Chapter 10 - Eleanor's Last Video
I did not want the photograph to matter.
Noah was an infant.
Whatever Julian had done, the baby did not deserve to become a weapon in our war.
Nadia must have seen the discomfort on my face.
"We don't know what this means."
"I know."
"A photograph is not a paternity test."
"I know."
Marcus picked it up by the edges.
On the back, Eleanor had written a name.
Cameron Ellis.
Below the name was a date and the words former fiance.
"She knew who he was," I said.
Marcus searched the investigator's folder.
A report was clipped beneath the photographs.
The investigator was a licensed Ontario professional named Danielle Price.
Eleanor had hired her ten months before her death to determine whether Julian still worked for Vance Global and to document his connection to Northstar.
The report answered the first question on page one.
Julian Vance's employment had ended thirty-one months earlier.
Five months after he left New York.
Cause of termination was listed as undisclosed internal conduct review.
I stared at the date.
For more than two and a half years, every story he told me about client meetings, corporate transfers, compensation delays, and Canadian taxes had been fiction.
Page three identified Northstar Meridian Ventures.
Julian had incorporated it with two other men after losing his job.
Page six documented the Toronto condo.
Page nine showed Chloe entering the building.
Page twelve showed Cameron Ellis.
According to the investigator, Chloe had been engaged to Cameron before meeting Julian.
Their engagement ended publicly six months after Julian and Chloe began appearing together.
But Cameron continued visiting the condo building where Chloe lived.
The photograph outside the clinic had been taken during one of those visits.
The date fell inside the likely conception window if Noah had been born at full term.
Marcus closed the report.
"This is personal material."
"Why did Eleanor collect it?" I asked.
He looked toward the USB drive.
"Maybe she explains."
The old laptop in the storage unit was charged to forty percent.
We carried it to the facility's small business lounge and sat around a plastic table beneath fluorescent lights.
The USB contained four files.
One was a scanned copy of the forged guarantee.
One was a spreadsheet of transfers.
One was an audio file from a call with the private investigator.
The audio file with the investigator was mostly businesslike.
Eleanor asked short questions.
Danielle answered with dates and names.
But near the end, Eleanor asked something that made Danielle pause.
"Does he look happy?"
The investigator seemed surprised.
"Your son?"
"Yes."
Danielle answered carefully.
"Sometimes."
Eleanor laughed softly.
"That is a professional answer."
"It's an honest one."
"Does the young woman look happy?"
Another pause.
"Sometimes."
Eleanor was quiet for several seconds.
Then she said, "Good."
I stopped the file.
"Good?"
Marcus nodded as if he understood.
"She didn't want misery to be the only explanation for what he did."
That was Eleanor.
Even while collecting evidence that her son had taken money from her, she still wanted to know whether the life he chose had at least made someone happy.
The answer had not been simple enough to comfort her.
The investigator also noted that Chloe appeared unaware of some business meetings and financial problems.
On two occasions, Julian left the condo carrying folders shortly after telling Chloe by text that he was going to a corporate office.
He was not only lying to me and Eleanor.
He was managing Chloe too.
That did not excuse her behavior at the airport.
It did explain why Eleanor's video later warned Julian not to punish Chloe for his own choices.
Eleanor had already seen that the lie was wider than the affair.
It was a system.
Julian told each person exactly enough to keep them in position.
I closed the audio file.
There was one item left on the USB.
The fourth was a video named FOR JULIAN AFTER I AM GONE.
My throat tightened.
Marcus checked the file date.
Eleanor recorded it thirty-four days before she died.
Two days before she wrote the sealed letter.
"Do we watch it?"
Nadia looked at Marcus.
Marcus looked at me.
I thought of Eleanor's note.
Two copies are enough to survive him.
"Yes."
Marcus clicked play.
Eleanor appeared on the screen sitting in the cream armchair from her bedroom.
She looked smaller than I remembered.
Her silver hair had been brushed neatly.
A pale blue blanket covered her legs.
The cannula beneath her nose was visible.
The first few seconds showed her adjusting the phone.
Then she looked directly into the camera.
"Julian, if you are watching this, I am dead or too sick to say it myself."
I put one hand over my mouth.
Her voice was weak, but her eyes were clear.
"I have spent most of your life believing love means protecting the people you love from consequences."
She paused to breathe.
"That was my mistake."
Marcus looked down.
Eleanor continued.
"When you were a boy, I replaced the neighbor's window after you broke it and told your father the wind did it."
A faint smile touched her face.
"When you were seventeen, I paid for the bumper you damaged and told you not to tell him."
"When you failed your first semester of college, I blamed the professor because I could not bear to admit you had stopped attending class."
Her smile disappeared.
"I taught you something every time I rescued you."
"I taught you that someone else would pay."
I felt tears slide down my face.
Eleanor looked directly into the camera.
"For three years, Elena paid."
"She paid with money."
"She paid with sleep."
"She paid with her career."
"She paid with the marriage she kept believing still existed."
"And while she did that, you told me you were working in Canada."
Eleanor reached beside her and lifted a printed page.
"You were fired thirty-one months ago."
She set it down.
"You told me your company delayed your housing allowance."
"My own money was paying for your condo."
Another page.
"You told me Northstar was your employer's new venture."
"It is your company."
"You told Chloe I invested willingly."
Her face hardened.
"I did not."
She coughed for several seconds.
The video shook slightly as someone off camera moved toward her.
I recognized my own voice.
"Do you want me to stop it?"
Eleanor answered without looking away from the camera.
"No, sweetheart."
I had forgotten that day.
I remembered helping her set up the phone because she said she wanted to record instructions for Marcus.
She had asked me to leave the room after that.
Apparently she called me back when she began coughing, and I never realized the recording continued.
Eleanor took a sip of water.
"Julian, I heard you say my money would be yours eventually."
"I want you to understand something you should have learned before I did."
"Death does not turn another person's property into a promise."
"Inheritance is not wages for being born."
Her eyes glistened.
"And being my son does not give you permission to declare me dead while I am breathing."
The room went completely still.
She knew.
Not just about the guarantee.
About the document describing her as deceased.
"I gave the house to Elena because she earned my trust and because I needed to protect the home from what you had already promised to strangers."
"I changed my trust because I wanted to give you one final chance to tell the truth."
"Ninety days."
"That is more time than you gave me when I asked you to come home from the ICU."
Eleanor looked away from the camera for the first time.
When she looked back, tears were running down her cheeks.
"I still love you."
Her voice broke.
"That is the humiliating part."
I closed my eyes.
"I loved you when you ignored me."
"I loved you when I saw the transfers."
"I loved you when the investigator showed me the woman you were living with."
"I loved you when I realized you had told her Elena was a house manager."
She breathed slowly.
"But love is not permission."
Then her expression changed.
It became almost stern.
"And before you destroy what remains of your life to defend this new family you keep talking about, you need to learn one more lesson."
Marcus leaned closer to the screen.
"Do not punish the baby."
"He has done nothing wrong."
"Do not punish Chloe for your choices either."
I was surprised by that.
Eleanor continued.
"But do not build another lie on top of the ones already collapsing."
She reached down and lifted a photograph.
The same photograph we had found in the envelope.
Chloe kissing Cameron Ellis outside the clinic.
"I do not know whose child she is carrying."
My breath caught.
Chloe had already been pregnant when the photograph was taken.
The loose coat had hidden it from me at first glance.
Eleanor looked into the camera again.
"Neither do you."
The video ended.
For several seconds, the laptop screen showed only our reflections.
Nadia broke the silence.
"Does Julian know Eleanor had this?"
Marcus shook his head.
"I don't think so."
My phone vibrated.
A text from Chloe appeared.
I need to talk to you before Julian finds out.
May you like
A second message arrived immediately.
It's about Noah's father.
