Chương 7
“So your mother didn’t leak it.”
“Apparently not.”
“I wanted her to have leaked it.”
Nathan nodded.
“So did I.”
“It made everything cleaner.”
“Yes.”
Grace looked at him.
“That scares me.”
“What?”
“How much I want her to be guilty of everything now.”
Nathan was quiet.
Then he said, “She can be guilty of one enormous thing without being guilty of every smaller thing.”
Grace put a hand over her stomach.
The baby shifted.
“Tell your daughter that when she’s sixteen.”
Nathan’s face softened.
“You called her my daughter.”
Grace had not meant to.
She turned toward the window.
“Don’t make it a moment.”
“Okay.”
He waited three seconds.
“It was a moment.”
She hit him gently with a pillow.
He yelped and grabbed his shoulder.
Grace gasped.
“Oh my God.”
“I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry.”
He started laughing again.
“You’re an idiot.”
“Probably.”
The police arrested Evelyn eleven days after the fall.
It happened at nine in the morning, not at midnight, and there were no television cameras outside the house because no one had known it was coming.
Detective Ortiz called Grace afterward.
The warrant was based on the physical evidence, Grace’s statement, Maya’s revised testimony, maintenance records, and the security video.
The prosecutor had approved charges that included attempted murder and assault.
Ortiz warned her that charges were accusations, not conclusions.
Grace appreciated the precision.
Nathan walked outside while she was still on the phone.
He stood in the backyard with his injured arm hanging stiffly at his side.
Grace watched him through the window.
When she finished the call, she joined him.
“Do you want to go inside?”
“No.”
“Do you want to say something?”
“No.”
“Do you want me to stop asking questions?”
“Yes.”
They stood together.
A neighbor’s sprinkler ticked somewhere beyond the fence.
Nathan stared at the grass.
“She used to take me to school every morning.”
Grace said nothing.
“She hated mornings. She’d drink coffee at red lights and curse anybody who honked after the light changed.”
Grace waited.
“When I was eight, I threw up in her car before a piano recital. She cleaned it herself because I was embarrassed.”
He rubbed his jaw.
“I keep remembering stupid things.”
“They’re not stupid.”
“They feel stupid.”
Grace watched a bird land on the fence.
“She tried to kill you.”
“Yes.”
“And somehow my brain is giving me a tour of every normal Tuesday I ever had with her.”
Grace slipped her fingers through his.
“That sounds like a brain.”
He squeezed her hand.
Two weeks later, Evelyn made bail.
She moved into a hotel because a court order prohibited contact with Grace and Nathan and because the mansion itself was still relevant to the case.
Her attorney released a statement describing the incident as a tragic accident aggravated by a known structural defect.
The statement expressed concern for Grace’s health.
It did not use the word pregnancy.
It did not use Nathan’s name.
It did not mention Maya.
Nathan read it once.
Grace read it six times.
“She’s going to say I stepped backward on purpose,” Grace said.
Nathan looked up from his laptop.
“Why would she?”
“Because I’m unstable. Because I’m ashamed. Because I got caught lying about the baby.”
“She can say it.”
“People will believe her.”
“Some will.”
“That doesn’t bother you?”
“Yes.”
He closed the laptop.
“But I can’t control idiots.”
“You’ve spent your entire adult life trying.”
“That is exactly why I know it doesn’t work.”
Grace stood at the kitchen island cutting strawberries.
The knife stopped.
“She called me three days before.”
“Who?”
“Your mother.”
Nathan’s face changed.
“You didn’t tell me that.”
“I forgot.”
“How do you forget a call from her?”
“I was pregnant, terrified, hiding a paternity test, fighting with you, and still answering work emails. Pick one.”
“What did she want?”
“She asked whether I’d signed the updated marital property agreement.”
Nathan frowned.
“What updated agreement?”
“The one your father’s attorney sent last year.”
“I told them we weren’t signing that.”
“I know.”
“What did she say?”
Grace returned to the strawberries.
“She said people make emotional decisions when they’re scared.”
Nathan watched her.
“And?”
“She asked if I was planning to leave you.”
“Why?”
“I thought she’d noticed we were having problems.”
“When was this?”
“Three days before the test result.”
Nathan went quiet.
Grace looked up.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“No. What?”
He stood and paced once across the kitchen.
“Dad’s trust.”
“Nathan.”
“The company’s voting structure changes if I die without descendants.”
Grace put down the knife.
She hated the word descendants.
It made the baby sound like a clause.
“Changes how?”
“Control shifts across several family branches. My mother loses a lot of influence.”
Grace stared at him.
“If you die.”
“Yes.”
“What if you don’t have a biological child?”
“It depends on how the trust defines issue.”
“Do not say issue.”
“I agree.”
“Say child.”
“Fine.”
Grace pushed the cutting board away.
“So if this baby isn’t biologically yours—”
“It could create a dispute someday.”
“And your mother knew that?”
“She understands the trust better than anyone alive.”
Grace felt cold despite the warm kitchen.
Nathan immediately saw where her thoughts had gone.
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that would mean she had a financial reason.”
“She already had a reason.”
“No. It would mean she had a reason to care whether I accepted the baby.”
Grace stared at him.
Nathan took out his phone.
“Who are you calling?”
“My lawyer.”
“Your lawyer or the company’s?”
He stopped.
Then put the phone away.
“Mine.”
He made the call from the living room.
Grace stayed in the kitchen.
She picked up a strawberry and ate it.
It tasted metallic.
May you like
The trust issue did not become the dramatic proof Nathan imagined.
His attorney reviewed the documents and explained that the language was old, complicated, and subject to interpretation. A child Nathan legally recognized might or might not qualify for certain future interests depending on circumstances that did not yet exist.
