Chapter 10 - My Face, Someone Else's Appointment
I studied the photograph under the bright desk lamp in my hotel room.
The woman was turned away from the camera, her face hidden by the angle of the entrance.
She wore a camel-colored coat with a narrow black belt.
I owned a coat like it.
So did half the women who shopped at the department store where I bought mine.
But a gold watch was visible on her left wrist.
I wore my watch on the right because of an old injury.
It was not proof on its own.
It was a place to begin.
Grant compared the timestamp with the conference recording and confirmed that I had been speaking onstage hundreds of miles away.
Maya asked the court to require appropriate authentication of the purported evaluation.
She also warned me that the judge might be more concerned with protecting assets than settling every disputed fact at one emergency hearing.
Tuesday morning came with gray skies and a corridor full of attorneys.
Richard arrived with two lawyers.
Eric sat behind them, looking sleepless.
My father avoided me.
Diane sat beside Natalie, who wore a loose cream dress and kept one hand over her stomach.
Celeste sat on the opposite side of the room with her own counsel.
For the first time, the people who had always acted like one smiling family looked like separate parties with separate fears.
The judge listened without interruption as Maya explained the attempted wire, the purported foundation resolution, and the contested authority documents.
Richard's lawyer described the dispute as an emotional breakdown following an affair.
Maya produced the conference record showing that I could not have attended the alleged clinical appointment.
The judge examined the timestamps.
"Counsel," she asked Richard's attorney, "how was this report authenticated?"
He requested additional time.
The judge did not accuse anyone of a crime.
She simply refused to rely on the disputed report at that stage and ordered the parties to preserve relevant records.
She also issued temporary restrictions on specified transfers pending further review, based on the financial evidence presented.
It was not a final victory.
It was a chance to keep the ground from moving while we investigated.
Outside the courthouse, Natalie approached me alone.
"You think you've won," she said.
I looked at her belly.
"I think you deserve medical care and the truth. Those aren't prizes I can take from you."
She flinched as though kindness from me was an insult.
"Eric still loves me."
"Then you should ask why he has spent a week trying to protect Richard instead of you."
Her face changed.
She glanced toward Eric, who was speaking urgently with Richard.
For one second she looked genuinely afraid.
"You don't know what he promised," she whispered.
"Who promised? Eric or Richard?"
Natalie said nothing.
Then she walked away.
That afternoon, Grant discovered a serious complication with the laboratory report.
The documentation confirmed the sample submitted as Eric's excluded him as a biological father, but the chain of identification for Natalie's sample needed verification.
The test was not the final answer I had treated it as at the party.
I felt sick, not because Eric might be the father, but because I had made a categorical claim from evidence that needed further authentication.
Maya was direct.
"We correct the public record where necessary and seek a properly documented test through consent or lawful court process."
I agreed.
Then Grant showed me a scan of the original request form.
May you like
The contact number attached to Natalie's sample belonged to my mother.
