Chapter 5: What Rebecca Was Really After
Claire's mother answered on the third ring.
Her name was Judith, and she was seventy-one years old and had never once in eleven years of knowing me raised her voice.
She raised it now.
"I've been trying to reach you for two days," she said.
"I called your office.
I called your cell.
Nathan, someone contacted our trustee last week.
A man named Patrick Hale.
He said he was representing your interests in a family restructuring matter."
My hand tightened on the phone.
"What did the trustee say?"
"He said he needed to verify the contact through you before discussing anything.
He called me because something felt wrong.
Nathan — what is happening?"
"I need you to tell the trustee not to speak to Patrick Hale under any circumstances.
Not by phone, not by email, not through any intermediary."
"Already done.
Yesterday afternoon." A pause.
"Are you safe?
Is Emily safe?"
"We're both safe.
We're outside the chapel."
A long silence.
"The wedding," Judith said.
"Didn't happen."
I heard her exhale.
It was not a sound of surprise.
"I want to tell you something," she said.
"And I want you to listen without interrupting."
"All right."
"Rebecca called me.
Six weeks ago.
She introduced herself very warmly.
She said she was going to be Emily's stepmother and she wanted to build a relationship with Claire's family.
She asked about the trust.
She said she wanted to understand it so she could help Emily feel connected to her mother's memory." A pause.
"She asked how the administration would change if you were no longer the primary custodial parent."
The stone path in front of me was very still.
"What did you tell her?"
"I told her that was not a conversation I was prepared to have with someone I had just met.
And then I called my own attorney."
"Judith—"
"I didn't tell you because I wasn't certain.
I didn't want to damage something that might have been real.
I thought perhaps I was being a suspicious old woman." Her voice tightened.
"I was not being a suspicious old woman."
"No," I said.
"You weren't."
Emily had come to stand beside me.
She was looking up at my face, reading it.
I crouched down to her level.
"Is Grandma Judith on the phone?" she asked.
I nodded.
Emily held out her hand.
I gave her the phone.
"Hi, Grandma Judith," she said.
Her voice was very small and very steady.
"I gave Daddy the note.
He didn't agree."
I could hear Judith's voice through the speaker, warm and immediate.
"I know, sweetheart.
I know he didn't."
I stood up and looked at Carol.
"Rebecca knew about the trust," I said.
Carol nodded slowly.
"How long do you think she's known?"
"Long enough to find Patrick Hale.
Long enough to put a clause in a legal document and hope I wouldn't read past page eight."
"She spent two years on this."
The number sat between us.
Two years of dinners.
Two years of helping with homework.
Two years of promising she would never try to replace Claire.
Every moment recalibrated now.
Every smile, every patient afternoon at the kitchen table, every time she had held Emily's hand crossing the street.
Carol put her hand on my arm.
"Nathan.
She's still in there."
I looked toward the chapel entrance.
"I know."
"She's not going to walk away quietly.
Not with Hale involved."
"I know that too."
Emily came back and returned my phone.
She looked up at me with an expression I recognized.
It was the same expression she had worn the night I told her that her mother was gone — that particular stillness children carry when they understand something enormous has happened and they are waiting to find out if the adults around them can hold it.
"Are we going home?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"We're going home."
"Is Rebecca coming?"
"No."
She considered this.
Then she reached up and pulled the last loose flower from her hair and held it in her palm and looked at it.
"Good," she said.
Behind us, the chapel doors opened.
Rebecca walked out into the light.
She was still in her wedding gown.
She had her phone in one hand.
Her expression had settled into something composed and deliberate, the face of someone who has moved from one plan to the backup.
"Nathan," she said.
"Patrick would like to speak with you."
She held out the phone.
I did not take it.
"Tell Patrick Hale," I said, "that my attorney will be in contact with the Vermont State Bar by Monday morning."
Rebecca's composure held for exactly two more seconds.
Then something shifted behind her eyes.
Not fear.
Something colder.
"You don't know what you're doing," she said.
May you like
"I'm starting to," I said.
And I turned and walked away with my daughter's hand in mine.
