CHAPTER 5: THE PHONE CALL
At 8:30 a.m., the phone rang.
I let it ring three times before I picked up.
"Hello, Mother."
"Evelyn. We need to talk."
"We're talking."
"Don't be difficult. You know what I mean. We need to discuss the situation."
"What situation? The one where your son almost killed my daughter?"
"Preston made a mistake. He was upset. The wedding had been stressful."
"Stressful. He hit a child with a wooden menu."
"You're exaggerating."
"I have it on video, Mother. And audio. I have everything."
Silence.
A long, stretching silence.
Then my mother's voice changed.
Lowered.
Darker.
"What do you want, Evelyn?"
"I want the truth."
"The truth about what?"
"About everything. The money. The business. The lies."
"Preston is the heir. He always has been. You walked away from this family."
"I walked away because you pushed me out."
"You chose a man who couldn't provide for you. You chose a life beneath your station. You don't get to come back now and pretend you're entitled to anything."
"He left me, Mother. He left me and Sophie. We had nothing. You knew that. And you did nothing."
"Because you made your choice. You have to live with it."
I took a deep breath.
"I've been living with it for ten years. But I'm done living with the lies."
"What lies?"
"The lies about Preston. The lies about his business deals. The lies about your involvement."
My mother was silent.
Then she said:
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Of course you don't. That's what makes it so easy to prove."
"I'm going to give you one chance to back down. Take the money I'm offering. Disappear. Don't come back."
"You're offering me money to go away?"
"Enough to start a new life. Somewhere far from here. Somewhere you can't embarrass us anymore."
I laughed.
"You think I want your money?"
"I think you want to protect your daughter. And I think you know that if you keep fighting, you'll lose everything."
"I've already lost everything. You made sure of that. I have nothing left to lose."
"Then I'm sorry for what happens next."
She hung up.
I stared at the phone.
And I realized that my mother hadn't been trying to threaten me.
She had been warning me.
May you like
Because whatever was coming next…
was going to be worse than anything I had imagined.
