Chapter 3 - The Daughter He Underestimated
“Did you think I would sign this?” I asked.
Daniel stepped closer.
“You would have if we explained it properly.”
The words hung in the air.
I stared at him.
“If you explained it properly.”
He realized what he had said.
But it was too late.
“You were going to manipulate me.”
“No. I was trying to save us.”
“You were trying to save yourself.”
“You don’t understand the pressure I’ve been under.”
“Neither did your wife,” Lauren said softly.
Daniel turned toward her.
“Not now.”
Lauren’s eyes narrowed.
The polished confidence she had carried into my home began to fracture.
“No,” she said. “You do not get to silence me now.”
My father looked at her sharply.
“Lauren.”
But she kept going.
“You told me Sarah would agree to the transfer. You told me she understood the debt. You told me the marriage was over.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“It is over.”
“Apparently not to her.”
I watched them.
Daniel.
Lauren.
My father.
Three people who had apparently been making decisions about my home, my marriage, and my future while I sat in airport lounges and believed I had a husband who missed me.
Then my phone vibrated.
A message.
From an unknown number.
Do not let your father take your phone. Call me when you are alone. — Mom
I stared at the screen.
My mother had been dead for nine years.
At least, that was what I had been told.
A drunk driver.
A highway accident.
A funeral with a closed casket.
My father had held my hand while I cried beside her grave.
My breath stopped.
Dad saw the message.
His face changed.
“Give me the phone.”
I stepped backward.
“No.”
“Sarah.”
“You said Mom died.”
His expression hardened.
“This is not the time.”
“Who sent this?”
“Give me the phone.”
For the first time, fear entered his eyes.
Real fear.
Not the irritation of a father losing control of a conversation.
The fear of a man whose secret had just reached the surface.
I pressed the call button.
The phone rang once.
Twice.
Then a woman answered.
“Sarah?”
The voice was older.
Unsteady.
But I knew it.
I knew it before she said another word.
“Mom?”
Daniel looked at my father.
Lauren took a step away from both of them.
May you like
My father closed his eyes.
And on the other end of the phone, my mother began to cry.
