Chapter 9 - THE EMAIL THEY HID FROM ME
Evelyn connected the flash drive to her laptop. The files contained emails, draft agreements, and scanned notes from Margaret’s office.
One message had been sent to the accounting firm five months earlier.
Prepare the Bellflower account in Emma Moretti’s name. The child’s identity must remain undisclosed until the marriage’s future is determined.
I read the line twice.
The child’s identity.
Not a child.
Not any future child.
This child.
Another email followed.
If Emma leaves, the fund must remain attached to the baby, not the mother. Dominic will understand once he sees what is at stake.
My hands curled into fists.
“They knew I was pregnant,” I whispered.
Gabriel shook his head.
“Margaret believed you were pregnant. She had seen you at the clinic.”
“But she didn’t know for certain.”
“No.”
“Then why did she choose that date?”
He scrolled through the files.
“Here.”
A calendar appeared on the screen. Several dates were marked in Margaret’s handwriting. One was the day I had gone to the clinic. Another was the day I had left the hospital after telling Dominic I was carrying his child.
Beside the first date, Margaret had written:
Likely.
Beside the second:
Confirmed.
I stared at the word.
“She knew before I told her.”
Gabriel nodded.
“How?”
A new file opened.
It was a message from the clinic’s billing department to a private email address.
The subject line read:
Confidential Patient Update—Emma Moretti.
I felt the room grow very still.
Evelyn leaned closer to the screen.
“That email address belongs to someone at the clinic.”
“Who?” I asked.
Gabriel pointed to the sender information.
“It was sent by Dr. Lena Voss.”
I recognized the name.
She was the doctor who had performed my consultation six months earlier.
The same doctor who had examined me after I began trying to conceive.
The same doctor who had ordered the blood test confirming my pregnancy.
I looked at the timestamp.
The email had been sent to Margaret two days before I told Dominic.
But beneath the sender’s name was another detail.
A second recipient.
Dominic.
I turned toward Gabriel.
“Did he receive this?”
Gabriel’s face had gone pale.
“I don’t know.”
Evelyn opened the message.
The text was short.
The pregnancy is confirmed. Approximately five weeks. Please advise how you wish to proceed.
There was no response from Dominic.
Only an automated notice showing the message had been opened.
The date of access appeared beneath it.
The same day I had stood outside the hospital room, holding the ultrasound photograph in my purse, while Dominic ran to Vanessa.
I could not breathe.
He had known.
He had known before I told him.
And he had still sent me home.
Evelyn looked at me carefully.
“Emma, we don’t know who opened the message. It could have been accessed through the family account.”
But I knew Dominic’s email address.
I knew the password he had used for years.
And I knew the Moretti family had never needed to guess anything about me.
Because I had trusted them with everything.
Gabriel rose.
“I’m sorry.”
I looked at the message again.
At the bottom, beneath the clinic’s signature, was a forwarded attachment.
It was the ultrasound report.
May you like
And in the margin, typed by someone who had accessed the file after it was sent, were six words:
Do not tell Emma until she signs.
