Chapter 3: What Was Inside the Safe
I looked at Victoria for a long moment.
Then I turned and walked toward the stairs.
"Nathan." Her voice followed me.
"Nathan, if you open that safe right now, you are making a decision you cannot take back."
I kept walking.
The safe was in the study on the second floor — a room Victoria had never shown much interest in.
I'd always assumed that was because it was full of company paperwork.
Quarterly reports.
Merger documents.
Nothing she would care about.
I pressed my thumb to the reader.
The lock released.
The first thing I saw was the envelope.
It was sitting on top of everything else, slightly crumpled, like it had been handled many times and replaced in a hurry.
My name was written on the front in handwriting I didn't recognize.
I opened it.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
A paternity acknowledgment form, dated four years and three months ago.
The child's name was listed as Lily Anne Mercer.
The mother's name was Grace Mercer.
The father's name, printed in clean black type and signed at the bottom with my own signature, was Nathan Cole.
My signature.
Except I had never signed it.
I stood there reading it three times.
Then I heard Victoria's heels on the staircase.
She appeared in the doorway.
Her composure was back — mostly.
Only her hands gave her away, pressed flat against her thighs.
"That document is a forgery," she said immediately.
"She forged your signature.
That's what I've been trying to tell you.
That's why I was trying to get it out of the house — to protect you."
"You were trying to destroy it."
"I was trying to protect you, Nathan.
There's a difference."
"Grace said she was trying to get it back before you destroyed it." I set the paper down on the desk.
"She said she tried to tell me four years ago.
What happened four years ago, Victoria?"
Something shifted in her face.
Just for a second.
"Nothing happened."
"You knew she was pregnant."
"I knew she claimed to be pregnant.
By you.
Which was a lie."
"Did you pay her to leave?"
The silence lasted exactly long enough to be an answer.
"I offered her a settlement," Victoria said carefully.
"Because she was making false accusations against my fiancé and I wanted to protect our future.
That is not the same thing as—"
"How much?"
"Nathan—"
"How much did you pay her?"
Victoria's chin lifted.
"Eighty thousand dollars.
And she took it.
Which tells you everything you need to know about what kind of person she is."
I looked at the document in my hand.
Then I looked at her.
"She took it," I said slowly, "because she had a child to feed.
And no father in the picture.
Because you made sure of that."
"She was a housekeeper who saw an opportunity—"
"She was someone I cared about." The words came out quieter than I intended.
"Before you.
And you knew that."
Victoria's expression didn't break.
But her voice dropped half a register.
"Be very careful, Nathan.
Be very careful about what you decide to believe right now, and what it will cost you." She glanced at the document.
"That signature is forged.
I can prove it.
And when I do, everything she's told you falls apart." She paused.
"Don't throw away what we have over a housekeeper and a child that may not even be yours."
I put the document back in the envelope.
"Go downstairs," I said.
"Don't go near Grace.
Don't go near Lily."
"Nathan—"
"Go downstairs, Victoria."
She went.
But at the door she stopped, one hand on the frame, and looked back at me with an expression I had never seen on her face before.
Not anger.
Not panic.
Calculation.
"You should know," she said quietly, "that I spoke to your board chair this morning.
Before you came home.
I told him you'd been under significant personal stress.
That I was worried about your judgment." A pause.
"I was being a concerned fiancée.
That's all.
But the conversation happened.
And he listened."
May you like
She left before I could respond.
I stood alone in the study, the envelope in my hands, and understood for the first time exactly what kind of woman I had agreed to marry.
