Chapter 8 - THE TRAP
Monday morning, Roman signed the Calder shipping agreement.
At least, Thomas believed he did.
The documents were replicas.
The conference room was wired.
Federal agents occupied two offices downstairs.
I watched remotely from the hospital.
My doctor disapproved.
Rachel said stress was unhealthy.
I reminded her that being murdered was probably worse.
She stopped arguing.
Roman sat at the head of a polished table in Manhattan.
Alessia sat to his right.
Cameras outside had photographed them arriving together.
On social media, I was already being portrayed as the discarded pregnant wife.
Strangers were calling me pathetic.
Manipulative.
Probably difficult.
One woman wrote that a man like Roman “wouldn’t wander unless home was cold.”
I stared at that sentence longer than I should have.
Then deleted the app.
The world always had volunteers willing to explain why betrayed women had caused their own betrayal.
I had more important things to do.
Thomas entered at 10:03.
Gray suit.
Blue tie.
Confident smile.
He hugged Alessia.
She let him.
That took courage.
Then he shook Roman’s hand.
“You’re making the right decision.”
Roman smiled without warmth.
“I’m making a decision.”
Thomas accepted the distinction.
Documents were placed on the table.
Roman signed.
Thomas visibly relaxed.
“Now Patrick,” Roman said.
“Safe.”
“That wasn’t the agreement.”
“He escaped.”
Thomas sounded mildly offended.
Roman leaned back.
“How inconvenient.”
Thomas’s smile disappeared.
“He has always been unreliable.”
Alessia asked, “And Cassandra?”
My name changed the room.
Thomas glanced toward her.
“She will be taken care of.”
Roman’s eyes sharpened.
“Meaning?”
“Financially.”
“Good.”
I admired Roman’s performance.
Months earlier, hearing him discuss me that coldly would have shattered me.
Now it felt like watching an actor play a version of himself he was trying to bury.
Thomas opened another folder.
“Then we need one last signature.”
Roman did not touch it.
“What?”
“Temporary guardianship nomination.”
“Cassandra hasn’t delivered.”
“Preparation.”
“Whose name?”
Thomas turned the document.
Evan Kane.
Not Calder.
Kane.
Roman pretended not to recognize it.
“Who is he?”
“My family’s trust specialist.”
Thomas was giving us everything.
Daniel, sitting beside me, whispered, “Come on.”
Roman picked up the pen.
Then stopped.
“Why him?”
Thomas’s voice cooled.
“You wanted your daughter protected from Cassandra’s instability.”
“And if I changed my mind?”
Thomas looked at him.
“Then you would be changing your mind very late.”
Threat.
Clear.
Good.
But not enough.
We needed Evan.
Not merely evidence against Thomas.
Roman pushed the paper away.
“No.”
Thomas stared.
“No?”
“The shipping agreement stands. My daughter stays out of it.”
Thomas’s jaw tightened.
“That is not possible.”
Roman stood.
“Everything is possible.”
Thomas stood too.
And there it was.
The confidence cracked.
“You stupid bastard.”
Roman smiled.
“Now you sound like Patrick.”
Thomas glanced at Alessia.
Then understood.
Her face told him.
Trap.
He moved toward the door.
Agents entered.
“Thomas Calder, don’t move.”
Thomas laughed.
Actually laughed.
“You think this ends with me?”
Roman said nothing.
Agents cuffed Thomas.
He looked directly into the hidden camera.
At me, though he could not know exactly where I watched.
“Cassandra,” he said.
My skin prickled.
“Tell her something for me.”
The agent pushed him toward the door.
Thomas continued.
“Evan has already gone to meet his niece.”
I stood so fast the fetal monitor lead pulled loose.
Daniel was already on the phone.
“Lock the maternity floor.”
The hospital alarm sounded.
Again.
No.
Not again.
Security footage appeared on Daniel’s tablet.
A man in physician scrubs.
Gray hair.
Glasses.
Different face from the old photographs.
But the scar near his temple remained.
Evan.
He entered the elevator five minutes earlier.
Third floor.
My floor.
Daniel drew his weapon.
“Bathroom.”
“I’m not hiding.”
“You are thirty-two weeks pregnant.”
“Thirty-three tomorrow.”
“Congratulations. Bathroom.”
Rachel grabbed my arm.
“Cass.”
This was not pride.
I knew the difference.
I went.
Daniel locked us inside.
Outside, footsteps.
A voice.
Then silence.
Too much silence.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Daniel had taken the secure phone.
This was my personal one.
I answered.
“Hello?”
A man’s voice.
“Cassandra.”
Evan.
My blood turned cold.
“You’ve caused a great deal of trouble.”
“You photographed me for two years. I think we’re past introductions.”
He laughed softly.
“You are better than Roman deserves.”
“That makes two of us who think so.”
Rachel stared at me.
I continued.
“Where are you?”
“Close.”
“Then come talk.”
“Brave.”
“No. Tired.”
That was true.
“Why Isabel?” I asked.
“You know.”
“Money?”
“My inheritance.”
“Your father left it to Roman’s child.”
“My father abandoned my mother.”
There it was.
Not business.
A wound.
“He paid her to disappear. Then raised Roman in mansions while I watched my mother die in a rented apartment.”
Pain.
Real pain.
Weaponized over decades.
“That was cruel,” I said.
Evan went silent.
“But Isabel didn’t do it.”
“My daughter?”
His voice changed.
I froze.
Rachel mouthed, What?
I pressed speaker.
Evan continued.
“Did Beatrice not tell you?”
My heart hammered.
“Tell me what?”
“Your husband’s father didn’t merely abandon my mother.”
A pause.
“He abandoned me because Beatrice told him I was not his son.”
I tried to understand.
“But you are.”
“DNA proved it years later.”
Evan’s breathing changed.
“I lost my father because of a lie.”
“And now you want to steal a father from Isabel?”
Silence.
That landed.
Good.
I pressed.
“You spent seven years planning to punish people who are dead or old or guilty. Fine. But my daughter is innocent.”
“She has what should have been mine.”
“She has nothing yet.”
“Four billion dollars.”
“No.”
My voice sharpened.
“She has a mother in a hospital bed and a father who nearly destroyed his marriage because he was too arrogant to admit he was scared.”
Rachel almost smiled despite herself.
“She doesn’t have four billion dollars. She doesn’t know what money is. She kicks me when I drink orange juice.”
Evan said nothing.
“You’re not fighting Isabel,” I continued. “You’re fighting a dead man.”
Then I heard a sound outside the bathroom.
Daniel shouting.
A shot.
Rachel grabbed my hand.
The line went dead.
The door handle moved.
Once.
Twice.
Then stopped.
“Cassandra?”
Roman.
I unlocked the door.
He stood there breathing hard.
Blood on his shirt.
Again.
“Whose?”
“Evan’s.”
My stomach dropped.
“Dead?”
“No.”
Daniel appeared behind him.
“Gone.”
“Gone?”
“He used the service stairs. Security is searching.”
Roman took my face in both hands.
Then remembered himself.
He started to release me.
I held his wrists.
Just for a second.
Because I had been afraid.
And because marriage can die without every feeling dying with it.
Roman’s eyes closed.
He rested his forehead against mine.
No kiss.
No promise.
Just relief.
Then my body tightened.
Harder than any contraction before.
I gasped.
Roman froze.
Water hit the bathroom floor.
Again.
But this time the nurse who rushed in examined me and looked directly at the obstetrician.
“We’re not stopping it.”
Roman’s face changed.
“What does that mean?”
The doctor looked at us.
“It means your daughter is coming.”
As nurses hurried me toward labor and delivery, Daniel’s phone rang.
He answered.
Then looked at Roman.
“What?”
Daniel lowered the phone slowly.
“Evan didn’t run from the hospital.”
“Where is he?”
Daniel looked toward me.
“He went upstairs.”
“To what?”
“The neonatal intensive care unit.”
My heart stopped.
The NICU.
Where my premature daughter would be taken minutes after birth.
May you like
Evan was not leaving.
He was waiting for Isabel.
