Chapter 2 - DON’T BE MY WIFE TONIGHT
Six months after my mother warned me that men like Gregory Hawthorne never entered lives like ours without a reason, I became his wife.
And less than four hours after saying I do, I began wondering whether my mother had been right.
I left the library hallway before Gregory’s relatives discovered I had overheard them.
Celeste Hawthorne’s words followed me back toward the reception.
She won’t last the night.
She learns why he really married her.
The ballroom inside the Connecticut inn glowed beneath hundreds of candles. Gregory stood near the windows speaking with his attorney, Naomi Keller.
Even from across the room, he noticed me.
He always noticed me.
His conversation stopped immediately.
He crossed the room.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
His eyebrows tightened.
“You’re terrible at that word.”
“At what word?”
“Nothing.”
I forced a smile.
“The dress is tight.”
Gregory studied me.
He did not believe me.
But instead of demanding an explanation, he touched my hand.
“Twenty more minutes.”
“For what?”
“Then everyone leaves.”
That should have comforted me.
It didn’t.
I looked beyond him.
Celeste stood beside Gregory’s younger brother, Charles Hawthorne.
Celeste was Gregory’s cousin, fifty-six, perfectly dressed, permanently smiling, and somehow capable of making compliments sound like tax audits.
Charles did not smile.
He watched us.
The reception ended shortly after eleven.
Gregory and I were staying in the inn’s private bridal suite before returning to New York the following morning.
When the suite door closed, silence settled around us.
No relatives.
No photographers.
No string quartet.
No champagne glasses.
Just me and the sixty-one-year-old man I had married.
Gregory loosened his tie.
I stood near the fireplace.
My heart began beating harder.
Not because I was afraid he would hurt me.
Gregory had never once pushed past a boundary.
But suddenly every whisper mattered.
Every joke about my age.
Every warning.
Every person who had looked at me as if I had entered a contract whose terms I had never read.
Gregory saw the panic.
He stopped.
“Eden.”
“I’m fine.”
“There’s that word again.”
I looked down.
He approached slowly.
“What happened outside?”
I said nothing.
His face changed.
“You heard something.”
I looked at him.
“Why did you marry me?”
The question landed heavily.
He did not laugh.
He did not seem offended.
“Because I love you.”
“Is that the only reason?”
Silence.
That was enough.
I stepped backward.
“Gregory.”
His eyes closed briefly.
“No.”
My stomach dropped.
“There is something else.”
I could barely breathe.
“What?”
He walked toward the writing desk.
Opened a drawer.
Removed a thick envelope.
Then he said the strangest words any bride could hear on her wedding night.
“Don’t be my wife tonight.”
I stared.
“What?”
He faced me.
“Be my witness.”
I felt cold.
“To what?”
“To what happens after midnight.”
The clock beside the bed read 11:37.
Gregory placed the envelope on the table.
Inside were company records.
Board resolutions.
Trust documents.
Letters.
A photocopy of what looked like his will.
I looked at him.
“Explain.”
“Eight months ago, I discovered someone inside Hawthorne Meridian was moving money through construction contracts.”
“How much?”
“At least eighty-four million dollars.”
My mouth went dry.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You own the company.”
“I own thirty-nine percent personally. Another twenty-two percent is controlled by the Hawthorne Family Voting Trust.”
“And?”
“My brother Charles chairs that trust.”
I thought of the man watching me across the ballroom.
Gregory continued.
“For a year, Charles and several family members have argued that I’m too old to continue running the company.”
“You’re sixty-one, not ninety-one.”
“To them, age is convenient language.”
“For what?”
“Control.”
I looked at the papers.
“What does this have to do with me?”
Gregory hesitated.
“My grandfather built the original company. After watching his own brothers destroy each other over money, he created succession rules inside the family trust.”
My pulse quickened.
“What rules?”
“If the sitting chairman marries, his legal spouse becomes temporary successor trustee if he is incapacitated before naming a permanent successor.”
I stared.
“You married me to control the trust?”
“No.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I planned to change the provision next week.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
He stepped closer.
“I proposed because I wanted to marry you. The timing of this wedding moved forward because three weeks ago someone tried to have me declared medically incompetent.”
I stopped breathing.
“What?”
“A neurologist I’ve never met submitted a confidential opinion to the trust claiming I had cognitive decline.”
“Do you?”
“No.”
“Then who paid him?”
“That is what Naomi is investigating.”
I looked toward the envelope.
“You thought something might happen tonight.”
“Yes.”
My heart hammered.
“And you still brought me here?”
His face tightened.
“I nearly canceled the wedding.”
“You should have told me.”
“Yes.”
The immediate admission made my anger worse.
“You had no right to let me walk into this blind.”
“No.”
“Stop agreeing with me!”
For the first time, Gregory raised his voice.
“I was afraid you would leave!”
Silence.
I had never heard him shout.
He lowered his voice immediately.
“And I would have deserved it.”
I stared at him.
He looked older suddenly.
Not weak.
Tired.
“I have spent forty years surrounded by people who can calculate what I am worth before I finish entering a room,” he said. “Then I met a woman who argued with me because I skipped lunch.”
Despite everything, my eyes burned.
“I should have told you. I didn’t.”
“Why tonight?”
“Because tomorrow morning the trust records your status.”
The clock clicked.
11:46.
“And until then?”
“Until then, technically, Charles can still challenge the marriage before the trust recognizes you.”
My stomach twisted.
“So Celeste was right.”
His eyes sharpened.
“What did she say?”
“That I wouldn’t last the night.”
Gregory went completely still.
“Who was she speaking with?”
“I couldn’t see.”
He crossed toward his phone.
Then stopped.
His hand touched his chest.
“Gregory?”
He frowned.
“I’m fine.”
But his face had lost color.
I moved toward him.
He reached for the bedside table.
His water glass fell.
Shattered.
“Gregory!”
His knees buckled.
I caught his arm, but his weight pulled us both toward the carpet.
His breathing became shallow.
“Call Naomi,” he whispered.
I grabbed my phone.
“Gregory, what’s happening?”
“My medication.”
“What medication?”
“Heart rhythm.”
My hands shook.
“Where is it?”
“Bathroom.”
I ran.
A black prescription bottle sat beside the sink.
I brought it back.
Gregory looked at the label.
Then his face changed.
“That isn’t mine.”
“What?”
“The pills are wrong.”
Someone pounded on the suite door.
“Gregory!”
Charles.
Then Celeste.
“Open the door!”
I called 911.
Gregory grabbed my wrist.
“Eden.”
“Don’t talk.”
“The envelope.”
“What?”
“Keep it.”
The pounding became louder.
“Eden!” Charles shouted. “Open this door immediately!”
Paramedics arrived six minutes later.
By then Gregory was barely conscious.
Charles pushed into the room behind them.
Celeste followed.
Her eyes moved first to Gregory.
Then to me.
Then to the envelope under my arm.
And I knew she understood exactly what I had.
At 4:18 the next morning, Gregory was in a hospital outside Hartford.
Doctors would tell me only that a medication interaction had triggered a dangerous heart rhythm.
Charles called it an accident.
Celeste called it stress.
I called it impossible.
At 6:03 a.m., I stepped into a private family waiting room.
Every Hawthorne relative from the wedding seemed to be waiting.
Charles stood first.
He placed a folder on the table.
Inside were annulment papers.
A cashier’s check sat on top.
Five million dollars.
I stared at him.
“What is this?”
Charles spoke carefully.
“A way out.”
“Out of what?”
“This family.”
Celeste folded her arms.
“You’ve been married less than twelve hours. Take the money. Sign the annulment. Go home.”
I looked at all of them.
“Gregory is still alive.”
Charles’s expression hardened.
“That is exactly why you need to decide before he wakes up.”
And suddenly I remembered Gregory’s words.
Don’t be my wife tonight.
Be my witness.
I pushed the check back across the table.
“No.”
Charles leaned forward.
“You don’t understand what you’re doing.”
I met his eyes.
“No.”
Then I picked up the envelope Gregory had trusted me with.
May you like
“But I’m starting to.”
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