Chapter 10 - THE MARRIAGE BEHIND GLASS
Julian met Brooke inside a courthouse interview room.
Investigators recorded everything.
I did not attend.
Helen later showed me the video because Brooke mentioned my house repeatedly.
She entered wearing a plain gray dress.
Without her jewelry and polished confidence, she looked younger.
Julian sat across from her.
For almost a minute, neither spoke.
Then Brooke began crying.
“I am pregnant.”
Julian stared at her.
The same claim had appeared twice before during arguments.
Both times, the tests were negative.
“Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have medical proof?”
Her tears stopped briefly.
“You do not believe me.”
“I believed you about the business.”
“The loans.”
“The house papers.”
“My mother.”
“I need proof now.”
Brooke looked wounded.
“You sound like Clara.”
“Her name is Mom.”
The correction changed the room.
Brooke leaned forward.
“She has always wanted us apart.”
“No.”
“She gave us a home.”
“She gave us money.”
“She gave you chance after chance.”
“And she made sure I knew it was hers.”
“It was hers.”
Brooke’s face hardened.
“We were supposed to build a family.”
“Not by stealing hers.”
“I did this for us.”
“You bought your mother a handbag with my mother’s savings.”
“That was one gift.”
“You forged a deed.”
“I needed collateral.”
“You tried to have Mom declared incompetent.”
“She would have fought every decision.”
“That was her right.”
Brooke looked toward the one-way glass.
She understood investigators were listening.
Then she changed strategy.
“Margaret planned the guardianship.”
Julian did not react.
“She told me Clara would never forgive you for failing.”
“She said you would lose the company.”
“She said once we controlled the house, we could repay everything.”
“Did you believe her?”
“At first.”
“And later?”
Brooke looked down.
“Later, I wanted the life she promised.”
There it was.
Not love.
Not survival.
A life.
The house.
The company.
The wedding photographs.
The right mother in the luxury handbag.
The inconvenient older woman removed from the frame.
Julian asked whether she was pregnant again.
Brooke admitted she was not.
She wanted to see whether he still cared enough to rescue her.
He stood.
“I did care.”
“Do you still?”
He looked at her for a long time.
“I care what happens to you.”
“But I will not lie for you.”
Brooke’s face became cold.
“Then I will tell them everything you did.”
“You should.”
She stared at him.
He left the room.
That was the first time my son accepted that truth might cost him the person he wanted.
The prosecutor later showed Brooke the videos from the Gucci bag.
Margaret had recorded private conversations with her daughter too.
In one, Margaret promised to remove Brooke from the financial scheme if anything failed.
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Brooke listened twice.
Then she agreed to cooperate.
