Chapter 5: The Brother's Call
I answered on the second ring and put it on speaker without asking Sloan's permission.
She needed to hear this.
And I needed a witness.
"You're home early," Dominic said.
His voice had the easy, slightly amused quality he had perfected over forty years of never being held accountable for anything.
"I am," I said.
"How's the penthouse?
I imagine it was a surprise, finding Sloan there."
He knew.
Of course he knew.
He had probably known the moment my flight landed.
"We've been talking," I said.
A brief pause.
Just long enough to mean something.
"About what?"
"Section eleven.
Subsection C."
The pause this time was longer.
"I don't know what you're referring to," he said.
"Dominic." I kept my voice flat.
"The edit log has your username and an eleven forty-seven timestamp.
Marcus has already pulled it.
Don't."
The easy quality left his voice.
What replaced it was something harder and more familiar — the tone he used when he had been caught as a child and was already calculating the fastest exit.
"Marcus has been filling your head with theories," he said.
"That man has hated me since I joined the firm.
Whatever he showed you, it's been framed to make me look—"
"He also has the letter you sent Sloan."
Silence.
"The handwritten one," I said.
"Where you threatened to contest Willa's paternity if she told me about the clause."
More silence.
Then: "She was going to take you for everything, Vincent.
I was protecting you."
Sloan's jaw tightened.
She didn't speak.
"You stripped her health insurance before our daughter was born," I said.
"Willa ended up in the hospital without coverage.
Sloan paid forty-three thousand dollars out of the settlement money you helped make sure was small enough to run out."
"That's not—" He stopped.
Started again.
"The clause was standard risk mitigation.
Any competent attorney would have—"
"It was inserted at eleven forty-seven at night, after the document had been approved, by your login." My voice didn't rise.
"Stop."
Another silence.
When he spoke again, the calculation was audible.
I had heard it my whole life — the moment Dominic shifted from denial to negotiation.
"Look," he said.
"This doesn't have to go anywhere.
You and I can sit down, work out a number, make sure Sloan is covered going forward.
Nobody needs to involve anyone outside the family.
Marcus can be managed.
The document can be—"
"Marcus made his calls an hour ago," I said.
Dead air.
"The ethics board will receive the file tomorrow morning," I said.
"The DA's office gets a copy of the letter and the edit log by end of week.
That's already in motion.
I'm not calling you to negotiate.
I'm calling to tell you that it's done."
"Vincent." His voice changed again.
Lower.
Something that might have been genuine, or might have been the last tool in the box.
"She left you.
She took your child and disappeared for six months.
I was trying to make sure you weren't the one who got destroyed by this."
"She didn't leave me," I said.
"I left her.
And then I left her alone with a sick newborn and no insurance and a letter from my brother threatening her into silence." I looked at Willa, asleep in the bassinet.
"You didn't protect me, Dominic.
You used my name and my documents to hurt someone who was already alone.
And you used my daughter as a weapon to keep her quiet."
Nothing from the other end.
"Don't call this number again," I said.
"Talk to a lawyer."
I ended the call.
Sloan was looking at the bassinet.
Her eyes were wet but she wasn't crying, not quite.
She pressed her lips together and breathed out slowly through her nose.
"He really thought you wouldn't believe me," she said.
"I know."
"Even with the letter.
Even with the edit log.
He thought your loyalty to him would outweigh all of it."
I looked at her.
"He's been wrong about me for a long time.
I just never made it cost him anything before."
Sloan nodded slowly.
Then she reached into the bassinet and adjusted Willa's blanket, even though it didn't need adjusting.
"Marcus said the ethics board process could take months," she said.
"It could."
"And the DA might not move quickly."
"He might not." I sat down on the other end of the couch.
"But the firm will suspend his access by morning.
He won't be able to touch another document with my name on it."
She was quiet for a moment.
Then: "What happens to us while all of that is moving?"
It was the first time she had said *us* since I walked through the door.
"I don't know yet," I said honestly.
"But I'd like to figure it out.
If you're willing."
Sloan looked at me for a long time.
Not with hope.
Not with anger.
With something more careful than either.
"Ask me again in a week," she said.
"When I've had more than four hours of sleep."
May you like
It was the closest thing to a yes I had any right to expect.
Then Willa woke up and began to cry, and whatever fragile thing had opened between us was set aside, because there was a baby who needed feeding, and for the first time, I was there to help with that too.
