Chapter 2
EVOLUTION AND GENETICS
*Samantha*
I froze, the kitchen, the fruit bouquet, even Diya and Nakita blurring out of focus. I had not heard his voice in weeks, but it was exactly the same as I remembered—precise, careful, but with an edge underneath.
I could not breathe.
Nakita mouthed, Say something! but my throat had sealed itself shut. I waited, hoping maybe he’d think it was a spam call or a butt dial. Maybe he’d simply hang up and I could have plausible deniability.
“Samantha?” he said again, and this time there was something about how he’d said my name that made my heart crack open, just a little.
I drew in a breath and opened my mouth to speak. My face went hot enough to fry eggs. Why had he answered?
Nakita leaned back and shouted at my phone like she was far away from it.
Or maybe in a canyon trapped under a heavy object.
“Hi, Andreas! It’s Nakita. I’m using Sam’s phone but she’s right here.
We were just calling to check on you, make sure you’re okay, after the tournament and your dad and every—”
I lunged forward and snatched the phone out of Nakita’s hand, a surge of strange protectiveness for Andreas and his privacy catching me off guard. I gave Nakita the kind of dirty look that would sterilize a petri dish, then took the call off speaker.
There was a second of breathless silence on the line. I pressed the phone to my ear and forced myself to croak out, “Sorry to disturb you. Nakita took my phone from me and called you without my knowing. It won’t happen again. Bye.”
I started to hang up, but Andreas said, “Wait, wait. Don’t hang up.”
I didn’t hang up. Of course I didn’t. The rational part of my brain screamed at me to end the call, but my thumb hovered over the screen like a chicken at the edge of a crosswalk. So dumb. And chickeny.
More silence, then, “How have you been?” The words were gentle, full of an earnestness that made my vision blur. I had not expected gentleness. I had not expected anything. I honestly hadn’t even expected him to answer. Why did he answer?!
I didn’t know how to respond to his question.
There was nothing I could say that wouldn’t betray the fact that he’d messed me up more than anyone had in over a decade.
I stared into the middle distance of the old kitchen, trying to breathe through the knot in my throat and the tightness in my lungs.
I felt both Nakita and Diya watch me. They were waiting for me to say something, to give some sign of life. Instead, I just stood there, letting the seconds tick by.
Andreas shifted on his side of the call, the faintest scrape of plastic against a cheek, then said, “Elio reached out to you, about my brothers’ lawsuit. Have you received the messages?”
I managed a “Mmm-hmm.” I did not trust my voice beyond that.
“I can help you,” he said, his voice deepening. “Remember the woman and child Tobias brought to the will reading? I have information that proves—”
“Before I let you go,” I interrupted, my heart aching like a motherfucker at his words.
This was the first time we’d spoken in months and all he wanted to talk about were his brothers? I asked the first thing that came to mind, the question tumbling out, “What was the name of the kombucha drink? The one you bought that was brewed nearby?”
A pause. Then, a tentative, “You want the name of the kombucha from Brooklyn?”
“Yes.”
He cleared his throat. “Uh, it’s called Andromeda. But, listen, that child—”
“Thank you,” I said, cutting him off, my voice shakier than I would’ve liked.
But given how agitated I felt, it was a miracle I could form words at all.
“I appreciate the information. Sorry for the interruption. Mmm-hmm. Okay. I won’t call again.
Sorry again. Bye.” Saying this last part for Nakita’s benefit, I hung up before he could speak another word.
I stared at my phone, my hands trembling, and navigated immediately to my contacts. “See, Nakita? He doesn’t want to talk to me. He asked me not to call again,” I lied as I blocked his number, then deleted his contact card.
Just like that, he was gone. It felt less like cutting a cord and more like tearing out an organ, but I did it anyway. He was never going to apologize. He didn’t care about me. It was always going to be about his brothers and his sick, twisted family. I never wanted to see him again. Ever.
Logically, I knew this was impossible. I would have to see Andreas—and Tobias, and Henrik—at the major shareholders’ meeting in a few weeks. But maybe I could get away with never actually speaking to him again. Maybe I could—
“Sam . . . are you okay? Are you—did he really ask you not to call?” Nakita said, her voice genuinely worried now, which almost made me want to forgive her for everything she’d just done.
Before I could answer, I felt Diya grab my wrist and yank me toward the hallway with force. I let myself be dragged, stumbling after her. Diya pulled me into the bedroom we used to share, then shut the door behind us. Once we were next to my old bed, she pushed me down until I sat.
Diya also sat, perched next to me, crossing her arms. “Okay. Let’s start from the beginning.
And don’t give me any of this bullshit about Andreas Kristiansen being a saint and helping you get your family’s shares back by adopting you and you insisting on pretending to be engaged.
I don’t believe that’s the whole story.”
I buried my face in my hands, squeezing my eyes shut, but the tears started anyway. “I am so sorry, Diya.”
“I’m not comforting you or forgiving you until you tell me the truth,” she said, her voice gentle but implacable.
“The whole truth, Sam. I know there’s more to the story and, I have to be honest here, I’m so damn tired of guessing with you.
I spent four years trying to climb over these walls you’ve built and I’m freaking tired of it.
Either you trust me and we’re friends, or you don’t trust me and we’re not friends. You can’t have it both ways.”
I sniffled. “I do trust you.”
“Listen, I understand why you’re not being forthright with Nakita.
” Diya’s tone softened, just a little. “But, honestly, you can trust her, too. You just have to tell her what’s public and what’s private.
She’s great, but she doesn’t always know unless you spell it out.
She’s an oversharer even about her own stuff, that’s just how she’s made.
Think of her like—like a journalist. Everything is on the record unless you invoke the cone of silence ahead of time. ”
I nodded, wiped my nose on my sleeve, and gave myself a second to pull it together. “You’re right. I didn’t tell you the whole story.”
“I know.” Despite her statement that she wouldn’t comfort me, her hand came up and rested on my shoulder. “And I also know that whatever you’re about to tell me is super top secret. I won’t tell anyone, not even my grandpa.”
The tears were flowing fast now, saturating my face and wracking my body with sobs. I wasn’t necessarily surprised. I hadn’t let myself cry yet. I’d raged when I told Kaitlyn. I’d tried to be logical when I spoke to my therapist. But I hadn’t really allowed myself to be sad.
“I’m not mad you lied to me—to us—about the engagement.
” Diya started rubbing circles on my back.
“I was mad, but when I read the news about how your father died, how your family lost the shares of the company he founded due to a civil suit after his death, how your mom died, then your grandma, I completely understand you doing whatever was necessary to get those shares back. I do. It wasn’t the lie about the engagement; it was the realization that I didn’t actually know anything about you.
I can’t be a good friend to you if you’re so stingy about sharing parts of yourself. Does that make sense?”
I nodded. “Yes. Yes. I’ll tell you.”
Diya’s arm came around my shoulders and she squeezed. And I took a long, ragged breath, then let it all go.
* * *
About an hour later, Diya and I were still in the old bedroom, sitting cross-legged on the mattress, both of us staring at a point on the opposite wall. I’d just finished telling her everything. Not the sanitized, Wikipedia version I’d given Nakita and Kendra, but the raw dataset. All of it.
When I’d started, Diya’s arm around me had been comforting but her body had been removed and stiff.
As I got deeper into the mess, she’d softened.
By the end, she was sitting so close our knees touched and she allowed me to rest my head on her shoulder.
She listened without interrupting, except to occasionally ask for clarification or blurt out, “Are you serious?” like a shocked TV judge.
When I got to the part about Paris, and the will reading, and Andreas explaining everything that night in the hotel, and especially the part about Dr. Hauser’s funding, she didn’t even try to hide her rage on my behalf.
In the end, she pulled me into a full hug and muttered, “If I ever see Andreas Kristiansen again, I’m going to punch him in the scrotum. And his evil brothers, too.”
After the hug, we sat there for a long time, just breathing.
Finally, she said, “I hope you have a good lawyer. I hope you prove your father was innocent.”
“I do have a good lawyer. In fact”—I breathed a laugh at the absurdity of what I was about to admit—“I have a whole legal team now. They’re going through the documents Kaitlyn obtained about the fraud charges against my father, the civil suit Oskar Kristiansen used to take the shares away from my mom after my father died, the original incorporation documents, and the publicly available IPO paperwork, and they think they’ve discovered some serious inconsistencies. They think Oskar framed my dad.”
“That’s great!” Diya jumped a little, but then gave her head a quick shake. “Sorry, I mean, it’s not great that Oskar framed your dad. But it’s great that it looks like you’ll be able to clear things up and prove your dad is innocent.”