Chapter 9 - The Recording.
Lily buried her face against my shoulder before the recording ended.
I could feel her entire body trembling.
I took Hannah's phone and stopped the audio.
"When did she record that?"
Lily would not look at Rebecca.
"In the car."
"Why were you crying?"
"She said Mommy would be disappointed in me."
A sound escaped Hannah that was half gasp and half sob.
My anger became so intense that I had to choose every movement deliberately.
I set Lily down beside Marisol and turned to Rebecca.
"You used my dead wife to make my child cry for an evaluation."
Rebecca backed toward the floral arrangement beside the window.
"That recording is out of context."
"What context makes that sentence acceptable?"
"She was having a meltdown."
"Because you caused it."
Rebecca's eyes filled with tears.
"Do you know what it has been like living in a house where Claire is still everywhere?"
I stared at her.
"Don't do this."
"Her pictures are everywhere."
"She was Lily's mother."
"Her name is on accounts, her furniture is still in the guest room, her traditions decide every holiday, and every time Lily gets upset, you compare my response to what Claire would have done."
Some of that was true.
Grief had made me clumsy more than once.
I had apologized when I unfairly compared Rebecca to Claire.
But truth inside one sentence did not excuse what she had done.
"If you felt second place, you could have left me."
Rebecca's face twisted.
"I loved you."
"Then why punish Lily?"
"Because you would never build a new life while she kept dragging you backward."
Lily whispered behind me.
"I don't drag Daddy."
Rebecca closed her eyes.
I turned immediately.
"You don't, sweetheart."
I knelt beside her.
"You never have."
Caleb stepped into the hallway and quietly told several guests to move toward the reception room while we handled a family emergency.
The wedding had effectively ended, but no one had announced it yet.
I looked at the white roses, the champagne glasses, the ribboned chairs, and the expensive afternoon Rebecca had spent a year arranging.
None of it mattered now.
Hannah continued searching the email folder.
"There's another recording."
Rebecca rushed toward her.
"Give me that phone."
Caleb blocked her path.
Hannah opened the file.
This recording did not contain Lily.
It contained Rebecca and a man's voice.
I recognized the man after only two sentences.
Vincent Cole.
"Once you're married, we have leverage," he said.
Rebecca replied quietly.
"And if Ethan refuses to sign the trustee amendment?"
Vincent answered.
"Then Havenridge creates the paper trail we need."
There was a short pause.
May you like
Then Rebecca asked the question that made every person in the room look at me.
"How long before a court would believe he's too emotionally unstable to control Lily's money?"
