Chapter 7 - The Man Who Lied to Me
Caroline stepped away from Ethan.
Police lights flashed across the snow.
Grant was being loaded into an ambulance.
Sloane stood with two officers.
And Caroline could hear only one sentence.
My real name is Ethan Cole.
“You’re his son.”
“Yes.”
“You lied to me.”
“About my name.”
“You think that’s a small detail?”
“No.”
“Were you investigating Grant?”
“Yes.”
“For your father?”
“No.”
Caroline laughed sharply.
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t immediately believe you.”
“I left Darius twenty-one years ago.”
“You don’t leave people like him.”
“I did.”
“So why change your name?”
“Because I wanted a life that wasn’t his.”
Caroline stared.
“Did my father know who you were?”
“Yes.”
That hurt differently.
“You knew Robert?”
“For fourteen years.”
“My father knew you, but you told me you’d never met him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Robert made me promise.”
Caroline walked away several steps.
Every man around her seemed to possess a private collection of truths he had decided she was too fragile to hear.
Ethan followed.
“Your father contacted me after he discovered Darius had approached Grant.”
“And you helped him?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know about the poisoning?”
“Not until after Robert died.”
“Did you investigate?”
“For two years.”
“Without telling me.”
“Yes.”
Caroline turned.
“I am so tired of that word.”
Ethan said nothing.
“Did my father trust you?”
“I hope so.”
“Should I?”
“That’s for you to decide.”
Caroline looked at the cabin.
“Who shot at us?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could it have been your father?”
“Yes.”
“Could you have led him here?”
“No.”
“Could you be lying?”
“Yes.”
His answer stopped her.
Ethan continued.
“You shouldn’t trust me because I tell you to. Trust evidence.”
At least that was honest.
Caroline walked back inside.
The notebook remained on the table.
Ravenwood.
418 acres.
She opened her phone and searched the property files.
Nothing unusual.
Then Sloane entered with an officer.
“She agreed to answer questions,” the officer said.
Caroline looked at her.
Sloane’s makeup had streaked.
For the first time that evening, she looked less like a glamorous rival and more like a frightened woman who had chosen dangerous people.
“What’s under Ravenwood?”
Sloane hesitated.
Caroline waited.
“Lithium.”
Ethan looked over.
“How much?”
“A lot.”
Caroline stared at the property map.
Lithium.
Battery production.
Electric vehicles.
Technology.
Billions.
“My father knew?”
Sloane nodded.
“Cole found out five years ago.”
“And Grant?”
“About a year ago.”
Caroline closed her eyes.
So the affair had begun around the same time.
“How much is the land worth?”
Sloane gave a tired laugh.
“Potentially four billion.”
The room became silent.
Caroline understood everything.
Her trust controlled the land.
If she were removed as trustee, someone else could approve its sale.
“Nathan,” she whispered.
Her brother was second in succession.
Sloane shook her head.
“Cole never intended Nathan to control it.”
“Then who?”
“Grant.”
“He can’t become trustee.”
“Not while you’re married.”
Caroline frowned.
Sloane explained.
Grant had secretly prepared amendments to a marital property agreement.
Forged amendments.
Documents that could claim Caroline had voluntarily delegated certain voting authority to him.
“With footage showing you behaving irrationally,” Sloane said, “they planned to argue you were mentally unfit to manage the trust.”
Caroline’s stomach turned.
“That’s why the gala mattered.”
“Yes.”
“And you agreed to provoke me.”
Sloane looked away.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Money.”
Caroline almost appreciated the simple answer.
“How much?”
“Five million.”
Grant had apparently been promised far more.
Caroline sat.
“So you slept with my husband for five million dollars.”
Sloane’s eyes flashed.
“I slept with your husband because I wanted him.”
“Even better.”
“I’m not asking you to forgive me.”
“Good.”
Sloane looked down.
“He told me you didn’t love him.”
Caroline laughed.
“And that justified assault?”
“No.”
“Did he ask you to push me?”
“No.”
“Then why did you?”
Sloane’s eyes filled.
“Because I thought he was going to leave you that night.”
Caroline stared.
“And when he didn’t?”
“I got angry.”
There it was.
Not a master plan.
Not sophisticated manipulation.
Jealousy.
Cruelty.
Vanity.
Caroline had spent nine months imagining Sloane as some brilliant enemy.
In reality, she was simply another person Grant had lied to.
Sloane sat opposite her.
“There’s something else.”
“Of course there is.”
“Grant was going to leave me.”
Caroline frowned.
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
“Why didn’t he?”
“I threatened to tell Cole he was collecting evidence.”
Caroline stared.
“Grant was investigating Cole?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I think he wanted out.”
Ethan nodded slowly.
“That explains Maya.”
Caroline looked at him.
“How?”
“If Grant was using Maya to copy company records, she may have been helping him build a case.”
Sloane nodded.
“She was.”
Caroline felt anger twist with confusion.
Grant had betrayed her.
But perhaps, somewhere within that betrayal, he had also been trying to undo part of what he had done.
It did not erase anything.
Still, truth mattered.
Police announced that the area was secure.
The shooter had escaped.
Ethan approached Caroline.
“We need to move the evidence.”
“To police?”
“Copies to police. Originals somewhere secure.”
“You’re not taking them.”
“I wasn’t asking to.”
Caroline looked at him.
For the first time, she saw something beneath his calm.
Fear.
“You’re afraid of your father.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Ethan’s voice lowered.
“Because he killed my mother.”
Caroline stopped.
“He made it look like an overdose.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I was seventeen.”
“And you’ve been trying to bring him down ever since?”
“Not every day.”
He looked at Robert’s recorder.
“But long enough.”
Caroline thought about her father.
Ethan’s mother.
Nathan.
Maya.
Grant bleeding in an ambulance.
So many people had spent years bending their lives around Darius Cole.
Enough.
“What happens if we prove everything?”
Ethan looked at her.
“My father goes to prison.”
“And Ravenwood?”
“Remains yours.”
“No.”
“What?”
Caroline looked at the map.
“If that land is worth billions, keeping it as a trophy makes me no better than the men fighting over it.”
“What will you do?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Her phone rang.
Hospital.
Grant was stable.
The bullet had passed through soft tissue.
Caroline felt relief she did not want to feel.
Ethan noticed.
“You still love him.”
She stared toward the snow-covered lake.
“I love who I thought he was.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
The difference hurt.
Caroline closed her father’s notebook.
“Tomorrow morning, I want every document copied.”
Ethan nodded.
“Then?”
“Then I’m calling a press conference.”
He looked surprised.
“That’s risky.”
“I know.”
“What are you going to say?”
Caroline glanced at the soaked silver gown hanging beside the fire.
Less than six hours earlier she had crawled from a swimming pool while people filmed her humiliation.
Now those same cameras could become useful.
“I’m going to give Darius Cole exactly what Grant and Sloane wanted from me.”
Ethan frowned.
“A public scene?”
Caroline smiled.
May you like
“The biggest one Boston has seen in years.”
And this time, she would control every word.
