Chapter 5 - Four Days Gone
Vincent did not shout.
That would have been easier.
He simply stood between me and the front door.
“Emily.”
“Move.”
“Not with my son.”
Eleanor stepped forward.
“Mr. Carter, do not make this worse.”
His eyes moved to her.
Recognition arrived slowly.
“You’re Eleanor Shaw.”
“Yes.”
Then he looked at Daniel.
Everything clicked.
“You brought lawyers into my house?”
“One lawyer,” Daniel said. “I’m an accountant.”
That somehow made Vincent angrier.
He looked at me.
“What have you done?”
For five years, that question would have made me panic.
I would have explained myself.
Apologized.
Tried to calm him.
Not anymore.
“I learned to read before signing.”
His face lost color.
Eleanor handed him an envelope.
“You’ve been served.”
Vincent did not take it.
So she placed it on the console table.
The petition requested dissolution of marriage, temporary custody arrangements, preservation of marital assets, and emergency restrictions preventing either party from transferring disputed property.
Vincent stared at me.
“You’re divorcing me?”
“Yes.”
“Because I missed the delivery?”
I actually laughed.
It hurt my incision.
“You think you missed a delivery?”
“I know I screwed up.”
“You left while I was hemorrhaging.”
“I didn’t know how bad—”
“My mother told you I could die.”
His mouth closed.
“And you said, ‘Handle it.’”
Silence.
Rosa stood near the staircase crying quietly.
Vincent looked at Lucas.
“Emily, please.”
“Move.”
This time he did.
I walked past him.
At the doorway he said, “Is there someone else?”
I stopped.
Of all the questions he could have asked, that one revealed everything.
I turned.
“Yes, Vincent.”
His expression shattered.
“There is someone else.”
Daniel went still.
I continued.
“Me.”
Vincent stared.
“I finally chose me.”
Then I left.
For four days, Vincent did not know where Lucas and I were staying.
Eleanor advised me to keep our location private while the court addressed temporary arrangements, especially after the suspicious financial discoveries.
We stayed at my mother’s condo in Evanston.
I slept badly.
Lucas slept worse.
Recovery was painful.
Freedom was not cinematic.
There was no triumphant soundtrack.
There were breast-pump parts drying beside the sink, pain medication alarms at 3:00 a.m., tears in the shower, and moments when I missed the man I had believed Vincent was.
Daniel came by twice.
The first time he brought documents.
The second time he brought groceries.
“You didn’t need to do this,” I said.
“I know.”
That answer stayed with me.
Vincent had spent years doing things because they benefited him.
Daniel seemed comfortable doing things that produced nothing for himself.
I was not ready for romance.
Daniel never tried to make me ready.
He simply sat at Mom’s kitchen table while Lucas slept and explained financial records until numbers stopped frightening me.
On the fourth morning, Rosa called.
“Mrs. Carter?”
“What happened?”
“He’s here.”
“Vincent?”
“Yes.”
“At the house?”
“He came home with flowers.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course he did.
“Red roses?”
“Yes.”
Twenty-four of them, Rosa said.
He had walked into the foyer expecting to find me upstairs.
Instead, she told him the truth.
“Mr. Carter, your wife left four days ago.”
There was a long silence.
“What did he do?”
“He dropped the flowers.”
Something inside me twisted.
Rosa continued.
“He went upstairs. He sat in the nursery for almost an hour.”
I looked at Lucas sleeping beside me.
I did not feel satisfaction.
Only grief.
The next day Vincent requested a meeting through Eleanor.
She advised against seeing him privately.
We met at her office.
Vincent looked terrible.
His beard had grown in.
His suit was wrinkled.
For the first time since I had known him, he looked like a man whose money could not solve the room he was standing in.
He placed something on the table.
His wedding ring.
“I haven’t taken it off.”
I looked at it.
“That isn’t evidence of fidelity.”
He flinched.
“I never slept with Vanessa.”
I almost smiled.
“You spent the night at the Langham.”
“We were working.”
“She wears the bracelet you bought.”
His face went white.
That was the moment Vincent realized how much I knew.
“What else?”
“Enough.”
He leaned back.
Then he surprised me.
“Vanessa is blackmailing me.”
Eleanor immediately interrupted.
“Careful, Mr. Carter. You are represented by counsel?”
“I fired him this morning.”
“That is not wise.”
“I don’t care.”
He looked only at me.
“Vanessa and Grant have been stealing from the company.”
I stared at him.
“You forged my signature.”
“Yes.”
The confession was so immediate that I forgot to breathe.
Eleanor reached toward the recorder on the table.
Vincent noticed.
“Record everything.”
Then he looked at me again.
“I forged it.”
“Why?”
“Because I lost money.”
“How much?”
“Originally? Three million.”
Daniel frowned.
“Our records show more.”
“Because I tried to recover it.”
“Using my inheritance.”
“Yes.”
“And Vanessa?”
“She knew.”
“Were you sleeping with her?”
“No.”
“Did you kiss her?”
Silence.
There it was.
“Once,” he said.
My stomach turned.
“When?”
“Seven months ago.”
While I was pregnant.
I looked away.
“I ended it immediately.”
“You bought her a bracelet.”
“She demanded it.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Poor Vincent.”
“I know how it sounds.”
“No. You know how you want it to sound.”
He leaned forward.
“The night Lucas was born, Vanessa had proof that Grant was planning to frame me for the missing funds. She said if I left that meeting, she would give everything to Grant and disappear.”
“And you chose money.”
“I chose keeping myself out of prison.”
“Over me.”
His eyes filled.
“Yes.”
It was the first truthful thing he had said that hurt worse than the lie.
Then he pushed a flash drive across the table.
“This is everything I have.”
Eleanor looked suspicious.
“Why give us this?”
Vincent stared at Lucas’s photograph on my phone.
“Because I already lost the thing I was trying to protect.”
I did not forgive him.
But that afternoon, Daniel opened the drive.
And discovered Vincent had told the truth about one thing.
Grant Keller and Vanessa Bellamy had been planning something.
May you like
Except it was much bigger than stealing money.
They were preparing to make me responsible for it.
