Chapter 4
Ethan finally spoke.
“This wasn’t all Diane.”
Good.
I turned.
He stood beside the overturned dive case, jacket off, arrogance reduced.
“How much was yours?”
He looked at Vanessa.
Then me.
“I found the padding.”
“When?”
“Seven weeks ago.”
Long enough.
Vanessa had ordered it online after her dresses became impossible to explain.
Ethan visited.
Saw the package.
Confronted her.
She told him everything.
His response should have been simple.
Tell Julian.
Instead:
“I asked what she wanted.”
Of course.
Sibling loyalty.
“What did she want?”
“To marry him.”
Vanessa looked away.
There.
Not only fear of Julian leaving Boston.
Fear of Julian leaving her.
Before the pregnancy, their relationship had been unstable.
Julian loved Vanessa.
But he had hesitated about marriage.
Why?
Avice.
Not because he blamed Vanessa.
Because his daughter still woke asking for her mother.
Julian did not want another woman entering the house as replacement before Avice could understand relationships on her own terms.
Reasonable.
Vanessa interpreted caution as rejection.
Then the false-positive test happened.
Suddenly Julian talked about marriage differently.
Not immediately.
But seriously.
Vanessa felt chosen.
Then the doctor took the pregnancy away.
The choice seemed to disappear with it.
So she kept the stomach.
Ethan told himself he was protecting his sister long enough for Julian to choose her for reasons beyond the baby.
“When would that happen?”
I asked.
He looked ashamed.
“I don’t know.”
Exactly.
Then I asked why he attacked me tonight.
His jaw tightened.
“Because once you held that padding, everything was over.”
“For you too.”
Silence.
Ethan’s connection to Lombardi came through Vanessa.
He had become a useful associate during the relationship.
Introductions.
Shipping work.
Access.
Not official family.
Not powerless either.
If Vanessa’s engagement died in scandal, Ethan expected his place to die with it.
Again.
A fake baby holding several adults in place.
Vanessa holding Julian.
Diane holding Julian in Boston.
Ethan holding his connection to us.
The child did not exist.
The dependencies did.
Then Julian whispered:
“And Avice?”
Nobody answered.
He looked at Vanessa.
“What did she do?”
Vanessa’s face changed.
Finally.
The part she feared more than me.
“She saw me without it.”
There.
May you like
The humiliation tonight was not spontaneous.
Avice had been carrying the truth for days.
