Chapter 7 #2
“You had already established a clinical relationship with Annie Grisham through your private practice,” Tricia said. “After receiving a referral from your cousin Brooke Halpert, founder of a fund for which you consult, supported by Mr. Grisham’s company, without disclosing those relationships.”
Dr. Lane’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “I dispute the characterization.”
“I expected you would,” Tricia said.
Brooke leaned toward the camera. “This is absurd. Bea saw Annie once. Annie didn’t like hearing that she might be contributing to the conflict, and now she’s trying to destroy a doctor’s career.”
Nathan’s voice cut through the screen. “Brooke.”
She stopped.
He looked at her with a steadiness that made Annie’s chest hurt. “You don’t get to speak for my wife.”
Brooke’s face changed. For one second, the hurt looked real. Then she buried it. “Your wife? You weren’t so certain last week.”
Nathan absorbed that without looking away. “I was confused last week. You helped make sure of that.”
“I helped keep you sane.”
“You isolated me from my own judgment.”
“I told you the truth.”
“You told me Annie was unstable when she was reacting to things you were doing.”
Brooke laughed. “And now you believe every accusation because you feel guilty.”
“No,” he said. “I believe evidence.”
Tricia folded her hands on the table in front of her. “Which brings us to the camera. Ms. Halpert, your administrator account disabled the back deck camera shortly before a brick was thrown through Nathan and Annie Grisham’s back door with a threatening note attached.”
Cecilia Grant whispered, “Oh my God.”
Brooke’s face went completely still. “I didn’t throw a brick.”
“That wasn’t the question,” Tricia replied. “Did you disable the camera?”
Brooke looked at Nathan. “You still had me on the account.”
Nathan’s mouth tightened. “Answer her.”
“You left me on the account,” Brooke said. “After everything I managed for you, after all the systems I kept running, after years of expecting me to fix the things you were too important to touch, now you’re shocked that I still had access?”
“Did you disable the camera?” Nathan asked.
Brooke’s eyes shone, but her voice stayed cold. “I checked whether I still had access.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“You want an answer? Fine. Yes. I disabled it.”
Maggie’s hand flew to her mouth. Annie sat very still.
Nathan’s face hardened. “Why?”
“Because I wanted to know whether you would notice.”
Cecilia Grant made a sound under her breath that suggested she regretted accepting the meeting.
Brooke ignored her. “I wanted to know whether you had really cut me out or whether Annie was performing control again.”
“And the brick?” Tricia asked.
“I said I didn’t throw it.”
“Did you cause someone else to throw it?”
“No.”
“Did you tell anyone the back camera was disabled?”
Brooke hesitated.
There it was. A silence shaped like a doorway.
Tricia leaned forward slightly. “Ms. Halpert.”
Brooke’s face tightened. “I was upset. I may have vented to someone.”
“To whom?”
No answer.
Nathan’s voice was quiet. “Who, Brooke?”
She looked at him then, and for the first time Annie saw something like fear.
“You brought lawyers,” Brooke said.
“Yes.”
“You brought Annie into this.”
“Annie was always in this. You just preferred her uninformed.”
Brooke flinched.
Tricia said, “This meeting will now end. Preservation letters are being served today. Ms. Halpert, you are instructed not to access any Grisham Meridian, Grisham household, foundation, vendor, personal, medical, security, or communications account. You are not to contact Nathan Grisham or Annie Grisham directly. All communications go through counsel.”
Brooke stared at Nathan. “You’re letting them talk to me like I’m some hostile stranger?”
Nathan’s face was bleak. “You made yourself one.”
Her composure cracked then, not in tears, but in fury. “You ungrateful coward. You think she’s going to save you? She’ll leave the second she has enough moral high ground. I stayed. I stayed through every ugly part you hid from her.”
Nathan did not move.
Brooke leaned closer to the camera. “Tell her, Nathan. Tell her who cleaned up your messes. Tell her who lied to investors when you were too panicked to function. Tell her who covered for you when your mother overdosed and you disappeared for three days. Tell her who knows exactly how fragile the great Nathan Grisham really is.”
Nathan’s face went white, but his voice remained steady. “I am telling her everything. From now on.”
“You won’t.”
“I will.”
“You can’t. Because if she sees all of you, really sees you, she won’t want you.”
The sentence struck him. Annie saw it. Brooke saw it too. For years, that had been the lever.
Nathan swallowed. “Maybe not.”
Brooke went still.
“But that’s Annie’s choice,” he said. “Not yours.”
Tricia disconnected the call.
For several seconds, no one at Maggie’s table spoke. Then Maggie shut the laptop gently, as if loud movement might break the air.
Annie sat back. Her hands were cold. She had wanted Brooke unmasked.
Now that it had happened, she felt less triumphant than emptied.
Brooke had confessed enough to matter, denied enough to remain dangerous, and confirmed what Annie had suspected all along: she had not only wanted Nathan. She had wanted possession of his shame.
Annie’s phone rang.
Nathan.
She let it ring twice before answering. “I won’t ask where you are,” he said.
“Good.”
“I won’t ask you to come home.”
“Also good.”
A pause stretched between them. Annie could hear voices in the background on his end, then a door closing.
When he spoke again, his voice was lower.
“I need to tell you about the investor reporting. And my mother. And the three days Brooke mentioned. Not because she threatened it. Because you should have known before.”
Annie closed her eyes. She was so tired. “Not now.”
“Okay.”
“I can’t hold any more of your past today.”
“I understand.” He paused, then asked, “Are you all right?”
“No.”
“No,” he repeated softly. “Of course not.”
Annie looked at Maggie, who was pretending not to listen while clearly listening to every word. “I need space. Real space. Not Brooke’s version. Not ClearPath’s version. Mine.”
“You have it.”
“I mean it.”
“So do I.”
The silence that followed was not comfortable, but it was clean. No Brooke inside it. No therapist. No translation.
Nathan said, “I’m moving out of the house for now.”
Annie sat up. “What?”
“I’ll stay at a hotel. You can come home if you want. Or not. But you shouldn’t be the one displaced because of what I allowed into our life.”
The words moved through her slowly. “What about the broken door?”
“Being replaced today. Security company is rebuilding access from scratch. Only your email and phone will have admin control until you decide otherwise.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll have guest access if you approve it.”
Annie swallowed. The gesture was practical. It was also symbolic, and she saw it for what it was. “I don’t know what I approve.”
“Then approve nothing until you do.”
She looked at the quiet laptop, the cooling coffee, the stranger’s sweater sleeves covering half her hands. “Okay.”
Nathan exhaled softly. “Okay.”
After they hung up, Maggie slid a plate of toast toward her. Annie looked at it. “I can’t eat.”
“I know. Eat half.”
Annie almost smiled. “You’re bossy.”
“Yes. And unlike Brooke, I don’t pretend it’s therapy.”
A laugh escaped Annie before she could stop it. It came out cracked but real, and the absurdity of laughing at all after the morning they had just had made her eyes fill again. Maggie pretended not to see that either.
By noon, Tricia sent a written summary of the meeting.
Annie skimmed it at first, then slowed when she reached the highlighted admissions.
Brooke Halpert acknowledged disabling the back deck camera.
Brooke Halpert acknowledged registering Nathan and Annie Grisham for ClearPath-related programming while disputing characterization of purpose.
Brooke Halpert referenced undisclosed personal information concerning Nathan Grisham in the presence of third parties.
The words were clean, organized, and sterile.
They did not smell like coffee gone cold in Maggie’s kitchen.
They did not capture Nathan’s face when Brooke said Annie would leave if she saw all of him.
They did not capture the way Brooke’s rage had filled the screen the moment she realized Nathan had chosen truth over her.
At one-thirty, Officer Keene called to ask follow-up questions about Brooke’s access and the disabled camera.
Annie answered what she could and forwarded the recording from the unknown number.
Keene listened while Annie stayed on the line.
When the recording ended, the officer said, “She admits targeting you.”
“Yes.”
“That helps.”
Annie closed her eyes at the simple solidity of the sentence. Not you might be misreading. Not maybe she meant well. Not she’s family. Not listen to yourself. Just: That helps.
After the call, Annie showered in Maggie’s tiny bathroom, using drugstore shampoo and a faded towel. The bruise on her cheek looked worse in the mirror. She photographed it again, then turned away.
By late afternoon, Nathan texted.
Security rebuilt. Door replaced. I’m at the Langham. House is yours. No response needed.
A second message followed.
Tricia has copies of all new access credentials. You should receive admin setup email shortly. I do not have admin rights.
Annie stared at the messages. No plea. No self-pity. No insistence that because he was doing the correct things now, she owed him warmth. He had finally begun acting without making her beg him to believe her.
She set the phone down.
Maggie came home from a grocery run with soup, crackers, bananas, and three kinds of cheese because, she said, all crises required options.
“You can stay as long as you want,” Maggie said, unpacking.
“I may go home tomorrow.”
“Also fine.”
“I don’t know.”
“Also fine.”