Chapter 7: The Will
My attorney's name was Patricia Hale.
I had used her once, twelve years ago, for a property matter when my mother passed.
She had been direct and efficient and had not wasted a single word.
I had kept her number ever since without knowing why.
Now I knew why.
She called me back within the hour.
"Tell me what you have," she said.
I told her everything.
The receipts.
Tessa.
Diane.
The transfers.
The will.
Patricia listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she was quiet for four seconds exactly.
"He's restructuring," she said.
"Explain that."
"The transfers to Diane's account — money she told him not to send, sent anyway, documented by her refusals in writing — those aren't gifts.
Or rather, they're not only gifts." Her voice was precise and unhurried.
"If he's also updating his will to include her, he may be moving assets in a direction that reduces what you'd be entitled to in a divorce settlement.
Establishing a pattern of financial obligation to a third party.
Making it look like long-standing support rather than a recent transfer."
I sat down.
"He's been planning this," I said.
"I don't know that yet.
But the shape of it is worth examining very carefully." A pause.
"Nora.
Do you have access to your joint financial accounts?"
"Full access.
Both names."
"I need you to pull statements for the past twenty-four months.
Every account.
Don't move anything and don't close anything.
Just pull the records and get them to me."
"Today?"
"Today."
I opened my laptop at the kitchen table.
Grant's car was still in the driveway.
He hadn't left for work yet.
I could hear him moving upstairs.
"There's something else," I said.
"Tell me."
"He had an affair.
Fourteen months.
The woman came to my door last night.
She's willing to talk."
"Her name?"
"Tessa.
She lives three houses down.
She has no idea about the financial side of this.
She thought she was involved with a man whose wife was terminally ill."
Patricia was quiet again.
"He told her you were dying."
"Yes."
"And she has no prior knowledge of the asset transfers or the will changes?"
"None.
She found out about Diane the same time I did.
Last night."
"She may be useful," Patricia said.
"Not as a weapon.
As a witness to the pattern of deception.
A man who lies that elaborately to two women simultaneously, while moving six figures in assets, is not a man who made a series of impulsive mistakes." A pause.
"That's a pattern.
And patterns matter in court."
I heard Grant's footsteps on the stairs.
"I have to go," I said quietly.
"Get me those statements," Patricia said.
"And Nora — don't tell him you've called me."
I closed the laptop as Grant appeared in the kitchen doorway.
He was dressed for work.
He looked like he hadn't slept.
"We need to talk," he said.
"We do," I agreed.
He sat down across from me.
He had the look of a man who had spent the night rehearsing.
"I should have told you about Diane from the beginning," he said.
"I know that.
I was wrong to hide it.
I was wrong about all of it — Tessa, the money, keeping Carol in the middle.
I know I have no right to ask for anything right now, but I'm asking you to let me try to fix this."
I looked at him across the table.
Eighteen years.
The chipped coffee mug.
The golf bag by the garage door.
"I want to see the will," I said.
He blinked.
"What?"
"The updated will.
The one you told Diane about three months ago.
I want to see it."
Something moved across his face.
Fast.
Gone before it fully formed.
"That's — I haven't finalized anything.
It's still in draft—"
"Then I want to see the draft."
"Nora, that's not—"
"Grant." I kept my voice even.
"You told your daughter, a woman I had never met, that you were updating your will to protect her.
Before telling me.
Before telling me she existed." I held his gaze.
"I want to see the document."
He looked at the table.
"I'll have to get it from my attorney," he said.
"Then call your attorney," I said.
"Right now.
While I'm sitting here."
His hand went to his phone.
He looked at the screen.
He put it face-down on the table.
"I'll call him this morning," he said.
"From the office."
"I'd like you to call him from this kitchen," I said.
He looked at me for a long moment.
The rehearsed version of this conversation was not going the way he had planned.
I could see him recalculating.
"Nora," he said.
"I love you.
I have always loved you.
Whatever this looks like—"
"Call your attorney," I said.
"Or I'll call mine."
May you like
The kitchen went very quiet.
Grant picked up his phone.
