Chapter 10: The Day It Caught Up With Him
Walter called me four times the morning after Tatum walked into Richard's office.
I watched the phone light up from across the room and let it ring.
He left no voicemails.
The fourth call came at eleven forty-seven.
At eleven fifty-two, Richard's number appeared on the screen instead.
"Detective Marsh executed a search warrant on Walter's residence this morning," Richard said.
"They took his laptop, his phone, and several boxes of financial documents."
I sat down on the edge of the hospital bed.
Nora was in the bassinet, awake, watching the ceiling with the focused, serious expression she had worn since the first hour of her life.
"Was he there?" I asked.
"He was there."
"Did they—"
"He wasn't arrested this morning.
The investigation is still open.
But Marsh told me to expect movement within the week once the digital forensics team processes the laptop." Richard paused.
"Walter knows what's on that laptop, Nadia.
He knows what they're going to find."
"What will he do?"
"That's what I want to talk to you about.
Men like Walter, when the walls come in — they don't go quietly.
They look for leverage.
They look for something to trade." His voice was careful.
"I want you to be prepared for the possibility that he contacts you directly.
That he says something designed to make you feel guilty, or frightened, or responsible.
He may tell you he's sick.
He may tell you he's desperate.
He may tell you that if you just withdraw the complaint, it all goes away."
"I won't."
"I know.
I'm telling you so that when it happens, it doesn't catch you off guard."
It happened that afternoon.
Not a call.
A visit.
Walter appeared in the doorway of my hospital room at three o'clock.
He had not been announced.
He had walked past the nurses' station and down the corridor and through my door, and he stood there in his coat, and he looked old in a way he hadn't looked two days ago.
Carol was on her feet immediately.
"Mr.
Voss, you need to—"
"One minute," he said.
Not to Carol.
To me.
"Give me one minute."
I looked at Carol.
She stayed where she was, hand on her phone.
"One minute," I said.
Walter came two steps into the room.
He didn't look at Nora.
"Call it off," he said.
"Whatever you've set in motion — call it off.
Tell them it was a misunderstanding.
Tell them you were emotional, you'd just given birth, you misread the situation."
"I didn't misread anything."
"Nadia." His voice cracked slightly at the edges.
"I am your father.
Whatever I've done — I am still your father.
You would do this to your own father?"
"You went through Owen's private documents.
You forged his signature on a legal instrument.
You tried to take my home eleven days after I buried my husband." I kept my voice even.
"You did those things.
Not me."
"I was desperate.
I owe money to people who are not patient.
I was going to lose everything—"
"So you decided I should lose everything instead."
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
"You have a granddaughter," I said.
"She's right there.
You haven't looked at her once."
Walter looked at Nora then.
Something moved across his face — something real, I thought, something that might have been genuine.
But it was too late to mean what it might have meant before.
"If you cooperate with the investigation," I said, "if you repay what you took from my mother's estate, if you withdraw the fraudulent creditor's claim — Richard says the prosecutor may consider that in how they proceed.
That's the only path I can offer you."
"You're asking me to confess."
"I'm asking you to stop making it worse."
Walter looked at me for a long time.
Then he looked at Nora again.
She had turned her head toward the sound of voices, her dark eyes moving slowly.
"She looks like Owen," he said.
"Yes," I said.
"She does."
He turned and walked out.
Carol followed him to the elevator and watched the doors close.
When she came back, she said: "His attorney called Richard twenty minutes ago.
He wants to negotiate."
I looked at Nora.
She had gone back to studying the ceiling, patient and unhurried, as if she had already decided the world would come to her in its own time.
May you like
"Tell Richard yes," I said.
"But the terms are mine."
