Chapter 4: The Offer
The call came again at seven-twelve the following morning.
Evelyn was in the kitchen of the small flat she rented — the one Julian had called embarrassing the one time he'd seen it, the one Lily had decorated with drawings taped to the refrigerator door — and she was making toast when her phone lit up on the counter.
Same unknown number.
She picked it up this time.
"Mrs.
Harcourt." The voice was male, practiced, the particular smoothness of someone paid to deliver bad news pleasantly.
"My name is Christopher Aldren.
I represent Julian Harcourt.
I was hoping we might have a brief conversation."
"Go ahead," Evelyn said.
A short pause — he had expected more resistance at the start.
"My client is prepared to make a generous offer to resolve the current dispute without the need for court proceedings.
He understands last night was distressing for everyone involved, and he wants to move forward in a way that is fair to all parties."
"What's the offer?"
"Forty thousand pounds," Aldren said.
"A clean settlement.
You relinquish any claim to the items named in the codicil, sign a standard non-disclosure agreement, and the matter is closed.
My client is also prepared to drop any consideration of a counter-complaint regarding last night's incident."
Lily padded into the kitchen in her socks, looked at Evelyn's face, and quietly poured herself a glass of orange juice.
"He's offering me money to pretend his mother didn't leave me anything," Evelyn said.
"He's offering a resolution—"
"And to sign something that stops me from talking about what happened last night."
"The NDA is standard—"
"While he has a recording of himself h*tting me in public."
Silence on the line.
"Mrs.
Harcourt," Aldren said carefully, "my client believes the recording has been taken significantly out of context—"
"Your client called my six-year-old daughter a thief in front of three hundred people," Evelyn said.
"Then he h*t me.
Then he told security I was unstable.
That is the context."
Another pause.
Longer this time.
"The offer is on the table until Friday," he said.
"I'd encourage you to discuss it with whoever is advising you."
"I will," Evelyn said.
"Thank you for calling."
She ended the call.
Set the phone face-down on the counter.
The toast had gone cold.
Lily was watching her from across the kitchen.
"Was that the bad man's helper?"
"Yes."
"What did he want?"
Evelyn looked at her daughter.
"He wanted us to go away quietly."
Lily considered this with the gravity of a child who had been called a thief in front of three hundred people and had slept on it overnight.
"Are we going to?"
"No," Evelyn said.
Lily nodded once, as if this was the answer she had already decided on herself.
She drank her orange juice.
Evelyn called Diana at seven-thirty.
"He moved fast," Diana said, when Evelyn finished relaying the conversation.
"Forty thousand is an insult.
The jewelry alone is worth four times that, and the monetary bequest in the codicil is considerably more.
He's testing you."
"To see if I'll panic."
"To see if you know what you have." A brief pause.
"Do you want to counter, or do you want to let it go to court?"
"What do you think?"
"I think Julian Harcourt has spent his entire adult life making problems disappear with money," Diana said.
"I think the only thing he has never had to face is a room full of people watching him do what he does.
And now there's a video." Another pause.
"I think court is where he loses the most."
Evelyn looked at the drawings on the refrigerator.
Lily had drawn their flat in crayon — the two of them, stick figures, standing in front of a building that had flowers in the window boxes even though their actual window boxes were empty.
"Court," Evelyn said.
"Good." Diana's voice was steady.
"I'll notify his solicitor by end of day.
Expect Julian to call you himself after that.
He won't be able to help it."
"What should I say to him?"
"Nothing," Diana said.
"Let him talk."
Julian called at four-seventeen that afternoon.
Evelyn answered on the second ring and said nothing.
"Evelyn." His voice was different from the night before — lower, controlled, the performance stripped back.
This was the voice he used when he wanted something and had decided charm was the faster route.
"I think we've both had time to calm down.
I'd like to talk."
She waited.
"Last night got out of hand.
I'll acknowledge that.
Things were said that shouldn't have been said." A pause, inviting her to fill it.
She didn't.
"The offer my lawyer made this morning — I want you to know it comes from a genuine place.
I have no interest in dragging this through the courts.
It's painful for everyone.
It's painful for Lily."
"Don't," Evelyn said.
"I'm simply saying—"
"Don't use her name as a reason for me to be quiet."
A beat.
The charm recalibrated.
"I'm trying to find a resolution."
"I know what you're trying to find," Evelyn said.
"Diana Marsh is my attorney.
Any further communication goes through her."
"Diana Marsh." His voice changed on the name — something tightened in it, something that wasn't quite controlled.
"You do understand what that woman's agenda is?
She has spent years trying to damage this family.
She's using you, Evelyn.
Whatever she's told you, whatever documents she's shown you—"
"Were drawn up by your mother's solicitor," Evelyn said.
"Mr.
Gerald Foss.
In Edinburgh.
Would you like his number, or do you already have it?"
The line was quiet for four full seconds.
"You'll regret this," Julian said.
The charm was gone now.
This was the voice from the ballroom — the one that had never been told no.
"I promise you that."
"Goodbye, Julian," Evelyn said.
She ended the call.
Her hand was shaking slightly.
She set the phone down and pressed both palms flat on the kitchen table and breathed.
Lily appeared in the doorway.
She had been in her room, supposedly doing homework.
From the look on her face, she had heard enough.
"Mommy," she said.
"Your hands are shaking."
"I know."
"Are you scared?"
Evelyn looked at her daughter.
Thought about lying.
Decided against it.
"A little," she said.
"But scared isn't the same as wrong."
Lily came to the table and put both her small hands over Evelyn's.
They stayed like that for a moment — her daughter's hands, warm and certain, pressing down on hers.
"Diana will help us," Lily said.
"Yes," Evelyn said.
"She will."
Her phone buzzed.
A text from Diana: *His solicitor responded.
They're not withdrawing.
See you Thursday.
Get some sleep.*
Evelyn looked at her daughter's hands still covering hers.
May you like
What she didn't know yet — what she wouldn't know until Thursday morning — was that Julian had already made his next move.
And it had nothing to do with lawyers.
