Chapter 10 - The Woman at the Door
We returned home with copies of everything.
Evelyn Vale was waiting outside our house.
I had never called her.
Neither had Daniel.
“Who told you?” Daniel asked.
“Judith.”
Of course.
Evelyn looked furious.
“She said you’re trying to fabricate a claim against Mercer-Vale.”
Daniel laughed.
“That sounds like her.”
Evelyn held out her phone.
“I recorded the conversation.”
That surprised me.
Maybe I liked her already.
We invited her inside.
Daniel told her everything.
Thomas.
The affair.
The DNA test.
Caleb.
The forged partnership agreement.
Evelyn did not speak for a long time.
Then she stood and walked to the window.
“My mother spent thirty years believing Dad abandoned us.”
“He didn’t,” Daniel said.
“That doesn’t give me those years back.”
“No.”
“And your family got rich.”
Daniel lowered his eyes.
“Yes.”
“While my mother worked two jobs.”
“Yes.”
“I went to community college because we couldn’t afford tuition.”
“I’m sorry.”
Evelyn turned.
“You didn’t do it.”
It was the first mercy anyone had offered Daniel since the truth began coming out.
Then Evelyn looked at me.
“Why did the DNA test happen?”
I told her.
The birthday party.
The accusation.
The chain.
Evelyn’s expression became cold.
“She chained your five-year-old outside?”
“Yes.”
“Then called me pretending she was protecting her family?”
“Yes.”
Evelyn sat down.
“Good.”
Daniel frowned.
“Good?”
“She’s scared.”
Evelyn leaned forward.
“Scared people make mistakes.”
She was right.
The next morning, Judith filed an emergency petition claiming I was mentally unstable and preventing Daniel from seeing Maisie.
Daniel learned about it before I did.
He drove directly to his mother’s house.
This time, I did not follow.
He called me forty minutes later.
“I told her I’m supporting you.”
I closed my eyes.
“What?”
“I gave your attorney a statement about the party.”
“That could hurt your mother.”
“I know.”
His voice was quiet.
“She hurt my daughter.”
It was the first time he had said it without an excuse.
Then he added.
“I’m moving out of the Mercer house.”
I was silent.
“Claire, I know that doesn’t fix us.”
“No.”
“I know I failed Maisie.”
“Yes.”
“But I’m done letting my mother decide what family means.”
That afternoon, police interviewed Judith about the chain.
That evening, Mercer-Vale’s board received notice of a potential ownership dispute.
By the next morning, the company’s lawyers had found something worse.
The forged partnership agreement was not the only altered document.
There were twelve.
And the most recent one had been signed only six years earlier.
Richard was already dead then.
May you like
Arthur was dead too.
Which meant someone still alive had continued the cover-up.
