Chapter 9: The Room Where It Ended
Victoria didn't panic.
I had expected her to.
Instead she set her bag down on the entry table, straightened her shoulders, and walked into the kitchen like she was arriving at a meeting she had called herself.
"Richard," she said pleasantly.
"I didn't know you'd be here."
Richard didn't stand.
"Victoria."
She looked at the documents in my hands.
"Whatever you think you have, Nathan, I'd encourage you to speak with an attorney before you say anything you can't take back."
"Conrad Reiss?" I said.
"Your attorney?
The one who structured Vantage Meridian and the Waverly deal before it?"
The name landed.
Her chin lifted a fraction of an inch.
"I don't know what you've been told—"
"I've been told by a forensic document examiner that the paternity acknowledgment in my safe was built around a real signature of mine taken from a different document." I set the forensic report on the table.
"I've been told by a private investigator hired by my father's estate that you did something very similar to Thomas Waverly in Seattle four years before you met me.
I've been told by Gerald Marsh that my father believed his fall down the stairs was not an accident."
The room was absolutely silent.
Victoria looked at Gerald.
"You have no proof of that."
"No," Gerald said.
"But we have everything else."
"The Vantage Meridian stake," I said.
"Two million dollars you never disclosed.
That you positioned to collect the moment the merger closed.
That you were willing to have me removed from my own board to protect."
"That stake is entirely legal—"
"It's a material conflict of interest that you concealed from me and from the board.
Richard?"
Richard Holt opened the folder in front of him.
"The board met by phone this afternoon, Victoria.
We've voted to refer the Vantage Meridian matter to our legal counsel and to the relevant regulatory authority.
We've also formally documented your call to me this morning as an attempt to improperly influence board perception of Nathan's competency." He looked up.
"You'll be hearing from our attorneys."
Victoria's composure held.
But something behind her eyes went very flat.
She turned to me.
"You're throwing away everything we built together.
Over a housekeeper.
Over a child you haven't even confirmed is yours."
"I confirmed it this afternoon," I said.
"We did a rapid test at a private clinic.
Lily is my daughter."
Something moved across her face.
Not guilt.
Recalculation.
"Then she manipulated you," Victoria said.
"She planned this.
She got herself hired, she got herself into this house, she put that document in your safe—"
"She put it there because you'd been intercepting her mail for two years." I picked up Finch's recorder and set it on the table.
"And because the last time she tried to tell me the truth, you threatened her visa and paid her to disappear."
Victoria looked at the recorder.
Then she looked at me.
"You want to do this," she said quietly.
"You want to burn it all down."
"I want my daughter to know her father," I said.
"Everything else is just what happens because of that."
For the first time, something real crossed her face.
Not remorse.
But the recognition that the ground she had been standing on was gone.
She picked up her bag.
"You'll regret this," she said.
Not a threat.
Almost tired.
"Maybe," I said.
"But not for the reason you think."
She walked to the door.
Stopped with her hand on the frame.
"For what it's worth," she said, without turning around, "I did love you.
In the beginning.
Before it became something else."
Then she left.
The door closed.
Richard Holt let out a long breath.
One of the board members pulled out his phone.
Gerald Marsh sat down heavily in a chair and looked at the table.
Finch looked at me.
"She'll lawyer up tonight."
"I know."
"It'll get harder before it gets easier."
"I know that too." I picked up my phone and called Grace.
She answered on the first ring.
"It's done," I said.
A long pause.
Then: "Is everyone all right?"
"Yes.
Can I come get you both?"
Another pause.
Shorter.
May you like
"Yes," Grace said.
"We'll be ready."
