Chapter 2: Page Nine
Grant grabbed my arm the moment the hotel manager walked toward him.
"You have no idea what you've just started," he said through his teeth.
"Neither did you," I said.
"When you married me."
The blonde woman — his mistress — took one step back.
Her name was Lauren.
I knew that already.
What I hadn't known, until that file opened on my phone, was that Lauren had signed a document eighteen months ago.
A document naming herself as Ellie's emergency guardian.
My three-year-old daughter.
My child.
And this woman had already signed paperwork.
Ellie stirred against my shoulder.
I held her tighter.
"How long?" I asked Grant quietly.
He said nothing.
"How long have you been planning this?"
The hotel manager stopped a few feet away, uncertain.
Grant's card had just been declined at the front desk.
His corporate account — frozen.
His personal account — frozen.
Even the joint account he thought I didn't know about.
Lauren touched his sleeve.
"Grant.
We should go."
That was when my phone buzzed.
It was my father's attorney.
He said four words I will never forget.
"Mara.
Read page nine."
I opened the file with one hand, Ellie still sleeping against me.
And when I saw what was on page nine…
May you like
I understood why my father had hidden it.
And why Grant had needed me alive.
