Chapter 7: What Tessa Wanted Her to Understand
Emma didn't respond to the message for two hours.
She sat in the back of Adrian's car while he made calls she only half-listened to — attorneys, a board member, someone named Harris who handled internal compliance.
The city moved past the windows in the early dark, the harbor lights smearing across the glass when they turned corners.
At some point Adrian ended his last call and said, "You don't have to meet with her."
"I know," Emma said.
"Whatever she wants to tell you — it won't change the legal situation."
"I know that too."
He was quiet for a moment.
"Then why are you going to go?"
Emma looked at the message on her phone.
Tessa's name at the top of the screen.
The same contact she'd texted a hundred times about nothing — dinner plans, their mother's birthday, a funny video, a question about a recipe.
"Because she's my sister," Emma said.
"And I need to hear her say it herself."
She texted back: *My apartment.
Eight o'clock.*
Tessa arrived at seven fifty-five.
She knocked instead of using the spare key Emma had given her two years ago, which told Emma something before the door even opened.
She looked different.
Not worse, exactly — but smaller.
The confidence from the hotel room was gone.
She was wearing a coat Emma didn't recognize, her hair pulled back, no lipstick.
She looked like someone who had been rehearsing a conversation for hours and had forgotten all of it.
"Come in," Emma said.
They sat at the kitchen table.
Emma didn't offer tea.
Tessa didn't ask for any.
"I need you to understand that I didn't plan for it to happen the way it did," Tessa said.
"Which part?"
Tessa's hands were flat on the table.
"Cole and I — it started before I understood what he was."
"When did you understand what he was?"
A pause.
"About four months in."
"And you continued."
"I thought I could—" She stopped.
"I thought if I stayed close enough, I could protect you somehow.
Get enough information to—"
"Tessa." Emma's voice was quiet and very clear.
"Don't."
Tessa went still.
"Don't tell me you did this to protect me," Emma said.
"I need you to not say that."
Tessa's eyes filled.
"I'm not saying that.
I'm saying that's what I told myself.
I know the difference."
That landed differently than Emma expected.
She looked at her sister — really looked at her — and saw something she hadn't been able to see in the hotel room.
Not triumph.
Not calculation.
Something more complicated and less forgivable and, in its own way, more painful.
"The Delaware company," Emma said.
"You're a co-owner."
Tessa didn't flinch.
"Yes."
"He put you on it."
"He asked me to sign documents.
He told me it was an investment vehicle.
A way to build something outside the Marston Group structure." She looked at the table.
"I signed them."
"Did you know where the money was coming from?"
Silence.
"Tessa."
"I suspected," she said quietly.
"I didn't ask."
"Because you didn't want to know."
"Because I didn't want to lose him." She looked up.
Her voice broke slightly on the last word and she pressed her lips together.
"I know how that sounds."
"It sounds like you chose him over me," Emma said.
"Repeatedly.
For five months."
"Yes." No hesitation.
"I did.
And I have to live with that."
Emma stood and walked to the window.
The harbor was visible from here on a clear day.
Tonight there was only the reflection of the kitchen light in the dark glass.
"He told you something in the records room," Tessa said behind her.
"About what he said to me.
What I agreed to."
Emma turned.
"He said you know what you agreed to."
Tessa's expression didn't change, but something behind her eyes went out.
"He was going to leave Port Mercy," she said.
"After the wedding.
After certain transfers were complete.
He said he'd take me with him." She paused.
"I believed him for about three months.
Then I stopped believing him and kept going anyway.
Which is worse."
"Yes," Emma said.
"It is."
"I called Diane Forsythe," Tessa said.
"Three weeks ago.
I was going to give her what I had.
The documents I'd signed, the account information, everything.
I thought if it came out before the wedding—"
"You'd be the one who stopped it."
Tessa looked at her hands.
"Something like that."
"But she didn't meet with you."
"No."
Emma came back to the table.
She sat down across from her sister.
She looked at her for a long time without speaking.
"I can't forgive you tonight," Emma said finally.
"I want to be honest about that."
Tessa nodded.
Her eyes were wet but she wasn't crying.
"But I need to ask you something, and I need the truth."
"All right."
"The documents you signed.
Do you still have copies?"
Tessa reached into her coat pocket and placed a folded envelope on the table.
"I brought them with me," she said.
"I brought everything I have."
May you like
Emma looked at the envelope.
Then she picked up her phone and called Adrian.
