Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN IN THE RED ROBE FINALLY TALKED
Mara did not forgive Serena because she was frightened.
Fear did not erase betrayal.
Pregnancy did not erase betrayal.
Tears did not erase betrayal.
But Mara listened.
Not for Serena.
For herself.
Nathan stayed in the room despite Serena’s demand for privacy.
A security officer stood outside.
Mara positioned her wheelchair across from the woman who had once known every secret she possessed.
Serena looked exhausted.
Her blonde hair was pulled into a loose knot.
No makeup.
No jewelry except a small gold chain.
“What happened?” Mara asked.
Serena swallowed.
“Lucas knows the car wasn’t destroyed.”
“Of course he knows.”
“He thinks I stopped it.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“You arranged to have it crushed.”
Serena looked toward Nathan.
“He told you.”
“The salvage yard did.”
Serena closed her eyes.
Mara’s voice hardened.
“Why did you try to destroy my car?”
“Because Lucas told me to.”
“That answer is becoming very popular.”
“It’s true.”
“So if Lucas told you to push me off a roof, you would?”
Serena flinched.
“No.”
“You helped him steal money.”
“Yes.”
“You helped him create shell companies.”
“Yes.”
“You helped him build a case that I was mentally incompetent.”
Serena looked down.
“Yes.”
“And you slept with my husband.”
A tear rolled down Serena’s cheek.
“Yes.”
Mara leaned back.
“Then start with the part where I’m supposed to care that you’re afraid of him.”
Serena cried quietly.
Nathan did not interrupt.
After several seconds, Serena spoke.
“Lucas approached me eighteen months ago.”
Mara frowned.
“The affair has been going on eighteen months?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“He asked me to help with a consulting project.”
“For Whitlock?”
“He said you were planning to remove him as CFO.”
“I wasn’t.”
“I know that now.”
“What did he tell you?”
“That your father’s trust made him financially vulnerable. That you controlled everything. That if you ever divorced him, he would leave with almost nothing.”
Mara stared.
“He signed the prenup willingly.”
“He said you forced him.”
“I met Lucas when he had thirty-eight thousand dollars in student debt.”
“I know.”
“Apparently you forgot.”
Serena wiped her face.
“He asked me to create the first company.”
“The one that paid the mechanic.”
“Yes.”
“What did you think it was for?”
“Executive consulting.”
“Twenty-five thousand dollars to a mechanic looked like executive consulting?”
“I didn’t see that payment until later.”
Mara looked at Nathan.
He remained unreadable.
“When did you start sleeping together?” Mara asked.
“Ten months ago.”
Mara felt sick.
Six months before the crash.
“Where?”
Serena stared at the floor.
“Chicago.”
Mara remembered.
The Urban Futures conference.
Mara had canceled because her father’s foundation needed her in Los Angeles.
Lucas and Serena attended together.
Mara had joked that her husband and best friend would keep each other out of trouble.
“How long before you got pregnant?”
Serena whispered, “Three months.”
“So the baby was planned?”
“No.”
“Does Lucas want it?”
Serena laughed bitterly.
“He wanted what it represented.”
“What does that mean?”
“He said once you were declared permanently incapacitated, he could divorce you without losing control of the company.”
Nathan shook his head.
“That isn’t how the trust works.”
“He believed it was.”
“Because?”
Serena looked toward him.
“Dr. Palmer told him.”
Nathan frowned.
“Palmer is a neurologist, not a trust attorney.”
“Lucas paid him to say whatever Lucas needed.”
Mara felt another piece click into place.
“The crash.”
Serena’s shoulders began to shake.
“I didn’t know beforehand.”
Mara’s face became still.
“Choose your next words carefully.”
“I swear.”
“Did Lucas cut my brakes?”
“I never saw him do it.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Serena pressed both hands against her stomach.
“Two days after the crash, Lucas was drunk.”
Nathan activated his recorder.
Serena watched but kept speaking.
“He said, ‘Dawson was supposed to make her scared, not send her over the edge.’”
Mara’s heart stopped.
“What?”
“He said it exactly like that.”
Mara’s voice became barely audible.
“What was Dawson supposed to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Serena.”
“I don’t know!”
She began crying harder.
“He said the brakes were only supposed to fail gradually.”
Nathan’s expression changed.
“That’s nonsense. A severed brake line is unpredictable.”
“I know.”
Mara stared at Serena.
“You knew Lucas arranged the brake failure.”
“Afterward.”
“And you stayed.”
Serena closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
“You stayed in my home.”
“Yes.”
“You visited me in the hospital.”
“Yes.”
“You held my hand.”
Serena sobbed.
Mara’s voice cracked for the first time.
“You watched me ask God if I would ever walk again.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t.”
Mara’s fingers shook.
“Do not insult me with that word.”
Serena covered her mouth.
Mara looked away.
She remembered waking in darkness.
Machines beeping.
Lucas asleep beside her bed.
Or pretending to sleep.
Serena arriving the next morning with flowers.
Red roses.
The same flowers that had been beside the sofa when Mara came home.
“How could you?”
Serena whispered, “I was afraid.”
“You were greedy.”
Serena looked at her.
“Yes.”
The honesty stopped Mara.
Serena wiped her face.
“I was jealous of you for years.”
“Of me?”
“You had everything.”
Mara laughed once.
“I buried two babies.”
Serena’s face collapsed.
“I know.”
“You sat beside me after the second miscarriage.”
“I know.”
“You told me I was your sister.”
“I know.”
“And you envied me?”
“I envied what people saw.”
“What did they see?”
“Your name. Your company. Your house. Your husband.”
Mara stared.
“You wanted my life.”
“Yes.”
“And now?”
Serena looked toward the windows.
“Now I know your life was never what I thought it was.”
“No. You helped make sure of that.”
Silence.
Nathan finally spoke.
“Why are you afraid Lucas will hurt you?”
Serena reached into her bag.
The security officer immediately stepped forward.
“It’s a phone,” Serena said.
She removed a cheap prepaid device and placed it on the table.
“Lucas doesn’t know I have this.”
Nathan took it.
“What’s on it?”
“Messages.”
“With Lucas?”
“And recordings.”
Mara stared.
“You recorded him?”
“After you came home.”
“Why?”
“Because I saw his face when you asked about the accident.”
Serena looked directly at Mara.
“I finally realized something.”
“What?”
“If he could do that to you after eight years of marriage, what exactly did I think would happen to me when I stopped being useful?”
Nathan opened the phone.
There were dozens of messages.
Lucas telling Serena to delete invoices.
Lucas telling her what to say to Dr. Palmer.
Lucas ordering her to have the Mercedes destroyed immediately.
Then one message sent after the courthouse hearing.
PACK A BAG. YOU’RE LEAVING TONIGHT.
Serena had replied:
WHERE?
Lucas:
NOT WITH ME.
Serena:
YOU SAID WE WERE A FAMILY.
Lucas:
DON’T START.
Then another.
YOU WERE A SOLUTION, SERENA. DON’T CONFUSE THAT WITH BEING IRREPLACEABLE.
Mara looked at Serena.
The words were cruel.
They also felt familiar.
Lucas had spent years making each woman believe she was uniquely loved.
Apparently neither had been.
Nathan opened an audio file.
Lucas’s voice played.
“You need to disappear until this is over.”
Serena answered, “What about the baby?”
“I’ll deal with that later.”
“You told me you loved me.”
“Keep your voice down.”
“Did you cut Mara’s brakes?”
Silence.
Then Lucas.
“You already know the answer.”
Mara’s blood went cold.
Serena’s recorded voice continued.
“I need you to say it.”
Lucas laughed.
“You’re not very good at this.”
“Say what?”
“Trying to get a confession.”
The recording ended.
Nathan immediately copied the file.
“It isn’t a direct confession.”
“But it helps,” Mara said.
“Yes.”
Serena leaned forward.
“There’s more.”
She told them about Eric Dawson.
The mechanic had not been hired to kill Mara, according to Lucas.
He had been paid to damage the brake system enough to cause a minor accident.
Lucas wanted Mara hospitalized for several weeks.
Why?
Because Whitlock Development was negotiating a massive acquisition called Meridian Harbor.
Mara opposed it.
Lucas supported it.
The board vote was scheduled three days after the crash.
With Mara hospitalized, Lucas voted her temporary proxy.
The acquisition passed.
Mara remembered waking from surgery and Lucas telling her how proud her father would have been.
She had been too drugged to ask what he meant.
Nathan stood.
“The Meridian deal.”
Mara looked at him.
“What?”
“I never understood why Lucas wanted it so badly.”
“Why did he?”
Nathan turned toward Serena.
“How much?”
Serena went pale.
“What?”
“His kickback.”
Silence.
Nathan stepped closer.
“How much did Meridian pay Lucas?”
Serena whispered, “Twelve million.”
Mara shut her eyes.
There was the missing money.
Not all of it.
Enough.
Nathan immediately called federal investigators.
The case was no longer simply marital fraud or attempted guardianship abuse.
Bribery.
Corporate theft.
Potential attempted murder.
Serena agreed to give a formal statement.
But before investigators arrived, the mansion alarm sounded.
Nathan looked toward the security officer.
“What triggered that?”
The officer checked his tablet.
“Garage door.”
Mara’s pulse accelerated.
“Lucas.”
Serena stood too quickly.
“He has a remote.”
Nathan pushed Mara’s wheelchair toward the secure hallway.
“Both of you upstairs.”
“I’m not hiding.”
“Mara.”
“He’s in my house.”
“And possibly under criminal investigation for sabotaging your brakes.”
“That still makes it my house.”
Nathan stared at her.
“This is not a board meeting.”
The front door opened downstairs.
Lucas’s voice echoed through the foyer.
“Mara?”
Serena went white.
“He knows I’m here.”
Lucas continued.
“I just want to talk.”
Mara looked at Nathan.
He whispered, “Police are nine minutes away.”
Lucas walked into the living room.
He saw Serena’s suitcase.
Then the prepaid phone on the table.
His expression changed.
“Serena.”
She backed away.
Lucas laughed softly.
“You actually did it.”
“What?”
“You recorded me.”
Mara rolled into view.
Lucas stared at her.
“You.”
“Yes.”
“You planned this.”
“No, Lucas.”
Mara’s voice was calm.
“You planned all of it.”
His eyes moved to Nathan.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
Nathan answered, “More than professional ethics encourage.”
Lucas ignored him.
He looked at Mara.
“You think you won because you embarrassed me in court?”
“No.”
“Because you found the car?”
Mara’s heart jumped.
He knew.
Lucas saw it.
Then smiled.
“Careful, Mara.”
He stepped closer.
“You’re not the only person who remembers things.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Lucas’s smile disappeared.
“You want to know why your father changed the trust?”
Mara froze.
“He knew you were going to lose the company.”
Nathan stepped forward.
“Don’t listen to him.”
Lucas laughed.
“You never told her?”
Mara looked at Nathan.
“Told me what?”
Nathan’s face changed.
Lucas saw it.
And smiled.
“Ask your loyal attorney what your father discovered six days before he died.”
Mara stared at Nathan.
“What is he talking about?”
May you like
For the first time since Nathan returned to her life, he had no immediate answer.
And Mara suddenly understood that Lucas was not the only man in the room who had been keeping something from her.
