The Wife He Rejected Became His Aunt

Chapter Eight:Daniel Kingston

I stood in the lobby and read the message three times.

Just the two of us.

Daniel Kingston had never once in three years of marriage reached out to me directly. He was not that kind of man. He worked through layers. Through Marcus. Through his wife Patricia who passed along his opinions in her soft careful voice like they were her own. He was the kind of man who never did anything directly if he could arrange for someone else to do it for him.

So this message meant something had changed.

He was worried.

I put my phone in my bag without responding and walked out of the building into the morning air. The street was busy and I moved through the crowd slowly with my mind working through everything.

He knew I had been in Ethan's building.

That was the only explanation. He had people watching. Maybe watching Ethan. Maybe watching me. Maybe both. And seeing me walk into his brother's office with a box under my arm had been enough to make him break his own pattern and reach out himself.

Good.

Let him worry.

I found a bench in a small square two streets away and sat down and called Ethan.

He answered before the second ring.

"Daniel messaged me," I said.

A pause. Short and controlled.

"What did he say."

"That he wants to meet. Just the two of us. He called himself my father in law."

Another pause. Longer this time.

"Do not meet him," Ethan said.

"I was not planning to," I said. "But I want to understand something. How did he know I was at your office."

"He has someone who watches my building," Ethan said. "It is not new. We are aware of it."

We. I noticed that word. Ethan had people too. Of course he did.

"He is moving faster than I expected," Ethan said. "This is good in one way. It means he is rattled. But it also means we need to move carefully from here. Do not go anywhere alone that is not public. Do not have any conversations about this on email."

"You think he would go that far," I said.

"My brother went far enough to use his own son's marriage as a business strategy," Ethan said. "Yes. I think he would go that far."

I looked at the pigeons walking around the base of the bench. Ordinary birds on an ordinary morning. I almost wanted to laugh at the distance between what this square looked like and what my life had become in forty eight hours.

"Alright," I said.

"Lena. Are you somewhere public right now."

"Yes. A square near your building."

"Good. Stay there for a few minutes. Cole will come down and walk you to your car."

"That is not necessary," I said.

"Humor me," he said.

He said it quietly. Not as an order. Just as a request from someone who was used to being listened to and was choosing to ask instead. Something about that small difference made me not argue.

"Fine," I said.

Cole appeared eight minutes later. Young and efficient in his grey suit. He did not make conversation which I appreciated. He simply walked with me to my car and waited until I was inside and the door was closed before he turned and walked back.

I drove to Sade's apartment.

She was at work.

I let myself in with the spare key she had given me years ago and sat at her kitchen table and opened my laptop. I needed to think and thinking always went better when my hands were doing something. I made a list. Not on paper. Just in my head. Everything I knew. Everything I needed to know. Everything that needed to happen next.

The divorce. Mrs. Cole was handling it. Marcus had not yet responded to the formal paperwork but he would. He did not want a fight. He wanted this to be quiet which actually worked in my favor because a quiet divorce moved faster.

The land. Ethan was handling that side. I had left my mother's box with him. That had not been easy. But I believed he would protect it.

Daniel Kingston. The real problem. The man behind all of it. He had stolen from my grandfather. He had used his son to keep the theft hidden. And now that things were unraveling he was reaching out to me directly.

What did he think I would do.

Did he think I would meet him alone and be charmed or frightened into silence. Did he think I was still the woman who stood in a hotel corridor and watched her husband sigh at being caught. That woman had existed for three years. She had been patient and accommodating and careful.

She was finished.

My phone rang.

Sade's name on the screen.

"How are you doing," she said when I answered.

"I am managing," I said.

"I have been thinking about you all morning," she said. "Do you need anything. Food. Company. Someone to go and stand outside Marcus's office and look at him disapprovingly."

I smiled properly for the first time in two days. "Not yet. Maybe later."

"I mean it though," she said. Her voice dropped a little. "Lena you are allowed to not be okay. You do not have to hold everything together every second."

I looked at the wall of her kitchen.

"I know," I said.

"Do you."

I was quiet.

The truth was I did not know how to stop holding things together. I had been doing it since my mother got sick. Since my father left when I was twelve and my mother had straightened her back and said well we will be fine without him and I had believed her and tried to be fine in the same way she was fine. Quietly. Without showing the cracks.

"I will fall apart later," I said. "When I have time."

Sade made a sound that was not quite a laugh and not quite a sigh. "I will hold you to that."

After she hung up I sat quietly for a while.

Then my phone buzzed again.

Daniel Kingston.

Same number as the message. This time calling directly.

I stared at his name on the screen.

Ethan had said do not respond. And I had agreed. But as I sat there watching the phone ring I thought about my mother. About the years she had spent fighting this man through other people and polite channels and lawyers she could barely afford. She had played by the rules and it had not saved her.

I picked up the phone.

"Mr. Kingston," I said.

A pause. He had not expected me to answer.

Then a voice came through. Deep but smooth. The kind of smooth that came from years of knowing exactly what to say to get what you wanted.

"Lena," he said. "I am glad you picked up. I was beginning to think you were avoiding me."

"I was," I said.

Another pause. Then a short sound that might have been amusement.

"I appreciate honesty," he said. "Good. Then let me be honest with you as well. You have been spending time with my brother. That concerns me."

"I imagine it does," I said.

"Ethan has his own agenda," he said. "He always has. Whatever he has told you about our family situation I want you to know there is another side to that story."

"I am sure there is," I said. "There usually is when someone has been caught doing something wrong."

Silence.

Longer this time.

When he spoke again the smoothness was still there but something underneath it had shifted.

"You are smarter than Marcus gave you credit for," he said.

"Most people are," I said.

"I would like to offer you something," he said. "A settlement. Clean and fair. Something that recognizes what you have been through and compensates you properly. No courts. No long battles. Just a conversation."

I stood up from the table and walked to Sade's window.

Below on the street life was moving. Buses and people and the sound of the city doing what it always did.

"Send whatever you want to offer to my lawyer," I said. "Her name is Mrs. Adaeze Cole. I am sure you can find her number."

I ended the call.

My hands were steady.

But my heart was going very fast.

I pulled up Ethan's number and typed a message.

I answered Daniel's call. I know you said not to. But I needed to hear his voice. He is offering a settlement. I told him to contact my lawyer.

Three minutes passed.

Then Ethan replied.

What did his voice tell you.

I thought about it. About the smoothness. About the pause when I answered. About the shift when I pushed back.

I typed back. That he is more afraid than he is letting on.

One minute passed.

Then. Good. Trust that. And next time listen to me.

I almost smiled.

Almost.