Chapter 6 - The Woman Who Smiled Too Soon
Ashley stepped from the sedan wearing sunglasses and a cream dress.
She looked as though she had arrived for lunch.
Not to confront the woman whose pregnancy she erased.
“Michael,” she called. “You weren’t answering.”
Emily moved behind me with the stroller.
Ashley noticed.
Her smile tightened.
“So this is what we’re doing now?”
“What did you pay the hospital contractor to remove?”
For one second, her face emptied.
Then the performance returned.
“I have no idea what you mean.”
“What did Daniel Price tell Emily?”
“You’re upset. She’s manipulating you.”
“What happened to my mother’s necklace?”
Emily’s hands tightened on the stroller.
Ashley removed her sunglasses.
“You cannot possibly believe her again after everything she did.”
“I believe the transaction records.”
That was when panic appeared.
Small.
Sharp.
Gone almost immediately.
Ashley stepped closer.
“You asked me to protect you.”
“I asked for advice. You built a fraud.”
“She would have ruined you.”
“No. She would have given birth to my children.”
Ashley glanced toward the twins.
The hatred in her expression lasted less than a second.
It was enough.
Emily saw it too.
Ashley lowered her voice.
“Those children could belong to anyone.”
“We’ll establish that properly.”
“And then what?” she snapped. “You destroy everything we planned because she appears beside a road looking pathetic?”
Emily flinched.
I did not.
“You threw money at two infants.”
“I was trying to make her leave.”
“Why?”
Ashley’s jaw tightened.
Because she had said too much.
I took out my phone.
The call was already connected.
David and Patricia were listening.
Ashley saw the active screen.
“You recorded me?”
“I preserved the conversation.”
Her expression turned vicious.
“You think you’re innocent in this? You were the one who threw her out. You were the one who signed the divorce. You wanted to believe she betrayed you.”
Every word was true.
“That is why I will spend the rest of my life facing what I did.”
I looked directly at her.
“But my guilt does not erase your crimes.”
The sedan driver stepped out.
Grant Wells.
My former head of security.
He moved toward Ashley and whispered urgently.
She turned on him.
“You said the records were gone.”
Emily inhaled sharply.
So did I.
Grant froze.
Ashley realized what she had admitted.
Then another vehicle entered the shelter lot.
Not police.
Not yet.
Patricia arrived with independent counsel for Emily and a digital-forensics specialist.
Ashley stared at the group assembling around us.
For the first time, she understood that she could no longer reach every document before we did.
“You planned this,” she said.
“No,” Emily replied from behind me.
May you like
Her voice was stronger now.
“You did.”
