Chương 8
“Not all of it.”
“That’s generous.”
“It isn’t generosity.”
Emily watched a bus pull away from the curb.
“Why tell me now?”
“Because Dad’s going to use it.”
Emily straightened.
“What?”
“If you come here.”
Emily’s stomach dropped.
“What do you mean?”
“He thinks if he shows you that part of the refinance paid your judgment, you’ll feel like you owe them.”
For several seconds, Emily could not speak.
Then she laughed.
This laugh was different.
It held no humor at all.
“Of course he does.”
“I told him it was insane.”
“He forged a loan in my name, let it default, hid it from me, paid the consequences using his own house, and now he thinks that means I owe him?”
“When you say it like that—”
“How else would you say it?”
Lauren had no answer.
Emily pushed off the wall and started walking again.
“Does Noah know any of this?”
“No.”
“Keep it that way.”
“I’m trying.”
“How much does he know about the foreclosure?”
“He knows we might move.”
“Does he know why?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Lauren exhaled.
“Emily.”
“What?”
“Dad is worse than he used to be.”
Emily almost made a bitter joke, but something in Lauren’s tone stopped her.
“Worse how?”
“Angrier.”
“At you?”
“At everybody.”
“Has he hurt anyone?”
“No.”
The answer was immediate, but not clean.
Emily slowed.
“Lauren.”
“He hasn’t hit us.”
“That wasn’t exactly what I asked.”
Lauren said nothing.
Emily heard a door open on the other end.
Then Robert’s voice, distant but unmistakable.
“Who are you talking to?”
Lauren whispered something.
Robert’s voice came closer.
“Is that her?”
The phone rustled.
Lauren said, “Dad, don’t.”
Then Robert was on the line.
“Emily.”
Seven years collapsed into one syllable.
Emily stopped walking.
“Dad.”
Robert breathed heavily.
“You finally decided to call.”
“I called Lauren.”
“Same difference.”
“No.”
A pause.
Then he said, “You know what’s happening.”
“I know about the foreclosure.”
“You can stop it.”
“I can’t.”
“You mean you won’t.”
“I’m recused.”
Robert laughed.
The sound was older now, roughened around the edges, but Emily recognized it immediately.
“Still hiding behind fancy words.”
Her pulse kicked harder.
“Do not do that.”
“Do what?”
“Talk to me like I’m twenty-two.”
“Well, maybe stop acting like it.”
Emily shut her eyes.
Somewhere inside her, the woman from the bedroom stood barefoot beside an open window.
“I know about Sterling Capital.”
Silence.
Complete silence.
When Robert spoke again, his voice had changed.
“Your mother told you.”
“Lauren did.”
“Of course she did.”
Emily ignored that.
“Did you sign my name?”
Robert breathed out slowly.
“It was more complicated than that.”
Emily opened her eyes.
“No.”
“Listen to me.”
“No.”
“You benefited from that money.”
“I never saw a dollar.”
“You had a roof over your head.”
Emily actually smiled.
There was something almost impressive about the speed with which he reached for justification.
“You put business debt in my name.”
“I was keeping the business alive.”
“With my credit.”
“You were nineteen.”
“That makes it worse.”
“You didn’t have credit worth protecting.”
Emily’s jaw tightened.
There it was again.
He could still find the exact sentence that made cruelty sound practical.
“You forged my signature.”
“I signed where I needed to sign.”
“That is called forgery.”
“Don’t start throwing legal words at me.”
“They’re not decorative, Dad.”
Robert’s voice rose.
“I paid it back.”
“You paid a judgment created by your own fraud.”
“With my house.”
“Your house secured your debt.”
“It cleared your record.”
Emily went still.
“What record?”
Robert hesitated.
Too late.
Emily’s mind sharpened.
“You said it cleared my record.”
“I mean the collection.”
“No.”
She stopped outside the entrance to her building but did not go in.
“You said record.”
“Emily.”
“Was there a judgment entered against me personally?”
Robert said nothing.
Her breath shortened.
“Dad.”
“It got resolved.”
“Was there a court judgment against me?”
“It’s gone now.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“It was seven years ago.”
“Four.”
“What?”
“You said the refinance was four years ago.”
Robert went silent.
Emily felt her professional instincts taking over, and for once she welcomed them.
“If the judgment was active that long, it could have affected background checks, credit reports, housing applications.”
“You got apartments.”
“That is not the point.”
“You got your job.”
“That is not the point.”
“You’re rich now.”
Emily looked through the glass doors of her building at the doorman sorting packages behind the desk.
She had spent seven years treating every hard-earned step as evidence that the Carters no longer had power over her.
Now she was wondering how many doors had been heavier because of something she had never known existed.
“I’m coming tomorrow,” she said.
Robert’s tone changed instantly.
“I knew you would.”
“Don’t.”
“We can sit down and work this out.”
“I’m not coming to work out the foreclosure.”
Silence.
“I’m coming to see every document you still have from Sterling Capital.”
“Those papers are old.”
“Find them.”
“I don’t know where they are.”
“Then look.”
Robert began to object.
Emily cut him off.
“And Dad?”
“What?”
“If a single page disappears before I get there, I’ll assume you destroyed it intentionally.”
He said nothing.
Emily’s voice remained calm.
“I’ll be there at ten.”
She ended the call before he could answer.
The next morning, Daniel was already in Emily’s office when she arrived.
He was sitting in one of the visitor chairs with her spare pharmacy flats in his hand.
Emily stopped in the doorway.
“Why are you holding my shoe?”
Daniel inspected it.
“I dropped my pen.”
“That does not explain why you’re holding my shoe.”
“I found the shoe while retrieving the pen.”
He put it back into the bottom drawer.
“Very glamorous.”
Emily set her bag down.
“You break into all your managing directors’ desks?”
“Only the suspiciously organized ones.”
He looked at her face.
Then the humor disappeared.
“What happened?”
Emily took off her coat.
“I need today.”
Daniel frowned.
May you like
“For the house?”
“For something older.”
