Chapter 8: What She Was Willing to Do
I didn't sleep well that night.
*She said if I made her leave, she'd make sure I regretted it.*
I turned the sentence over in the dark, trying to find its edges.
A threat from Judy could mean a hundred things.
A cold silence.
A campaign of guilt.
Calls to extended family.
Something worse.
By morning I had decided one thing: I was not going to wait and find out.
I called Mark at seven.
"Did she say anything else last night?"
"She cried.
Told me I was abandoning her.
That she gave up everything for me and this is how I repay her." His voice was tired.
"The usual."
"Mark, she threatened you."
"I know."
"That's not nothing.
What does she actually have?
What could she do?"
A pause.
"I don't know.
I've been trying to think."
"Think harder.
Because she said it for a reason."
He was quiet for a moment.
"There's one thing.
When we bought the house — our house — my mom lent us part of the down payment.
Forty thousand dollars.
We paid her back over two years, but there's no formal documentation.
It was a family thing."
My stomach dropped.
"She could claim she never got it back," I said.
"She could try.
But she'd have no proof either way."
"People don't need proof to cause damage, Mark.
They just need to make noise."
He exhaled.
"I know."
"Do you have any bank records?
Transfers?
Anything?"
"I'd have to look.
The transfers were a while ago."
"Look today," I said.
"Pull everything you can find."
He said he would.
I hung up and stood in my mom's kitchen for a moment, Riley on my hip, thinking about Judy sitting in our house right now.
In the bedroom down the hall from the nursery.
Watering her own plants, probably, since she'd had the foresight to bring some.
My phone buzzed.
A text from a number I didn't recognize.
*Kate.
This is Judy.
I think we should speak privately.
Woman to woman.
Before this goes further.*
I stared at it.
She'd gotten my number from Mark's phone.
Or she'd always had it and never used it before now.
I typed back: *I'm listening.*
Her reply came within thirty seconds.
*Not by text.
Can you meet me?*
I thought about what Patricia had said.
*Don't tell him.
Show him.*
I thought about what Mark had said.
*She said she'd make sure I regretted it.*
I typed: *Tomorrow.
11am.
The coffee shop on Mercer Street.
Public place.*
Her reply: *Fine.
Come alone.*
I put my phone down and looked at Riley.
"Your grandmother wants a private meeting," I told her.
Riley blinked at me with her enormous, unconcerned eyes.
"I know," I said.
"I don't trust it either."
But I was going.
Because Judy had tipped her hand by reaching out at all.
She was worried.
May you like
And a worried Judy was a Judy who might say something she couldn't take back.
I just needed to make sure I had a way to remember exactly what that was.
