Chương 6
You do not have to write back.
Alexander
Sophie read it at the breakfast table.
“Franklin is a weird dog name.”
Victoria exhaled.
“Yes.”
“Do you know Franklin?”
“No.”
“Did he have him before?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
Victoria looked at her daughter.
“I looked him up.”
Sophie grinned.
“You googled him.”
“I conducted basic research.”
“You googled him.”
“Yes.”
Sophie returned to the letter.
“Can I meet the dog?”
Victoria nearly objected.
Instead she said, “Maybe.”
Sophie looked surprised by the answer.
“So I have a dad.”
“Yes.”
“Did I always?”
Victoria felt her chest tighten.
“Yes.”
“But he didn’t know.”
“No.”
“Because of his mom.”
Victoria had not told her that much.
Children had ears.
The internet had parents.
School hallways had whispered versions of every adult scandal.
“Partly.”
“What did she do?”
Victoria folded her hands.
“She lied to him about me. And she lied to me about him.”
“Why?”
“She thought she was protecting her family.”
“From us?”
The question hurt more than accusation would have.
Victoria chose her words carefully.
“Yes.”
Sophie stared at the cereal floating in her bowl.
“That’s mean.”
“Yes.”
“Does Dad hate her?”
Victoria stopped.
It was the first time Sophie had called him that.
Not Alexander.
Dad.
“I don’t know.”
Sophie shrugged.
“I think I would.”
That afternoon, Victoria met Alexander for the first time without an audience.
Daniel had arranged a private conference room in his office.
Alexander arrived eight minutes early.
Victoria arrived nine minutes late because she had sat in her parked car downstairs telling herself she could leave.
When she entered, he stood.
Black suit. No tie. Dark hair slightly longer than she remembered. A faint line beside his mouth that had not been there seven years ago.
He looked at her as though he had been punched and had decided not to mention it.
“Hi.”
Victoria put her bag on the table.
“Hi.”
Daniel remained for the first ten minutes, then announced he was going to obtain coffee from a machine twenty feet away and somehow took twelve minutes to do it.
Alexander sat across from Victoria.
For a while neither spoke.
He rubbed one thumb against the side of his index finger.
He had done that years ago when anxious.
Victoria looked away.
Finally he said, “Thank you for agreeing to this.”
“I didn’t do it for you.”
“I assumed.”
“That sounded sarcastic.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Everything you say sounds sarcastic.”
“That used to be one of the things you liked.”
“There are a lot of things I used to like.”
He nodded.
The answer had landed.
Good.
She hated herself for being pleased.
Alexander looked down at the table.
“I read the letter again.”
“The forged one.”
“Yes.”
“You believed it.”
“Yes.”
“Immediately?”
He took a breath.
“No.”
Victoria had not expected that answer.
“What?”
“I didn’t believe it immediately.”
Something cold moved through her.
Alexander looked directly at her.
“I called your number that night.”
“My number never changed.”
“I know.”
“You called once?”
“Three times.”
“I never got those calls.”
“I blocked caller ID because I was angry and stupid.”
Victoria stared at him.
“I didn’t answer unknown numbers then.”
“I know that now.”
“What did you do next?”
“I went to your apartment two days later.”
Victoria stopped breathing.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I did.”
“I was there.”
“You weren’t.”
“When?”
“Thursday afternoon.”
Victoria searched the year in her mind.
Thursday.
Her mother had driven her to a prenatal appointment.
She had been gone less than two hours.
Alexander continued.
“Your neighbor said you had left with an older woman. I thought maybe your mother. I waited outside for twenty minutes.”
“You waited twenty minutes.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
“I left.”
Victoria laughed.
It sounded almost exactly like the laugh on the boat.
“You left.”
“Yes.”
“You had a letter saying I was pregnant and the baby wasn’t yours. You didn’t believe it. You called three times with your number hidden, came to my apartment, waited twenty minutes, and that was your investigation?”
His jaw tightened.
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I asked my mother.”
Victoria looked away.
There it was.
Alexander continued, “She said you had already left Chicago.”
“I was at Northwestern Memorial getting blood drawn.”
“I know.”
“Now.”
“Yes.”
“Seven years later.”
“Yes.”
Silence settled between them.
Someone outside the conference room laughed at something near the elevators.
Alexander rubbed his thumb against his finger again.
“My father couldn’t speak,” he said. “The acquisition was falling apart. I was sleeping three hours a night. You and I had spent the last month hurting each other. I had that letter. My mother told me you had admitted the baby might not be mine. And I…”
He stopped.
Victoria waited.
“I chose the version that allowed me to stop looking.”
She looked at him.
He did not defend himself.
“I told myself I was respecting what you asked for. I told myself if you lied about the pregnancy, chasing you would only make everything worse. Mostly I was humiliated.”
“Humiliated.”
“Yes.”
“Imagine that.”
“I have.”
“You don’t get points for saying the right thing now.”
“I’m not asking for points.”
“You’re very calm.”
“I haven’t slept much in two weeks.”
“Neither have I.”
“I know.”
“No. You don’t know.”
Alexander nodded slowly.
“You’re right.”
She hated that answer.
“Stop agreeing with me.”
A tiny, almost involuntary smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
It vanished when he saw her expression.
“Sorry.”
Victoria leaned back.
“What did your mother say when you confronted her?”
He looked at the table.
“That she was protecting me.”
“Of course.”
“That you were going to take me away from the family when my father was dying.”
Victoria felt something bitter rise in her throat.
“I was carrying your family.”
“I know.”
“She knew.”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
Alexander’s voice went quieter.
“More than she admitted on the boat.”
Victoria waited.
May you like
“She had someone in the family office flag messages from you.”
The room became very still.
