Chapter 12 - LACEY WITHOUT THE ROBE
I met Lacey once.
Voluntarily.
Months after the kennel.
Naomi hated the idea but arranged it in a conference room with lawyers nearby.
Lacey wore a plain gray suit.
No wineglass.
No silk robe.
No triumph.
I had imagined I would feel powerful seeing her diminished.
I did not.
She looked like a woman who had made terrible decisions and finally run out of flattering lighting.
“I’m not here to forgive you,” I said.
“I know.”
“Why did you want to meet?”
“To tell you what Damon is saying.”
“Tell my lawyer.”
“I did.”
“Then why me?”
Lacey looked down.
“Because I spent months treating you like an obstacle instead of a person.”
That was almost an apology.
Not enough.
She continued, “I believed everything he said about you because believing him made what I was doing easier.”
“What did he say?”
“That you didn’t love him anymore. That you only stayed because you were pregnant. That your father controlled you. That you were trying to take Halstead from him.”
“Did you believe I agreed to the sale?”
“At first.”
“And after you knew I didn’t?”
She closed her eyes.
“I told myself you were being unreasonable.”
“So you lied.”
“Yes.”
“Signed as a witness.”
“Yes.”
“Cropped my message.”
“Yes.”
“Moved into my bedroom.”
“Yes.”
“Wore my clothes.”
Her face tightened.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
This answer mattered less legally.
More personally.
“Because I wanted you to know.”
I stared.
“Know what?”
“That I had replaced you.”
There.
No excuse.
No Damon made me.
Her own cruelty.
“Thank you for finally saying something honest.”
She cried.
I did not comfort her.
Then she said, “Damon never planned to leave you immediately.”
I almost laughed.
“That’s supposed to help?”
“No. It’s supposed to explain why I hated you.”
He wanted both.
The wife whose trust rights stabilized the company and connected him to Calder capital.
The mistress who helped him hide the failure.
A family.
An accomplice.
Everything.
Until my refusal forced him to choose which woman was useful in that moment.
Then Lacey said something unexpected.
“He was scared of your father.”
“I know.”
“No. Not physically.”
“I know.”
“He spent years trying to prove Orson was wrong about him. Every success was for your father. Every magazine cover. Every building.”
That sounded plausible.
Not my burden.
“Damon is responsible for Damon.”
“Yes.”
Good.
Then I asked, “Did you know he would put me in the kennel?”
“No.”
“Did you laugh?”
Her eyes filled.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I was drunk. Angry. Jealous.”
“None of those things move your mouth for you.”
“I know.”
We sat in silence.
Then she said:
“I’m sorry.”
I believed she meant it.
That did not make us friends.
I stood.
“I hope cooperation with investigators is truthful.”
“It is.”
“Not because it saves you.”
She nodded.
Then I left.
Outside, Evelyn slept in her stroller beside Dad.
He looked at Lacey through the glass.
“Want me to—”
“No.”
He stopped.
Growth.
We walked away.
Lacey would face her own legal outcomes later.
May you like
I no longer needed to imagine them every night.
That felt like getting a room back inside my own mind.
