Chapter 5 - THE FIVE WEEKS
Sarah and John had not spent five romantic weeks together.
They had spent five ugly weeks orbiting the same financial disaster.
The difference mattered.
The secrecy still did.
Robert traveled to London and met John privately.
Sarah refused to return home.
She claimed she could recover the money before the administrator discovered the forged documents.
Robert wanted to report the transfer immediately.
Diane begged him not to.
That revelation came from Robert, not John.
Emma looked at her mother.
“Why?”
Diane started crying.
“Because Sarah could have been arrested.”
Sarah looked away.
Emma felt something inside her settle into a colder shape.
“So you protected her.”
“She’s my daughter.”
“I’m your daughter.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Emma shook her head.
“You knew sixty-eight thousand dollars had been taken from me. You knew my name had been forged. And your concern was what might happen to Sarah.”
Diane cried harder.
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Then tell me what it was like.”
No answer came.
Robert negotiated with the account administrator.
Because the funds had not yet been spent completely, most could be frozen.
But approximately seventeen thousand dollars had already gone toward old business debts, London housing costs, and a deposit Sarah paid to a distributor.
Robert covered that amount personally to restore Emma’s trust.
Then the family attorney corrected the account records.
The transfer was reversed.
No police report was filed.
The administrator accepted an internal fraud declaration without pursuing further action because the trust was made whole and Robert assumed liability for the control failure.
Emma stared at him.
“You covered it.”
“Yes.”
“And then everybody decided I didn’t need to know.”
Robert looked ashamed.
“I wanted to tell you.”
“When?”
“Immediately.”
Diane said:
“We wanted Sarah home first.”
Sarah interrupted.
“I was in the middle of a placement.”
John laughed once.
Everyone looked at him.
He sounded disgusted.
“She was not in a placement.”
Emma turned.
“What?”
Sarah’s face flushed.
John said:
“The internship ended after nine days.”
Emma stared at her sister.
Sarah had continued posting London photographs for another month.
Museums.
Restaurants.
A rooftop bar.
A weekend in Bath.
Every caption suggested career success.
“What were you doing for the other four weeks?”
Sarah snapped:
“Trying to fix my life.”
John answered:
“Mostly trying to convince everyone not to tell Emma.”
That was why they kept meeting.
Sarah needed signatures.
Account documentation.
Calls coordinated across time zones.
John became involved because Robert did not understand the compliance process, and John had been the first person to discover the forged transfer.
He never handled Emma’s money.
Never lived with Sarah.
Never slept with her.
Never kissed her.
Sarah had tried once.
Emma’s stomach turned.
“What?”
John looked at Sarah.
“Tell her.”
Sarah said:
“It was nothing.”
Emma’s voice went flat.
“Tell me.”
Sarah looked furious now.
“One night I was upset.”
John continued.
“She had been drinking.”
Sarah snapped:
“Stop making me sound pathetic.”
“You came to my hotel lobby at midnight.”
Emma’s eyes closed briefly.
John continued anyway.
“She said I was the only person who understood what she was going through.”
Emma opened her eyes.
“And?”
“She kissed me.”
Sarah said quickly:
“And he pushed me away.”
That admission came out like a weapon she regretted dropping.
Emma stared.
John nodded.
“I told her if it happened again, I’d tell you everything that night.”
Emma looked at Sarah.
Her sister had kissed him.
Her fiancé had rejected her.
Then they all continued keeping the underlying secret.
Sarah had spent the next several weeks terrified John would expose her.
Which explained the anniversary-party greeting.
John! You actually came!
May you like
She had expected him to stay away.
Because Sarah had already started preparing another version of London.
