Mr. Meyers cleared his throat softly. “Mrs. Carter, I recommend Mr. Carter leave now. Further discussions should take place through counsel.”
Daniel nodded once, almost mechanically.
Vanessa stood. “I’ll leave too.”
She looked at me as if searching for something—permission, forgiveness, maybe a way to step back into the person she thought she was that morning.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
The apology did not heal anything.
But it landed.
I nodded once. “Leave the scarf.”
She looked confused.
“My blue scarf.”
Her face flushed. “It’s in my bag.”
“Then take it out.”
A few minutes later, the front door opened.
Daniel paused on the threshold.
The late afternoon sun cut across his face, dividing it into light and shadow.
He looked at Lily. Then Noah. Then me.
“I was going to tell you,” he said.
I believed, strangely, that in some version of his mind, that was true. He had always been going to tell me tomorrow. After the deal closed. After the debt cleared. After the lie became unnecessary.
