Chapter 217 I Found Letters

Chapter 217 I Found Letters
Chapter 217: I Found Letters 

Reese 

The water in the stone pool at the side of the manor was as dark as I remembered.

No one came here. That was the point. It sat too close to the trees, too far from the polished paths the family preferred, a leftover piece of the grounds that had never been worth civilizing. 

It was the only place left that did not want anything from me. Especially my sanity.

Nothing in the house was meeting in the middle. Lizzie would not keep the child for my sake. I would not stand by and watch her erase it because of a fear that belonged to people who had already failed her. Those two sentences had been circling each other for an hour and neither one had budged.

I had not meant the threat the way it had come out of my mouth. I wanted her to understand I was not playing. That this was not another year she could bargain into ten. 

That I would not smile and call it love while she treated our child like a problem to be solved in private.

That did not mean I would fail to follow through if she woke up one morning and made the decision without me.

The thought sat in my chest like a stone. I stared at the black water and tried to decide which version of myself I hated more. 

The man who had put his hands on her shoulders and drawn a line through the marriage, or the man who was already preparing to live on the side of that line if she crossed it.

Footsteps broke the quietness I sought.

I looked up. Lauren.

Not in the chair. On her own feet, moving across the uneven stone as if the performance of helplessness had finally bored her. She was smiling. That was never a good sign.

“I thought I’d find you here.”

I scoffed. “Tired of playing broken?” I did not stand. “Get out. I want to be alone.”

She kept walking.

“I said get the hell—”

“I overheard you and your wife.”

The sentence stopped me colder than the pool. My spine went rigid. “What are you talking about?”

She laughed under her breath and sat on the bench beside me as if she had been invited. “You know exactly what I mean. I saw her crying before she left with Savannah. When you followed, so did I. I thought it was just another ugly fight. I got something better—”

My hand was around her throat before the last word finished landing. I squeezed. Not enough to finish anything. Enough to make the point she had spent years refusing to hear.

“You have a problem taking a hint.” My voice stayed low. “I told you to stay away from me. I told you to stay away from my wife. Keep testing it and I will put you in the ground.”

She did not look as frightened as she should have. Her fingers wrapped around my wrist and pulled. But it was useless.

“Go ahead,” she rasped. “I have audio of both of you. I learned that trick from watching you at the hospital. That is all the confirmation anyone in this house needs that you two have been lying about—”

I laughed. The sound had no humor in it. I tightened my grip a fraction.

“You think I give a damn what Reginald thinks? What any of them think?” I leaned in. “Say one more word. I am getting tempted to finish this.”

“Reese—”

“I’m listening.”

“I know about the General’s tapes.”

The words hit differently. My hand loosened. Not kindness. Recalculation.

“So the amnesia was a performance.” A short, ugly breath left me. “You could not remember a thing. That was the story.”

I let her go.

She dragged in air like she had been underwater, one hand at her throat, eyes watering. “I was not lying. I still don’t remember everything. That is not how I know.”

“Then how?” Impatience cut through the leftover violence. “And why would I believe a single sentence that comes out of your lying mouth?”

“I found letters.” She swallowed. “Unsent ones. In my father’s things after his funeral. And messages between him and the General. They were about the tapes.”

The pool, the trees, the fight still ringing in my ears—all of it receded a step.

“What did the messages say?”

She looked at me the way people look when they are deciding whether a secret is worth more intact or spent. “My father was asking for them. He sounded afraid of them coming out.”

“I need to see them. The phone. The letters. Now. Give them to me.”

She was on her feet immediately. “No.”

I stood with her. The last of my patience had already been spent in a bedroom upstairs. “Lauren. Do not make me ask twice.” 

“You put a hand on me again and you will never find them.” The threat was small and precise and, infuriatingly, effective.

I dragged a breath in through my nose. “What do you want?”

She did not waste time. “You already know.”

The laugh that left me this time was worse. “You are out of your mind. Stay out of my way. I would rather die than spend a lifetime anywhere near someone as disgusting as you. Keep your letters. Keep your recordings. I don't care.”

I turned to leave.

Her voice followed, rushed, stripped of the earlier smugness. “Tatum is not my brother. I was adopted.”

I stopped. Not because I believed her. “And I am supposed to take that on faith because you finally ran out of other leverage?”

“I could not tell you then. My father made us swear. The General does not even know.” Her voice dropped. “Dad was terrified he would find out I was not a real—”

“I appreciate the confession.” The sarcasm came easy. “This is the wrong morning for your family novel. I do not care about your history, Lauren. I care that you followed my wife. I care that you recorded a conversation that was not yours. And I care that you think a dead man’s letters are going to buy you a place in my bed.”

She held her ground. That was the problem with Lauren. She had never learned when a room had already rejected her.

“You need those tapes more than I need you to like me,” she said. “You know it. Whatever is on them must be important to you. I am offering you a—” 

“You are offering me a collar.” I turned fully to face her again. “You overheard a conversation and decided that was your opening. That is not a partnership. That is scavenging. And quite frankly, Lauren, I should kill you.” 

Her mouth tightened. For a second the polished act slipped and something uglier showed underneath.

“I heard what she said.” Lauren’s voice went quieter. “That she does not want the baby. That she would rather keep you to herself than give you a child. Do you know how that sounds to a man who has been waiting for an heir?”

My hands curled at my sides. “Don't talk about my marriage. I'm warning you.”

She lifted her chin. “I am not the one who put that fight on a recording. You two did that yourselves. All I did was stand close enough to hear you.”

“Mess with my wife again, Lauren… And I'll kill you. I won't say it again.”