Chapter 18 Catherine
MIA
She was nothing like her husband.
I had prepared myself before walking into the hotel café.
Neutral expression. Steady hands. Controlled breathing.
The emotional equivalent of putting armor on properly before stepping into something difficult.
Then she stood when she saw me approaching and all of that preparation became slightly irrelevant.
She was smaller than I expected.
Not fragile exactly. Just worn thin in a careful quiet way.
Dark hair tucked neatly behind her ears. Grey coat still buttoned. Hands wrapped around a coffee cup she had probably stopped drinking ten minutes earlier.
She had Caleb's eyes.
The same grey.
Just softer somehow.
“Mia,” she said. “Thank you for coming.”
“Thank you for calling.”
We sat across from each other in the corner booth.
The café was busy enough that nobody paid attention to us, which I suspected was intentional on her part.
For a moment she just looked at me.
Studying. Measuring.
Then she sighed softly and lowered her eyes to the coffee cup.
“I want to apologize first,” she said quietly. “For my husband. For what he asked you to do. For the fact that he used your mother's illness against you.”
I stayed still.
“I did not know about the meeting until afterward,” she continued. “Richard mentioned it over dinner like he was discussing quarterly numbers.”
Something tightened briefly in her expression.
“He was pleased with himself.”
I looked down at my hands.
“Why are you telling me this,” I asked.
She met my eyes again.
“Because I recognize what happened to you,” she said. “Not exactly. But enough.”
The words settled carefully between us.
“Richard does not make requests,” she said after a moment. “He presents situations where refusal becomes impossible and then calls the result a choice.”
That sounded accurate enough to make my stomach hurt slightly.
She reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a folded document.
“This,” she said, setting it carefully on the table, “is a copy of the original agreement he drafted before the version you signed.”
I frowned slightly.
“There was a clause removed before he showed it to you,” she explained. “A clause that would have allowed him to accuse you publicly of fraud if the arrangement with Caleb ever became inconvenient.”
I stared at the paper without touching it.
“He removed it because he knew you would never sign if you saw it,” she said. “But the intention remained.”
The café suddenly felt colder.
“He was preparing protection for himself,” I said quietly.
“Yes.”
“But Caleb is his son.”
Something complicated moved across her face then.
“Yes,” she said. “And Richard has spent most of Caleb's life treating that fact like an investment.”
I looked away for a second.
Outside the windows people walked past carrying coffees and talking and existing inside entirely different lives.
“Walter already handled the transfer,” I said eventually. “The agreement is void.”
“It is.” She nodded once. “Walter moved very quickly.”
Relief flickered through me again even though I already knew.
“But Richard does not know that yet,” she continued. “As far as he is concerned, he still controls the situation.”
I looked back at her.
“What is he planning.”
She hesitated slightly before answering.
“He has been speaking to a reporter.”
My stomach dropped immediately.
“A hockey journalist,” she clarified. “Someone who covers recruitment and junior league funding. Richard has been feeding him information for over a week.”
“About the contract.”
“Yes.”
I could suddenly see it happening.
The headlines. The framing. The comments online.
Not a real relationship. Calculated image management. Prospect manipulation.
Everything ugly made cleaner and more believable once printed professionally.
“If the story runs,” I said slowly, “Caleb looks dishonest.”
“And you look opportunistic,” she said gently. “Which I suspect is exactly how Richard wants this remembered.”
Silence settled over the table again.
Then she surprised me slightly by smiling.
Small. Tired. Private.
“I decided to call you after the dinner,” she said.
I frowned slightly.
“When you told Richard your mother watches people fight instead of die.”
I remembered saying it.
Barely.
Catherine looked down at the table briefly.
“Most people become careful around my husband,” she said quietly. “You became honest.”
Something about that made my chest tighten unexpectedly.
She reached into her coat one more time and placed a small recorder between us.
“I need your help,” she said.
I looked down at it.
“I am calling Richard tomorrow morning,” she continued. “And this time I would prefer not to have the conversation alone.”
I looked back up slowly.
“You want him recorded.”
“I want him witnessed,” she corrected softly.
The distinction mattered.
I thought about Caleb.
About his face the night he said then pull it without hesitating.
I thought about my mother asleep in our apartment with treatment she almost lost because one powerful man decided her illness was useful leverage.
Then I looked back at the recorder.
“What time,” I asked.
Something steadied in Catherine's expression then.
Not confidence exactly.
More like exhaustion finally giving way to decision.