure the ticket together.”
Emily felt the cut in her palm pulse beneath the bandage.
“There it is,” Claire said.
Mark ignored her. “We’re married. Whatever happened in that room does not erase twenty-three years.”
“Eighteen,” Emily said.
“What?”
“We’ve been married eighteen years.”
“I know how long we’ve been married.”
“You said twenty-three.”
Mark’s mouth opened.
Twenty-three years was how long ago Emily had met Paul.
Claire heard it too. Her face went still.
Mark looked down at the blanket. “I misspoke.”
“You practiced that line for someone else,” Emily said.
For the first time, he appeared afraid of her.
Not of the money. Not of Claire. Of Emily’s attention.
A physician approached from the hall and asked the orderly to return Mark to his room. Mark resisted, gripping the armrests.
“I want my wife listed as my medical decision-maker,” he said.
“You removed her authorization this afternoon,” the physician replied.
Emily looked at Mark.
He blinked.
The physician, a tired woman with silver hair pulled through the back of a surgical cap, seemed to realize she had revealed more than intended.
Mark lowered his voice. “That was temporary.”
“Why?” Emily asked.
He did not answer.
The physician turned to her. “Mrs. Carter, I can’t discuss details without the patient’s permission. I can tell you that we need to reassess Mr. Carter’s mobility and reported symptoms.”
“Reported,” Claire repeated.
Mark’s hands tightened on the wheelchair.
“Emily, don’t leave with that ticket. At least put it in the hospital safe.”
Officer Bell appeared behind the physician.
“Mr. Carter,” he said, “your wife has asked to leave without contact.”
“I am not threatening her.”
“No one said you were.”
“She is carrying marital property.”
Officer Bell’s face took on the patient emptiness of a man refusing to become a family-court judge in a hospital corridor.
“That is not a matter hospital security can determine.”
Mark looked at Emily one last time.
His voice softened.
“Em. Please.”
He had not called her Em in years.
The name struck the place in her that still expected tenderness from familiar sounds. Her fingers tightened around Claire’s wrist.
Then she noticed Mark’s bare heel protruding beneath the blanket. There was a gray mark on it from the hospital floor.
He had walked farther than the bed.
Emily picked up her bag.
“Do not call me tonight,” she said.
Claire drove Emily’s car because Emily’s hands would not stop shaking.
They left the hospital through a side entrance to avoid the main lobby. Cold daylight still filled the parking garage, though it was nearly seven. Emily’s gown caught on the passenger door. Claire knelt, freed the fabric, and muttered, “This thing has hostile intentions.”
Emily gave a broken laugh.
Claire glanced up, surprised.
For half a minute they both laughed, not because anything was funny but because the alternative was making a sound neither wanted to hear.
Inside the car, Claire locked the doors before starting the engine.
“Where are we going?” Emily asked.
“Not your house.”
“It’s my house.”
“Mark has keys.”
“He’s in the hospital.”
“He was also unable to stand.”
Emily looked through the windshield at a concrete pillar marked LEVEL THREE.
Claire backed out.
“I have a friend whose mother is a divorce lawyer,” she said. “Her office is closed, but she’ll take calls.”
“I don’t know if I want a divorce.”
Claire braked too hard at the exit ramp.
The car behind them honked.
She drove forward without speaking until they reached the street.
“I didn’t say I forgive him,” Emily said.
“I didn’t say you did.”
“I need time.”
“You need a lawyer while you take time.”
Emily turned the handbag lock beneath her thumb.
“What if he is sick?”
Claire’s jaw worked.
“He can be sick and dishonest.”
“What if standing was part of physical therapy?”
“Was laughing about manipulating you part of physical therapy?”
“No.”
“Then we can start there.”
They drove to Claire’s apartment, a third-floor walk-up above a bakery and a tax-preparation office. Emily had visited only twice. Mark disliked the neighborhood because parking was difficult and the upstairs tenant played drums after ten.
Claire’s living room held too many books and no matching furniture. A blue blanket covered a tear in the sofa. On the windowsill, three basil plants leaned toward the glass.
“You can sleep here,” Claire said.
“I’ll ruin your sofa in this dress.”
“You already improved it.”
Emily set the teal handbag on the kitchen table and remained standing beside it.
Claire noticed.
“We need somewhere safer for the ticket.”
“The banks are closed.”
“We can use my office safe overnight.”
“Who has access?”
“Me, my director, and the building manager.”
“No.”
“Good. You’re thinking.”
Claire called her friend, who contacted her mother, Priya Shah.
Priya answered from a restaurant. Emily could hear silverware and low conversation behind her voice. She asked only essential questions: when the ticket was purchased, who paid, whether Emily had signed it, who knew, whether there were photographs, whether Mark had ever been granted power of attorney, and whether he had access to Emily’s phone or email.
“Joint bank account?” Priya asked.
“Yes.”
“Separate business accounts?”
“Yes.”
“Can your husband access them?”
“He helps with taxes.”
May you like
Claire closed her eyes.
Priya’s tone remained calm. “Change no records tonight. Delete nothing. Move no money except what is required for ordinary expenses. Turn off shared location services, but document that you did so. Change passwords from a device your husband has never used. Do not post. Do not send the recording. Do not confront the woman on the phone.”
