Chapter 53 Returns
I woke up in my own bed, tangled in the sheets and in Tristan. His arm was heavy across my waist, his breathing slow and even against my shoulder.
For a moment, in the soft gray light, I let myself believe we were safe. Ida was at St. Jude’s—a luxury cage, but a cage nonetheless. The press was still howling, but the immediate storm had passed. We had survived the night. We had survived the seduction.
Then, the doorbell rang.
It wasn't a polite ring. It was a persistent, urgent buzzing that sliced through the quiet morning.
Tristan groaned, tightening his grip on me. "Ignore it."
"I can't," I whispered. "It might be the police. Or the press."
I disentangled myself from him. I pulled on my robe and walked barefoot to the living room.
I looked through the peephole.
It wasn't the police.
It was Vane. And a man I didn't recognize. A man in a rumpled trench coat holding a thick manila envelope.
I unlocked the door.
"Vane?"
"Minerva," Vane said, stepping inside without waiting for an invitation. He looked exhausted. "We need to talk. Is Tristan awake?"
"Barely."
"Wake him up," the trench coat man said. His voice was gravel. "He’s going to want to see this."
I looked at the envelope in his hand. It was stamped CONFIDENTIAL in red ink.
"I’ll get him," I said.
Five minutes later, we were sitting around my small kitchen table. Tristan was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt, his hair messy, his eyes sharp despite the sleep. I made coffee. Strong coffee.
"This is Detective Miller," Vane said, gesturing to the man. "Or rather, Private Investigator Miller. He retired from the force last week."
"The detective who called me about Ida?" I asked.
"The same," Miller said. He took a sip of coffee, grimacing. "Except now I work for myself. And I found something the precinct missed."
He placed the envelope on the table.
"What is it?" Tristan asked.
"The smoking gun," Miller said. "Or rather, the smoking bank transfer."
He opened the envelope. He pulled out a stack of papers. Photos. Bank statements. grainy surveillance shots.
He slid a photo across the table to Tristan.
It showed a man. Young, handsome, with a cocky smile.
"Recognize him?" Miller asked.
Tristan frowned. "No."
"Look closer," Miller said.
Tristan picked up the photo. He studied it. Then, his face went pale.
"That’s... that’s the guy," he whispered. "The guy from the hotel room. Five years ago."
My stomach dropped.
The guy. The actor. The man Ida had hired to be in my bed when Tristan walked in. The man who had ruined my life.
"His name is Julian Thorne," Miller said. "Small-time actor. Did some commercials. Disappeared five years ago."
"Disappeared?" I asked.
"Moved to the Cayman Islands," Miller said. "Bought a beach house. Paid cash."
He slid a bank statement across the table.
"This is from a shell company called 'Bluebird Holdings,'" Miller explained. "Registered in Panama. But the funding source? It traces back to a trust fund in New York."
Tristan looked at the statement. His hand shook.
"The Stevens Family Trust," he read.
"Ida," I whispered.
"Five hundred thousand dollars," Miller said. "Transferred the day before the divorce was finalized. Payment for services rendered."
Tristan stared at the paper. He stared at the number.
Five hundred thousand dollars.
That was the price of our marriage. That was the price of my reputation. That was the price of our child’s future.
"There’s more," Miller said.
He pulled out another photo.
This one was grainy. It showed a woman handing an envelope to Julian Thorne in a park.
The woman was wearing a distinctive coat. A red coat with a fur collar.
"I remember that coat," Tristan whispered. "Mom gave it to her."
"It’s Ida," Miller confirmed. "Taken three days before the... incident."
Tristan dropped the photo. He looked like he was going to be sick.
"She planned it," he said, his voice hollow. "She hired him. She paid him. It was all a lie."
"We knew it was a lie," I said gently, reaching for his hand.
"No," Tristan said, pulling away. "We suspected. We thought. But this..." He gestured to the papers. "This is proof. This is... concrete."
He stood up. He walked to the window. He looked out at the city, his shoulders hunched.
"I believed it," he whispered. "For five years, I believed it. I let her poison my mind. I let her destroy you."
"Tristan—"
"I threw you out!" he shouted, spinning around. "I threw you out on the street! I called you a whore! I let my sister win!"
He was spiraling. The guilt was hitting him like a physical blow.
"Tristan, stop," Vane said. "This isn't about guilt. This is about ammunition. With this evidence, we can bury her. We can prove premeditation. We can prove fraud. We can get the St. Jude’s transfer revoked."