Chapter 11 - TIFFANY’S FINAL OFFER
Tiffany requested a meeting after her father’s arrest.
She offered to surrender in exchange for speaking with Ryan privately.
Mara refused the private condition.
The meeting took place inside a monitored room.
Ryan sat across from Tiffany.
I watched from behind the glass.
She wore no wedding ring.
Her hair was tied back.
Without the gown, flowers, and cameras, she looked smaller.
Not harmless.
Smaller.
“Are you hurt?” she asked Ryan.
“Your father hit me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you?”
She looked toward the camera.
“He was not supposed to threaten the cemetery.”
“What was he supposed to do?”
“Convince your mother to sign.”
“Using what?”
“Pressure.”
Ryan laughed once.
“You call everything pressure when you do not want to say violence.”
Tiffany’s face tightened.
“I grew up watching my father lose everything.”
“Every project failed.”
“Every investor left.”
“He said the Bennett land was our last chance.”
“Our?”
“My parents’.”
“Mine.”
“Yours.”
“No.”
Ryan’s answer came immediately.
“It was never mine.”
Tiffany studied him.
“Your mother made sure you believed that.”
“My mother believed land should not become payment for my choices.”
“Same thing.”
“No.”
“That is what you still do.”
“What?”
“You rename another person’s boundary until it sounds like cruelty.”
Tiffany’s eyes filled.
“You loved me.”
“Yes.”
“Then help me.”
“How?”
“Say I did not know about the forged transfer.”
“You wrote messages about the facial scan.”
“My father told me it was legal.”
“Say the slap happened because I was overwhelmed.”
“You looked directly at the camera first.”
Her face changed.
Melissa’s footage showed Tiffany checking the photographer’s position before striking me.
The slap had been meant for witnesses.
If I reacted physically, Price would describe aggression.
If I left, Elaine would complete the transfer.
Tiffany lowered her voice.
“I can tell investigators my parents forced me.”
“Did they?”
“My father controlled everything.”
“Did he control your hand?”
She looked away.
Ryan leaned closer.
“You hit her because you believed she had finally become useless.”
Tears rolled down Tiffany’s face.
“I was angry.”
“You were certain.”
“Certain of what?”
“That she would still pay.”
The words remained between them.
Tiffany had not expected the cancellation because our family trained her to believe my giving had no end.
Ryan helped teach her.
So did I.
Every time I paid after being insulted, I made generosity look compulsory.
Tiffany placed both hands on the table.
“I am pregnant.”
Ryan stopped breathing.
Behind the glass, Mara looked toward me.
Tiffany continued.
“I found out three days before the wedding.”
“I was going to tell you during the honeymoon.”
Ryan stared at her stomach.
“Do you have proof?”
She produced a clinic report.
The physician’s name was Dr. Samuel Price.
Ryan closed his eyes.
“Is it real?”
“Yes.”
“Then we will have an independent test.”
She began crying harder.
“You think I would lie about our child?”
“I thought you would not lie about our marriage.”
Mara entered the room.
Tiffany’s attorney objected.
Mara placed a laboratory report on the table.
The blood sample on Price’s document belonged to another woman.
The report was false.
Tiffany’s tears stopped.
Ryan stood.
“I hope one day you decide to become someone who does not require another lie to survive the last one.”
He walked out.
Tiffany called his name.
May you like
He did not turn.
She was arrested before leaving the building.
