Chapter 14 - The Man In The Video
Charles reached for the laptop.
I pulled it away.
“Talk.”
His face tightened.
“I met Rebecca six months ago.”
“Why?”
“She contacted me.”
“Why?”
“Because she saw your wedding announcement online and realized Nathan had married again.”
Victoria stared at him.
“You lied to me.”
“I didn’t trust you.”
That landed harder than shouting.
Victoria stepped back.
Charles kept his eyes on me.
“Rebecca showed me the old bank records, the medical notes, everything she had saved.”
“And you changed the trust.”
“Yes.”
“You put the house in my name.”
“Yes.”
“And the company shares?”
“Yes.”
“Without telling me.”
“I needed Nathan not to know.”
“He found out anyway.”
Charles nodded.
“Someone leaked it.”
We both looked at Victoria.
She went pale.
“I didn’t.”
Rebecca’s video resumed automatically.
She had recorded a second segment.
“If Victoria says she didn’t help Nathan, don’t believe that either.”
Victoria grabbed the back of a chair.
Rebecca continued.
“Years ago, she helped him forge documents to hide losses inside Hale Industries.”
Charles’s face hardened.
Victoria whispered, “I told you I moved money.”
“Not that you taught Nathan how.”
“I didn’t teach him.”
Rebecca’s recorded voice cut through her.
“She showed him how signatures, notarizations, and internal approvals could be manipulated without triggering an audit.”
Victoria’s eyes filled.
“It was to save the company.”
Charles laughed bitterly.
“And he used it to destroy women.”
Victoria sat.
“I know.”
The video continued.
“Victoria helped me escape later. Both things are true.”
I stared at the woman who had slapped me hours earlier.
Victim.
Accomplice.
Abuser.
Witness.
Nothing about her fit into one box anymore.
I said, “Why did you reach for my vitamins at Thanksgiving?”
Victoria looked at me.
“I was trying to take them.”
“To destroy evidence?”
“No.”
Her voice broke.
“To replace the bottle before Nathan realized I had switched some of the capsules.”
My skin went cold.
“What?”
“The first batch he gave me was stronger.”
“How strong?”
She looked down.
“I don’t know. Strong enough that I was afraid.”
“So you changed them?”
“I emptied most of his capsules and replaced the powder with harmless filler.”
“Most?”
“I couldn’t change all of them without him noticing.”
My hand moved to my stomach.
Charles whispered, “You should have told us.”
Victoria snapped, “And when? Before or after your son threatened to kill his own child?”
A police radio crackled.
Detective Ramos lifted his head.
His face changed.
“What?” I asked.
He pressed the earpiece.
“Repeat that.”
Then he looked at us.
“Nathan escaped transport.”
For one second, nobody understood the sentence.
Then everything moved.
Ramos shouted into his radio.
Charles grabbed his phone.
Victoria stood so fast the chair fell.
I felt a contraction tighten across my abdomen.
I bent forward.
Charles caught me.
“Emily?”
“It passed.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Ramos said, “Don’t answer.”
I already had.
Nathan’s breathing filled the line.
Behind him, I heard an overhead announcement.
Paging respiratory therapy to maternity.
My blood stopped.
Nathan whispered, “You wanted the truth?”
I gripped the phone.
“Nathan, where are you?”
A newborn cried in the background.
Then another.
Hospital sounds.
He was at my hospital.
May you like
Nathan said, “Come find me before your baby gets here.”
The line went dead.
