Chapter 6: What Tom Was Afraid to Say Alone
Emma met her father at a coffee shop two miles from his house — neutral ground, her choice, somewhere public enough that neither of them would lose control of themselves.
She called me from the parking lot before she went in.
"You don't have to tell me everything afterward," I said.
"Whatever he says is between you and him."
"I know," she said.
"I just needed to hear your voice first."
I waited at home.
I made tea I didn't drink.
I sat by the window and watched the street and tried not to check my phone every four minutes.
She called two hours later.
"Are you sitting down?" she said.
"Yes."
"Kristen was married before.
Not just once — twice.
Both husbands." Emma's voice was careful, measured, like she was reading from notes she'd made to keep herself steady.
"The first one died.
Heart attack, they said, though he was fifty-one and had no history of cardiac problems.
The second one divorced her after fourteen months and filed a restraining order.
Dad found out about the restraining order six weeks ago."
I said nothing.
"She had him sign documents," Emma continued.
"Early in the marriage.
He thought they were standard financial planning forms — he said she had an accountant present, someone he'd never met, and it all looked legitimate.
He signed them.
He didn't read them closely enough." A pause.
"Mom, she has power of attorney."
The word landed like something dropped from a height.
"Over everything?" I said.
"Over everything.
His accounts.
His property.
His medical decisions if he becomes incapacitated." Emma's breath was uneven now.
"The will wasn't his idea.
He told me today — he told the lawyer — that Kristen presented it as estate planning.
She sat with him and the accountant and walked him through it and he signed it because she told him it was the right thing to do for their future together."
"Tom signed away his daughters," I said.
"He didn't understand what he was signing." Her voice broke slightly.
"I'm not defending him.
He should have read it.
He should have had his own lawyer look at it.
He was careless and he was naive and he trusted her when he shouldn't have.
But Mom — he didn't do it on purpose."
I pressed my hand flat against the kitchen table.
"Where is he now?" I said.
"Still at the coffee shop.
He didn't want to go home." A long pause.
"He's scared of her, Mom.
He said she monitors his phone.
She checks his email.
He said the last time he tried to bring up changing the will back, she cried for four hours and then didn't speak to him for two weeks and he just — he gave up."
I thought about the man I had been married to for nineteen years.
His stubbornness.
His pride.
The way he had once told me, during one of our worst arguments, that he would rather be wrong in silence than right out loud.
That man had walked into something he didn't know how to walk out of.
"He needs a lawyer," I said.
"His own.
Not the one she introduced him to."
"I told him that."
"A family law attorney.
Someone who handles financial coercion."
"I know.
I already called Daniel's uncle — he's a family attorney in the city.
He said he can see Dad tomorrow if Dad comes in alone."
I exhaled slowly.
"Emma," I said.
"You just got married four days ago."
"I know," she said quietly.
"You should be on your honeymoon."
"We postponed it." A small, sad sound that was almost a laugh.
"Daniel said the honeymoon will keep.
He said family doesn't."
I closed my eyes.
"Tell your father," I said carefully, "that whatever happened between him and me — whatever he did or didn't do — he is still Sophie's father.
And yours.
And if he is in trouble, the right thing is to get out of it.
Not to protect her.
Not to avoid embarrassment.
To get out."
Emma was quiet for a moment.
"He asked me something," she said.
"Before I left."
"What?"
"He asked if you would hate him for this."
I looked out the window at the ordinary street, the ordinary afternoon, the life I had built carefully and quietly after the divorce, the life that was now being pulled sideways by a woman I had met exactly once.
"Tell him," I said, "that I don't have the energy to hate him.
Tell him to focus on getting himself free."
After I hung up, I sat at the table for a long time.
Then I picked up my phone and called Sophie.
May you like
"We need to talk," I said.
"About those folders you saw."
