Chapter 7: Patricia Fights Back
She called at seven the next morning.
I was on my second cup of tea, sitting at the kitchen table with Gerald's summary notes spread in front of me, when my phone lit up with her name.
I put it on speaker.
"You've made a very serious mistake," Patricia said.
Her voice was composed.
She had slept, or at least rested, and she had used the hours to rebuild herself.
"My solicitor has reviewed the referral documents.
There are significant gaps in the transfer evidence.
The case is far weaker than you believe."
"Good morning, Patricia."
A short pause.
"I want to talk about a resolution."
"I'm listening."
"The money can be returned.
All of it.
Within thirty days.
In exchange, you withdraw the fraud referral and we proceed with the original divorce terms."
"The original divorce terms left me with my clothes."
"The terms can be renegotiated.
You keep the house.
A fair settlement.
We both walk away cleanly."
I looked at Gerald, who was sitting across from me with his pen poised.
"And the company registered in Ethan's name?" I said.
A beat.
"A misunderstanding.
A filing error.
Easily corrected."
"And Sasha?"
"That's Ethan's concern.
Not mine."
"She has a document you gave her, Patricia.
A pre-signed property transfer form.
Reeves has it."
Silence.
"Whatever Sasha thinks she understood about that document —"
"Reeves has already had it examined.
The form type, the dating gap, the signature placement.
It's consistent with what I told them it was." I paused.
"You gave a twenty-five-year-old woman a document she didn't understand and told her it was a formality.
She has a newborn baby.
She came to this house last night because you told her it would be hers."
"I was managing a complicated situation."
"You were using her."
Patricia's voice hardened.
"You have no idea what I was managing.
Ethan would have destroyed himself without me.
He has no instinct for money, no instinct for people.
Everything he has, I built for him."
"Including a fraud case with his name on it."
"That was a contingency."
The word landed in the room like something dropped from a height.
Gerald wrote it down.
"A contingency," I repeated.
"If the divorce had gone wrong.
If you'd fought it.
I needed something that would make you back down."
"You were going to threaten your own son with a fraud charge to control the outcome of my divorce."
Silence again.
Longer this time.
"You won't understand this," Patricia said, "because you don't have children.
But everything I did was for him."
"You moved his money into your account.
You registered a company in his name without his knowledge.
You introduced a young woman into his life and gave her false promises so she would sign a document that served your purposes." I kept my voice level.
"Which part of that was for Ethan?"
No answer.
"The offer is declined," I said.
"The referral stands.
Reeves will be in contact about the Spanish property today."
"You're making an enemy."
"You said that last night.
It didn't change anything then either."
I ended the call.
Gerald set his pen down.
"Contingency," he said.
"Write it up.
She said it on a recorded line."
He was already typing.
My phone buzzed again almost immediately.
Not Patricia this time.
It was Sasha.
*Can I come down?
Clara's awake and I need to talk to you.*
*Come down,* I wrote back.
She appeared in the kitchen doorway two minutes later, the baby in her arms, her hair pulled back, looking like someone who had also been awake since before dawn.
"I heard your phone," she said.
"Was that her?"
"Yes."
"What did she want?"
"To make it go away."
Sasha sat down at the table.
Clara blinked at the kitchen light with the slow, unfocused attention of someone encountering the world for the first time.
"I need to tell you something," Sasha said.
"Something I didn't say last night."
I waited.
"The document she gave me.
There was a second one.
I didn't bring it because I didn't think it mattered.
It was in a different envelope." She paused.
"She told me it was a life insurance nomination form.
She said Ethan wanted Clara covered."
Gerald looked up from his laptop.
"Do you still have it?" I asked.
"At my flat.
Yes."
"Don't touch it.
I'll send someone to collect it today."
Sasha nodded.
She looked down at Clara.
"I was so sure she was helping me," she said quietly.
"She was so kind.
She remembered things I'd told her.
She asked about my mum, my sister." She shook her head.
"I've never felt so stupid in my life."
"She's had decades of practice," I said.
"And she chose you carefully.
You were young, you were alone, you had no reason not to trust her."
"That doesn't make me feel better."
"No," I said honestly.
"It probably doesn't."
Clara made a small sound.
Sasha adjusted her hold.
"What happens now?" Sasha asked.
May you like
"Now we find out what the second document actually says." I looked at her steadily.
"And then we make sure she can't use either of you again."
