Chapter 2 - THE SILICONE BELLY AND THE FORTY-EIGHT-MILLION-DOLLAR LIE
The truth arrived eleven days later.
Julian had rented the upstairs dining room at Aster Row for a private wedding dinner. His mother was there. Sloane’s parents. Their closest friends. Attorneys. Business partners.
Tess was assigned to the event.
Halfway through dessert, Sloane excused herself.
Her closest friend, Brynn Foster, followed.
Tess entered the restroom two minutes later to replace hand towels.
She stopped when she heard voices behind the private powder-room door.
“I can’t keep wearing this thing ten hours a day.”
Sloane.
Tess froze.
“You only have twelve more days,” Brynn replied.
“Easy for you to say. My back is killing me.”
Then came a ripping noise.
Velcro.
Tess’s breath caught.
Through a narrow gap between the storage alcove and the mirror, she saw Sloane lift her blouse.
A flesh-colored silicone abdomen hung from a harness around her torso.
Tess stared.
She stopped breathing.
Sloane rolled her shoulders in relief.
“I swear, if this wedding were one month later, I’d need a wheelbarrow.”
Brynn laughed.
“What happens if Julian wants to touch it?”
“He barely does. He’s terrified he’ll hurt the baby.”
Something in Tess’s stomach turned.
Brynn leaned against the sink.
“And Keene?”
“Paid.”
“How much?”
“Enough.”
“For the scans too?”
Sloane checked her lipstick.
“For everything.”
Brynn lowered her voice.
“You realize you’re playing with a man who has enough money to investigate God.”
“He won’t investigate the mother of his child.”
“He’s not stupid.”
“No. He’s grieving.”
The word entered Tess like a blade.
Sloane smiled at herself in the mirror.
“That’s better.”
Brynn looked uneasy now.
“And after the honeymoon?”
Sloane’s expression changed.
Not much.
Just enough.
“Accident.”
Tess felt her fingers tighten around the towels.
“What kind of accident?”
“I haven’t decided. Bathroom fall. Boat stairs. Something believable.”
Brynn stared.
“That’s dark.”
“Oh, please. There is no baby.”
Sloane fastened the silicone belly again.
“Once the marriage goes through, Julian’s prenatal trust amendment becomes effective. The money gets placed into the family trust because a pregnancy has been medically certified. The protections in the original agreement change too.”
“And if you miscarry?”
Sloane smiled.
“The trust stays.”
Silence.
Then Brynn whispered, “How much?”
“Forty-eight million immediately.”
Tess almost dropped the towels.
Sloane continued.
“And if the marriage ends after that, the revised settlement gives me enough equity that I never have to ask another man for permission again.”
Brynn exhaled slowly.
“This isn’t just about money anymore, is it?”
For the first time, something ugly flashed across Sloane’s face.
“My father spent my entire childhood promising me security while gambling away everything my grandmother left us. Then men like Julian get to write contracts deciding whether women deserve anything after marriage.”
“So this is justice?”
“No.”
Sloane picked up her purse.
“This is leverage.”
Tess stood in the shadows long after they left.
Her legs trembled.
A thousand practical arguments screamed at her.
Stay out of it.
You need this job.
You need tuition.
You don’t know these people.
Rich people destroy ordinary people without remembering their names.
Then Tess remembered Julian talking about the nursery.
A tiny detail.
Two weeks earlier, he had shown his mother a photograph on his phone.
He had painted a crooked line of small white stars himself across one blue wall.
Sloane had teased him.
“They’re uneven.”
“They’re handmade.”
“They look drunk.”
“My kid’s first astronomy lesson will be that the universe is imperfect.”
Julian had laughed.
His mother had quietly wiped her eyes.
Tess walked to the service station.
May you like
She took a napkin.
And she wrote.
