Chapter 10 - OUR MARRIAGE HAD BEEN PART OF HER PLAN
The memo was devastating.
Victoria had known exactly who I was.
She knew about the disputed Carter shares.
She knew my father's trust could eventually activate.
And she knew marriage created potential leverage.
One paragraph made me physically sick.
Maintaining Emma Carter within the immediate Vance family reduces litigation risk and provides future access through spousal and descendant interests.
I read it again.
Descendant interests.
Leo.
Chloe.
My children had been financial strategy before they were even born.
I called Arthur.
"Did you know your mother investigated me before we got engaged?"
"No."
"Don't lie."
"I'm not."
"Then why did you have the memo?"
"I found it in her office this morning."
I wanted to believe him.
That frightened me.
Because trusting Arthur had once cost me nearly everything.
Thomas studied the document independently.
"It appears authentic."
Arthur sent more.
Emails.
Internal notes.
Messages between Victoria and Brooke.
One referenced Vanessa by name eighteen months before Arthur claimed they met.
Victoria had identified her as a "suitable post-divorce partner."
My marriage.
Arthur's affair.
Vanessa's pregnancy.
Everything seemed to orbit the same obsession.
Control.
But why?
Thomas finally found the answer in the Carter Trust.
My father's thirty-four percent stake carried special voting rights.
As long as his direct descendants remained within the Vance family through marriage, certain votes could be exercised jointly.
But after divorce with full custodial separation, those rights reverted exclusively to the Carter line.
Arthur had signed away the one thing Victoria had spent years trying to preserve.
Control.
The irony was almost beautiful.
Her own son had destroyed her plan because he was too impatient to read the papers.
Then Vanessa called.
"I'm leaving Arthur."
I said nothing.
"I'm going back to Chicago. I don't want Victoria near my child."
"That's between you and Arthur."
"I know."
Her voice softened.
"But there's something you need to know."
During the clinic appointment, Vanessa had overheard Victoria arguing with the financial director about a stored file.
A file from fourteen years earlier.
My father's name was attached to it.
"What kind of file?"
"Medical."
I felt cold.
Vanessa continued.
"The director said he couldn't keep hiding it."
"Hiding what?"
"I don't know."
Then she told me the doctor's name.
Dr. Samuel Kirk.
My father's former oncologist.
Except he hadn't worked in oncology.
May you like
Not according to the records Thomas found.
He had specialized in toxicology.
