Chapter 3 - THOMAS HART'S EMPLOYER
The police took statements.
Genevieve admitted pushing Isolde.
Not that she intended a fall.
Her wording was precise.
“I intended to move her away from the family stairs.”
The officer stared at her.
“By pushing a pregnant woman toward them?”
“I misjudged the direction.”
Rowan almost spoke.
Isolde stopped him with one look.
Let Genevieve own her own sentence.
Rowan admitted slapping his mother.
No claim of self-defense.
No rewriting it as instinct.
The officer documented both incidents.
No one was arrested at the mansion that afternoon.
The reports would go to prosecutors.
That was less satisfying than television and more realistic.
When the officers left, Rowan walked into the east sitting room alone.
Genevieve was pouring mineral water.
Her cheek had reddened.
“You're going to explain the message.”
“No.”
“Then I'll start with Julian.”
Her glass stopped halfway to her mouth.
There.
“Who is he coming for?”
Genevieve looked at him.
“You already know.”
“Isolde?”
“The tape.”
“What tape?”
She smiled faintly.
“You married a woman without learning what her parents kept?”
Rowan stepped closer.
“Do not turn this into her failure.”
“I’m turning it into yours.”
He stared.
She set down the glass.
“Thomas Hart worked for your father.”
Everything in Rowan went still.
“Dad?”
“Yes.”
“As what?”
“Driver.”
Rowan thought of the old photographs.
His father, Adrian Vale, climbing out of sedans.
Black cars.
White gloves.
Men whose names Rowan never learned.
“1999.”
Genevieve nodded.
“The West Side Highway crash.”
“Yes.”
Rowan understood before she said it.
The Mercedes had belonged to Adrian Vale.
His father.
He sat down.
Not because Genevieve invited him.
“Was Dad in the car?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
She did not answer.
Rowan stood again.
“Where was he?”
“Passenger seat.”
Too fast.
He heard it.
“You've said that before.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“To police?”
“Yes.”
“To lawyers?”
“Yes.”
“To Isolde's mother?”
Genevieve's expression changed.
There.
“Marianne knew.”
“She knew your family.”
“She knew enough.”
“Did Isolde?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“You would have to ask Marianne.”
“She’s dead.”
“I know.”
Rowan studied his mother.
“When did you learn Isolde was Thomas Hart's daughter?”
“Before you proposed.”
The room seemed to change shape.
“You knew for three years.”
“Yes.”
“And said nothing.”
“I told you to end the relationship.”
“You said she was unsuitable.”
“She was.”
“Because her father worked for Dad?”
“Because I didn't believe her arrival in your life was accidental.”
Rowan laughed in disbelief.
“You thought she targeted me?”
“I still don't know that she didn't.”
“She did not even know Thomas worked for us.”
“So she says.”
Rowan stepped closer.
“If you say one more thing about her lying before you explain your own part—”
Genevieve looked amused.
“You sound like your father when he had already decided which truth he wanted.”
That stopped him.
Then she asked:
“Did you ever investigate her?”
Rowan did not answer.
Genevieve saw enough.
“Yes.”
The background report.
Before the engagement.
Something Rowan had never told Isolde.
Genevieve had insisted.
He had allowed it.
And the report had contained one line he had deliberately ignored:
Father: Thomas Edward Hart. Criminal conviction, 1999. Prior employment records partially sealed following private civil resolution.
Rowan remembered.
He had asked family counsel whether it affected Isolde.
They said no.
He did not ask what “private civil resolution” meant.
Because he did not want the answer to make him look like a man auditing his fiancée's bloodline.
So he chose not to know.
Genevieve watched his face.
“You saw it.”
“I saw a sealed employment note.”
“And didn't ask.”
“No.”
“Convenient.”
Rowan hated that she was right about one thing.
He had chosen comfort.
Then Genevieve picked up her water.
“If Marianne's tape exists, Julian has spent twenty-seven years hoping it was destroyed.”
“Uncle Julian?”
“Yes.”
Rowan's father's younger brother.
Seventy now.
Former general counsel of Vale Holdings.
Current chairman of the family trust committee.
The man who toasted Isolde at their wedding.
Rowan asked:
“What is on the tape?”
Genevieve finally looked afraid.
“I never heard the whole thing.”
“That wasn't the question.”
“I don't know.”
“Then why does Julian want it?”
May you like
She stared at her son.
“Because Thomas Hart said it proves he wasn't driving.”
