Chapter 6
I thought I had run out of ways to feel betrayed.
I was wrong.
“You knew Mom left me money?”
Dad nodded.
“Why didn’t I?”
“You did.”
“What does that mean?”
“The account transferred to you when you were twenty-five.”
“I never received it.”
Dad’s confusion became alarm.
“That’s impossible.”
“I’m telling you, I never received it.”
He stood and went to his office.
I followed him.
Everyone else stayed in the kitchen.
Dad opened an old filing cabinet and pulled out a thick envelope.
My mother’s handwriting was on the front.
For Emily.
My chest tightened.
I hadn’t seen that handwriting in twelve years.
Dad sat slowly.
“She set up the account when you were a teenager.”
He removed statements.
“The funds were transferred after her estate closed.”
I looked at a statement from years earlier.
$217,463.
My name.
My Social Security information.
Everything.
Then I noticed the mailing address.
It was the apartment where Ryan and I had lived when we were newly married.
I felt cold.
“Where did the money go?”
Dad flipped through the pages.
“According to this, the transfer check was mailed to you.”
“I never saw it.”
“You were married to Ryan.”
“Yes.”
Dad looked sick.
The detective called back before we could investigate further.
He had news.
A copy of a deposited cashier’s check had been found in the storage unit.
The amount was $217,463.
Payable to Emily Sterling.
Endorsed on the back.
Deposited into an account connected to a company owned by Ryan.
I sat on the floor of Dad’s office.
Not because I chose to.
My legs simply stopped holding me.
He stole my mother’s money.
More than ten years earlier.
Before the worst of the screaming.
Before Noah.
Before he started controlling every grocery receipt.
Before I understood what kind of man I had married.
He had already been stealing from me.
Dad crouched beside me.
“I’m sorry.”
I shook my head.
“He knew.”
“What?”
“When Mom died, I was barely functioning.”
Dad’s eyes filled.
“He knew exactly how vulnerable I was.”
I remembered Ryan sorting mail.
Ryan saying, “I’ll handle all the estate paperwork. You’ve been through enough.”
At the time, I thought it was love.
Now I knew what he had really been doing.
He was looking for opportunities.
I laughed once.
A terrible sound.
“He bought my engagement anniversary gift with my own inheritance.”
Dad frowned.
“What?”
“A car.”
Three months after the estate settled, Ryan surprised me with a used luxury SUV.
He told me he had saved for years.
I had cried because I thought he was sacrificing for me.
The cruelty of it was almost impressive.
He had stolen my money.
Then used some of it to make me grateful.
The next morning, police contacted me again.
Financial investigators were getting involved.
The storage unit had changed everything.
Ryan was no longer dealing only with the assault allegation.
They were looking at fraud.
Identity theft.
Forgery.
Possibly theft connected to my mother’s estate.
Dad’s company had also opened an internal investigation into the stolen bidding records.
Ryan’s carefully built life was beginning to split open.
And he knew it.
At ten, someone rang Dad’s doorbell.
We all froze.
Dad checked the camera.
Diane.
She stood outside alone.
I told him to let her in.
He didn’t like it.
Neither did Lauren.
Kyle had gone home to get clothes, but he had warned us that his mother might come.
Diane entered looking exhausted.
No makeup.
Hair pulled back.
She looked smaller somehow.
“Where’s Noah?”
I stiffened.
“Safe.”
“I want to see my grandson.”
“No.”
Pain flashed across her face.
“Emily.”
“You defended the man who frightened him.”
“He is my son.”
“And Noah is your grandson.”
She swallowed.
“I made mistakes.”
“That’s a small word.”
She looked at Dad.
“Can I speak to Emily alone?”
“No,” Dad said.
I surprised him.
“It’s okay.”
He hesitated.
“I’ll be right outside.”
When we were alone, Diane sat.
I remained standing.
“What did you come to say?”
She looked at her hands.
“Ryan needs help.”
I stared at her.
“Then get him a lawyer.”
“That isn’t what I mean.”
“What do you mean?”
“He has always been… difficult.”
I nearly laughed.
“He choked me.”
“I know.”
“He stole my inheritance.”
Her eyes closed.
That told me everything.
“You knew.”
“I knew he took money.”
My heart started hammering.
“How?”
“Years ago, he came to me.”
“When?”
“After your mother died.”
“Why?”
“He needed somewhere to deposit it.”
My vision blurred.
“You helped him?”
“No.”
She spoke quickly.
“I refused.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“He said the money was his.”
“It had my name on it.”
“He said you had agreed.”
“And you believed him?”
She didn’t answer.
“No. You didn’t believe him.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“He was my son.”
I stepped back.
“That sentence keeps coming out of your mouth like it excuses everything.”
“It doesn’t.”
“Then what does it do?”
She cried silently.
For the first time, I felt nothing.
No sympathy.
No guilt.
Just exhaustion.
“What happened to the money?”
“I don’t know all of it.”
“How much do you know?”
“He invested some.”
“In what?”
“Property.”
“Miller Residential Holdings?”
She looked shocked.
“You know about that?”
My stomach tightened.
“You knew about the company too.”
“He said it was for your future.”
“My name is on almost a million dollars in debt.”
Her face drained of color.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Did you sign anything?”
“No.”
“Did you ever pretend to be me?”
“No!”
The answer came quickly.
Genuinely offended.
Then she looked away.
And I knew there was something else.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“What did you do?”
She started crying harder.
“Diane.”
“I gave him documents.”
“What documents?”
“Things you left at our house years ago.”
My pulse pounded.
“What things?”
“Copies of tax returns. An old driver’s license. Some bank statements.”
I stared at her.
“You gave him my identity.”
“I didn’t know what he planned to do!”
“You knew enough to hide it.”
“I was afraid of him.”
The room went silent.
There it was.
The first truly honest thing Diane had said.
I sat across from her.
“Why?”
She wiped her face.
“Because Ryan is like his father.”
Noah’s words from the night before returned.
Dad said Grandpa yelled at Grandma.
“What did Thomas do?”
She looked toward the window.
“He controlled everything.”
“Money?”
“Everything.”
“Did he hit you?”
She didn’t answer.
She didn’t need to.
My anger shifted.
Not away from her.
But into something more complicated.
“You knew what was happening to me because it happened to you.”
“Yes.”
“Then why didn’t you help me?”
Her answer was barely audible.
“Because if I admitted what Ryan was, I had to admit I raised a man like Thomas.”
I looked at her for a long time.
“You didn’t make him choke me.”
She lifted her eyes.
“But you helped him hide.”
She nodded.
“Yes.”
“That matters.”
“I know.”
“Are you willing to tell the police everything?”
Fear crossed her face.
Ryan still had power over her.
Even now.
“If I do, he’ll hate me.”
I stood.
“Diane, he already uses your fear as a weapon.”
She covered her face.
I went to the door.
Before opening it, she spoke.
“There’s something you should know.”
I turned.
“Ryan has another account.”
My hand froze on the doorknob.
“What account?”
“I don’t know where.”
“What is in it?”
“Money.”
“How much?”
“I heard him arguing with someone last year.”
“Who?”
“Gavin Wexler.”
Dad’s former competitor.
My pulse quickened.
“What did they say?”
“Gavin said Ryan had taken more than his share.”
“Of what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Diane.”
“I swear.”
She stood.
“But there was a number.”
My father opened the door behind me.
He must have heard my voice rising.
“What number?”
Diane looked at him.
Then at me.
“Three point six million.”
No one spoke.
Dad’s face changed.
“Three point six million dollars?”
May you like
She nodded.
“And Ryan said if anyone discovered where it came from, all of you would go down with him.”
