Chapter 9—Christa #2
I grip the chair opposite him. At Bellweather, Charla accepted congratulations meant for me.
At Saturday dinner, Tate let his mother discuss my supposed failure while he already knew he had another plan.
Monday, he begged me to wait. Wednesday, he brought Charla out as his pregnant wife.
The pieces finally fit. “Does the trust require the trustees to meet the pregnant woman?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Does she have to sign anything?”
“I don’t know that either.” She sounds apologetic, not impatient.
“Does anyone verify that she’s actually the wife?”
She flips some pages. “That’s one of the questions I’m asking.”
I turn from the table. “He can’t actually think this would work?”
Jai snorts. “People get away with fraud because everyone around them assumes no one would be stupid enough to try it.”
Simon lowers himself into the chair across from mine. “Tate also has one advantage. Christa and Charla are identical.”
“Exactly,” Jai says. “A casual social introduction is one thing. A formal certification process should require more. I need to know what the trustees demand.”
I sit. “What happens if I divorce him before fourteen weeks?”
“The summary doesn’t answer that cleanly. It refers to the marital line at certification. Your divorce won’t be final in three weeks under any normal schedule anyway.”
The thought irritates me. “He doesn’t need me to withdraw the divorce.”
“Possibly not.”
“Then why ask?”
“He may need the appearance of a stable marriage while the certification is pending. He may also need you quiet.” Jai pauses before adding, “A filed divorce petition creates questions. A wife publicly accusing her husband of impregnating her twin while the twin impersonates her creates many more.”
Simon looks across the table at me. “Thirty days wasn’t about saving the marriage.”
I give him a dry look. “I’m comfortable treating that as established.”
Jai moves on before either of us can dwell on it. “I also found language saying a certification can be challenged by an interested party if the qualifying status is disputed. I don’t have the procedures yet.”
That gets my attention. “Interested party meaning me?”
“Potentially. Celeste may qualify too. Bernard certainly would. The trustees themselves may have authority to investigate.”
I sit back. “What happens after a challenge?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Can you get the rest today?”
Jai sighs. “I’m working on it. Tate’s counsel received our amended discovery request at six-twelve this morning.”
I blink. “You sent amended discovery at six-twelve?”
“I had coffee and time to kill while on the treadmill.”
Simon glances toward me. “I like her.”
I shoot him a quelling look. “You aren’t allowed to steal my lawyer.”
He chuckles. “I have my own.”
“Probably a team of them,” I mutter.
Jai clears her throat. “There’s another point. I don’t want you contacting anyone in his family yet.”
That wipes away the humor. “I want to call Celeste. She deserves to know.”
“She does. Timing still matters. If she’s an interested party under the trust, I need to understand her position before we hand Tate a warning that we’re looking at the succession provisions.”
I don’t like it, but that doesn’t make her wrong. “Fine.”
“Thank you.”
“I said fine, not happy.”
“I don’t bill extra for happy.”
Simon looks down at the table, hiding a smile.
Jai continues before I can comment. The lender’s fraud investigator will call at nine, and she wants to be on the line. After that, she advises me to work if I can concentrate.
“I have a walnut hutch from the Colonial period waiting for me,” I say.
“Excellent. Work on something whose identity you already know.”
I almost laugh. “That was terrible.”
“I’ve been awake since four.”
“It shows.”
Jai hangs up after confirming the nine o’clock call.
For a minute, neither Simon nor I speaks. The breakfast tray sits between us. His eggs are cold. My toast is untouched.
He reaches for the coffee carafe and refills his cup. “Fourteen weeks.”
“Three weeks from now. Roughly.”
I look toward my phone on the table. Twelve messages from him. Nine from Charla. Neither knows I understand their plan now. That gives me a satisfaction I probably shouldn’t enjoy this much, but I enjoy it anyway.
Simon watches while I pick up the phone. “What are you thinking?”
“That Tate believes I’m still six-weeks-ago Christa.” I unlock the screen. “The woman who wanted a clean divorce. The woman who didn’t want his money or his family’s business. The woman who’d rather leave quietly than embarrass anybody.”
Simon takes a drink of coffee. “He’s going to have a disappointing month.”
“Three weeks.”
His eyebrows lift.
“That’s how long I have to screw up their plan.”
I open Tate’s messages. The first several are exactly what I expect.
Tate: Call me.
Tate: You need to hear the whole story.
Tate: Simon is making this worse.
Then the tone changes around midnight.
Tate: Charla shouldn’t have told him anything.
Tate: This was supposed to be handled privately.
Tate: I was going to explain once everything was settled.
I stop there.
Simon sets his cup down. “What does settled mean?”
“I have a theory.”
I take screenshots without replying.
Farther down, Tate writes:
Tate: You don’t understand what’s at stake for my family.
Then:
Tate: Please don’t destroy something important because you’re angry.
I stare at that one for several seconds before turning the phone so Simon can read it.
He takes in the message, then looks at me. “That’s remarkably generous of him.”
“He doesn’t want me to destroy something important.” I save the screenshot for Jai. “He had fewer concerns about destroying things that belonged to me.”
Simon doesn’t offer anything that would make the sentence easier.
I switch to Charla’s messages, and they’re worse.
Charla: I know how this looks.
Charla: You weren’t happy with him.
Charla: He was miserable too.
Charla: We didn’t plan it.
Charla: The baby changed things.
Then:
Charla: You don’t even want that family.
I stop scrolling. Charla thinks wanting less means deserving less.
I save the message and continue.
Charla: I can explain the car too.
For several seconds, I only stare.
Simon sees my face change and pushes his plate away. “What?”
I turn the screen toward him.
His expression goes blank before disbelief replaces it. “Huh.”
“She must be worried I’ll discover it or already know.”
“Apparently.”
I open the next message.
Charla: Dad was never going to approve the purchase because he treats me like I’m sixteen. I was going to pay it. You were never going to lose anything.
I read it twice, amazed that a person can fit that much entitlement into three sentences.
“She confessed before breakfast.”
Simon leans back. “Before the lender even called you.”
I screenshot everything and send it to Jai with a note.
Christa: You are going to enjoy this.
Her reply appears almost immediately.
Jai: Don’t answer her.
I show Simon, and he smiles. “She knows you.”
I nod slowly. “Apparently better than my sister does.”
One more message waits underneath.
Charla: You have more than enough credit. It wasn’t hurting you.
Anger rises again. My marriage. My identity. My credit. Charla sees abundance in my life and treats it as inventory she can borrow.
I put the phone down before I answer.
Simon gives me a few seconds before speaking. “What do you want to do?”
“I want the car taken.” I stand and carry my untouched coffee to the counter. “I want Dad to know. I want Tate to know she stole my identity.”
Simon turns in his chair so he can still see me. “He may already know.”
That possibility stops me. “No.”
“Maybe he doesn’t.”
The affair started before the car. Tate knows Charla is impersonating me now. That doesn’t prove he knew about the loan five weeks ago. I dump the cold coffee into the sink. “I’m not assigning him crimes he hasn’t committed.”
“Jai would be proud of your control.”
I glower at the phone. “I hate that both of you are right so often.”
Simon rises and brings his own cup over. “I’m willing to make an effort to be wrong more frequently.”
“You’d probably research it first.”
“Thoroughly.”
I look at him across the narrow counter, rumpled and underslept because he spent the night on my hotel sofa after I cried in front of him for an embarrassing amount of time.
Warmth slips through the anger. I know what attraction to Simon feels like. I’ve been managing it since the day I walked into his house. This is different. Smaller, somehow, and more dangerous.
He stayed because I asked him to stay and didn’t ask for anything in return.
I set my cup down. “You need clothes.”
Simon glances at his wrinkled shirt. “I was hoping this would become a new look.”
“You look like you lost a fight with upholstery.”
He gives me a crooked grin. “I did.”
“Go home.”
The humor leaves his face. “Are you sure?”
The question matters more than it should. “I have Jai and the lender calling at nine, then I’m going to the studio. I’m not going to call Tate, Charla, Celeste, Bernard, the lender, or anyone else without adult supervision.”
His mouth curves again. “Jai will be relieved.”
“I also won’t commit any felonies.”
“Now I’m relieved.”
“Probably.”
He frowns. “Less reassuring.”
I touch his shoulder. “I’m joking.” Mostly.
I walk him to the door. He picks up his jacket from the chair and slips it on, which improves the situation only slightly.
When he reaches for the handle, I stop him. “Thank you for staying.”
Simon turns back to me. “You don’t have to thank me.”
“Maybe not, but I want to.”
He rests one hand on the door handle. “Call me if you need me.”
I smile but sound more serious than I intend. “That’s dangerously open-ended.”
“I’m very brave.”
“You’re very rich. People confuse the two.” I wink.
He laughs, then opens the door.
I catch his sleeve before he can step into the hall. Simon turns.
I don’t think about it long enough to make it complicated. I wrap my arms around him.