Chapter 19 Naomi #3
“Well, technically, my parents bought it. I mean, we gave them the money, but they put it under their name. Some stupid tax thing Simon insisted on. So when we got divorced, it was the only thing he couldn’t take from me.
Not that he didn’t try. But he didn’t have a legal leg to stand on, and I had given him everything else without a fight.
I couldn’t give up that silly little plot.
But then, right before the wedding … Simon …
well, he called. And he said he saw me on the news.
And he said …” She paused, trying to steady herself.
“He said he could see that Will and I were truly in love and that he would leave us alone.”
That day, when she sat in the parking lot of her bachelorette party, he had said the words she had waited so long to hear.
Not that he was going to win her back.
But that he was going to let her go.
It was going to be the greatest wedding gift she could give to Will. A life free from Simon.
“Let me guess. There was a catch.”
“He wanted me to sign over the land to him. It seemed so easy. I should have known better. But I agreed. It was such a small price to pay.” What little steadiness she had begun to dissolve again.
“But why didn’t you say anything?”
Naomi put her cheek on her knee and stared at the wall, her eyes relaxing until the busy, flowered wallpaper was only splotches of pink, maroon, and brown.
“I think … I think I knew it was a mistake. But the idea of having him out of my life forever was too great an opportunity to pass up. And I knew you’d try to talk me out of it. ”
“Did you end up signing the papers?”
She pressed her eyes shut and then opened them again so that the wallpaper came back into focus.
“I got a call from his lawyer right after you left, and he said Simon wanted the papers signed right away. And that he would meet me at a café down the street. I should have known something was up but … you were gone, Abby, and I … I wanted it over. I was afraid what he would do if I said no. So, I left and met the lawyer. That’s why,” she forced herself to finish the sentence, “I couldn’t say anything at the wedding. ”
“What do you mean?” Abby was trying to hide her frustration, but it was simmering under the surface of her words. “You had proof!”
“Come on, Abby, proving that I wasn’t cheating by admitting I was lying and sneaking behind his back wouldn’t have made things any better. Besides …” She retreated into a throw pillow, pressing it to her face. “It wasn’t real.”
“What wasn’t real?”
Naomi kept her eyes closed as she talked into the pillow.
“Him, the lawyer. I checked. I knew you were going to want to use him as my alibi, so I went to look him up, and he doesn’t exist. There is no Kevin Freemont of Wilson he’s even been there—remember?
He came for the little office-warming party that Riley threw me when I first started my practice there.
I remember because that’s right before you were going to serve him papers for divorce, and I was so afraid I would let something slip. ”
“That’s right!” Riley exclaimed, snapping their fingers. “We even talked about how grown-up you were with your very own alarm system.”
“Right! So, he knew what to do. He knew when to do it. But what I can’t figure out is how he got into my office. The door was always open, but there was no sign of forced entry.”
Naomi didn’t even have to think about it.
“I can answer that. He copied the spare key off my key ring. I can’t believe I never thought of it.
He was always insisting on having a copy of all my keys—Abby, remember I had you change your locks after we broke up?
I didn’t think about your office key. It never occurred to me …
” As absurd as it all sounded at the offset, it now was making sense.
A lot of sense. Why hadn’t she seen it all sooner?
She had spent so much time trying not to think about everything that happened that she had failed to pick up on the obvious connection between all the events that evening.
Riley began bouncing in their seat like a yo-yo.
“Of course! So, he has the key. He can set off the alarm without doing any damage that might raise actual suspicion. Then he does a bunch of practice runs before the wedding so he knows how long it takes you to get there, handle everything, and come back. Then the night before the wedding, he sets the alarm off at the same time Naomi happens to get a call from this lawyer.”
“And then,” Becca chimed in, “all that was left was to take some pictures in front of your place with a Naomi lookalike and shoot them off to NBS!”
“Brilliant!” Riley shouted. Then, more solemnly added, “Incredibly twisted, but brilliant.”
A surge of excitement and hope lifted Naomi, but the wave broke almost instantly, dragging her back under. “Yeah, but even if we could prove this, what good would it do anyway?”
“There has to be something,” Riley said. “Couldn’t you sue Simon for slander or something?”
“For what?” Naomi felt herself plummeting back down to the depths of the ocean again.
“For going out with someone who looks like me from behind? Besides, I don’t want revenge.
All I want is to get Will back, and there’s pretty much zero chance of that happening.
Whether or not I was in those pictures, I still lied to him, and he hates me for it. ”
Abby returned to her seat beside Naomi. “You’re right, Naomi. You should give up now.”
They were out of options. There was no way to prove it, and it didn’t matter if they did. So yes, giving up did seem like the right call. Except she got the sense that’s not what Abby really meant. “You make it sound so awful when you say it like that.”
“She has a way of doing that,” Riley agreed. “I think it’s her tone of voice.”
“It’s not my—” Abby stopped herself with an exhale, then said calmly, “I’m trying to point out that this helpless maiden thing is not for you.”
“Me?” Naomi pointed at herself to give Abby the opportunity to correct the mistake. “I am not being a helpless maiden.”
“I see,” she hummed. “So, then you’re not lying locked in your room, waiting for your knight in shining armor to come to you?”
The words were like a taser sending thousands of volts through her body and rendering her muscles useless. She fell back, draping herself over the armrest of the sofa. “Why do you think I wouldn’t let you see me for the last week? I don’t want to hear this!” she said, burying her face in her hands.
Since escaping to Michigan, she had been hiding not only from the cameras, not only from the haters, but from the voice of reason that would tell her the one thing she already knew she had to do: keep fighting.