Chapter 7 - The Marriage They Wanted
I did not sleep.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Ethan’s face on the video.
Who introduced us?
Dad.
It sounded absurd.
Eight years of marriage reduced to a question I had never thought to ask.
Had meeting Ethan truly been chance?
The following morning, Detective Sloan returned with a financial crimes investigator named Aaron Webb.
He carried a laptop and several folders.
“We found something in Walker Development’s records,” Webb said.
“What?”
“Mark’s hiring documents.”
I frowned.
“I helped him get the job.”
“You recommended him.”
“Yes.”
“But Ethan initially rejected him.”
I stared at Webb.
“No, he didn’t.”
Margaret looked uncomfortable.
Apparently she knew.
“Ethan never told me.”
Webb opened an email.
It was from Ethan to the company’s former CFO.
MARK HALE DOES NOT HAVE THE EXPERIENCE FOR PROCUREMENT.
DO NOT MOVE FORWARD.
The date was two years ago.
Three days later came another message.
APPROVED.
“What changed?” I asked.
Webb slid a printed email toward me.
It was from my father.
Richard Hale.
To Ethan.
The subject line read FAMILY MATTER.
Most of the email looked ordinary.
Dad wrote about my pregnancy struggles at the time.
My stress.
My desire for family unity.
Then came the last paragraph.
Claire takes rejection personally.
It would mean a great deal to her if Mark were given a chance.
I remembered that week.
Dad had called me repeatedly.
He told me Mark was desperate.
He told me Ethan could easily help.
He told me family supported family.
So I had pressured my husband.
I had opened the door.
“I put Mark inside Ethan’s company.”
Webb shook his head.
“Your father manipulated you into doing it.”
“That doesn’t change what happened.”
“No,” Margaret said.
“But it changes responsibility.”
Webb opened another file.
“Ethan started looking backward.”
“How far?”
“Eight years.”
The year we met.
My stomach tightened.
“He discovered Richard Hale had purchased information from a private wealth database three months before you met.”
“What kind of information?”
“Executives.
Inheritance structures.
Single business owners.
Net worth estimates.”
I felt cold.
Webb rotated the screen.
One name was highlighted.
ETHAN WALKER.
Below it was an estimated net worth.
Twenty-nine million dollars at the time.
I whispered, “Dad researched him.”
“Yes.”
“Before I met him.”
“Yes.”
I thought about the charity auction.
Dad insisting I wear the blue dress.
Dad telling me a successful young developer would be there.
Dad laughing when Ethan asked me to dance.
Maybe Ethan and I had fallen in love honestly.
But someone had put us in the same room intentionally.
“Why?”
Webb took a breath.
“We believe your father was already in severe financial trouble.”
“How severe?”
“Nearly six million dollars.”
My mouth went dry.
“Six million?”
“Failed investments.
Private loans.
Unpaid taxes.”
“But he lived normally.”
“He was borrowing to preserve appearances.”
I finally understood.
My marriage had been a rescue plan.
Not for me.
For him.
Then Sloan placed another photograph on the bed.
It was taken at the charity auction eight years ago.
Ethan and I were dancing in the background.
Dad stood near the bar.
Beside him was a man I had never seen before.
Sloan tapped the stranger’s face.
“His name is Victor Dane.”
“Who is he?”
“A private investigator.”
I waited.
Sloan’s next words changed everything again.
May you like
“Your father paid him to follow Ethan for four months before you met.”
*
