“What does that mean?” I asked.
Rebecca’s eyes narrowed slightly. “It means Brenda may not be aligned with them in the way we assumed. Or she wants you to believe she isn’t.”
“She was on the recording,” my father said.
“She was,” Rebecca agreed. “But she asked questions. Cynthia made most of the statements. Elias confirmed enough to condemn himself emotionally, but Brenda’s position may be more complicated.”
I didn’t like the flicker of curiosity that moved through me.
Brenda had known. Brenda had asked about the apartment. Brenda was pregnant with my husband’s child.
Complicated did not mean innocent.
Still, her voice had sounded afraid.
By late afternoon, Elias had moved from calls to emails.
His first email was pleading.
Ella, please. I don’t know what you think you heard or who is filling your head with ideas, but we need to talk as husband and wife. You can’t let lawyers into this before we’ve even had a real conversation.
His second came forty minutes later.
I made mistakes. I said things I shouldn’t have said because I was stressed and overwhelmed. My mother says things dramatically. Brenda has nothing to do with us.
His third was shorter.
Who is Eleanor Grace Wilson?
I read that line three times.
Then I looked up at Rebecca.
“He knows my legal name now.”
“He received my email,” she said. “He may be searching public records.”
My father’s expression hardened.
Let him search, I thought.
Let him discover the boring secretary had a name printed on buildings he passed every day without noticing.
But the anger passed quickly, leaving something heavier behind.
“I don’t want him crawling through my life,” I said.
My father stood. “Then we bring the walls up.”
By evening, the apartment locks were scheduled to be changed. The building manager, who knew me as quiet tenant Ella Morris, received a formal ownership verification from Rebecca. My father’s security consultant reviewed cameras and access points. Elias’s keycard was deactivated pending legal review.
It should have made me feel safe.
Instead, it made everything real.
I had been married less than twenty-four hours, and my husband was already locked out of my home.
At eight that night, I went to my old bedroom.
It had not changed much. My father had once admitted he couldn’t bring himself to alter it after I moved out. The pale blue curtains remained. The built-in shelves still held my childhood books, though the trophies had been packed away. On the dresser sat a framed photograph of my mother and me at the beach when I was sixteen. Her hair was windblown, her smile wide and unguarded.
