Chapter 7 - REID FINALLY STOPPED BLAMING CLARA
Reid asked to meet.
I agreed because Miriam would be there.
He arrived alone.
No Clara.
No company attorney.
No tie.
For the first time in years, Reid looked uncertain.
“Nora.”
I waited.
He sat.
“I used the saved signature.”
No preamble.
Good.
“For the bridge-loan acknowledgment?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
“The seller authorization.”
My chest tightened even though I expected it.
“And?”
He closed his eyes.
“The estate-beneficiary confirmation.”
Three.
“How?”
“I thought you would sign eventually.”
There it was.
The sentence underneath our marriage.
“I thought you would.”
I leaned back.
“So you signed first and planned to get my consent later.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because the financing timeline was collapsing.”
“Why Clara’s account?”
“She needed documented liquidity for the new division.”
“With my money.”
“Yes.”
“Did you intend to repay me?”
“Yes.”
I almost smiled.
“With what?”
“Expansion proceeds.”
“That didn’t exist.”
“No.”
A plan funded by confidence.
Then Miriam asked:
“Did Ms. Vale ask you to forge Nora’s signature?”
“No.”
Important.
Clara was guilty of knowingly processing suspicious documents.
The forgeries were Reid.
“Did she design the separation strategy?”
“No.”
“Who did?”
Reid looked at me.
“I did.”
There it was.
No mistress villain large enough to hide behind.
“I was going to tell you after Hale funded the expansion.”
“Tell me what?”
“That the marriage was over.”
“And the apartment?”
“I thought we would negotiate.”
“You already sold it.”
He flinched.
Then:
“I was angry at Margaret for refusing to help.”
I stared.
“My mother gave you four and a half million dollars.”
“I know.”
“She saved your company.”
“I know.”
“And when she refused to pledge her home too, you became angry.”
His eyes filled.
“Yes.”
Not enough.
But true.
Then he said:
“I started seeing Clara because she made me feel—”
I held up my hand.
“No.”
He stopped.
“I don’t need the sentence.”
He looked confused.
“She made you feel admired. Young. Important. Understood. Whatever.”
I shook my head.
“None of those feelings forged my signature.”
He lowered his head.
“No.”
“None told me to leave at six.”
“No.”
“None wrote ‘personal transition’ on a board slide.”
“No.”
The affair had not stolen his agency.
Then Reid said the thing I did not expect.
“I called you comfortable because I was jealous.”
I stared.
“Of what?”
“You never needed Northbridge.”
Almost funny.
“You thought I needed you?”
“Yes.”
He swallowed.
“And somewhere along the way I realized if the company disappeared, I didn’t know who I was.”
He looked at me.
“You had your mother. Friends. The apartment. A life that existed before me.”
His voice became quiet.
“I hated how easy you made belonging look.”
I had no answer because perhaps that was the first honest thing he had said about us.
Then Miriam placed a document in front of him.
Petition for dissolution of marriage.
His face changed.
“You filed?”
“This morning.”
He looked at me.
“Nora—”
“No.”
“Twenty-three years.”
“Twenty-three years are not a coupon for a twenty-fourth.”
He laughed once through tears.
Then nodded.
“I deserve that.”
I disliked the phrase.
“This is not about what you deserve.”
I signed the acknowledgment page.
“It is about what I choose.”
Before he left, Reid asked one question.
“Are you going to take Northbridge?”
I looked at him.
“No.”
Hope appeared.
May you like
Then I finished.
“I’m going to make sure you can’t keep running it like everything belongs to you.”
