Chapter 3 - The Heirs Who Weren’t His
Grant stared at me as if he had forgotten how to breathe.
Around us, people continued drinking coffee.
A barista called someone’s name.
A child laughed near the window.
Chicago moved on.
But Grant’s world had stopped.
“No.”
His voice was barely audible.
I didn’t move.
“Claire.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
Daniel stepped between us slightly, not aggressively, but enough to remind Grant that this wasn’t his boardroom.
Grant looked at him.
“You ran the test?”
“I helped verify it.”
“Using what?”
“Legally obtained samples.”
Grant turned back to me.
“You tested me behind my back?”
I almost laughed.
“You brought your pregnant mistress to my divorce negotiation.”
His jaw tightened.
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
“No. It doesn’t.”
“Then answer it.”
“Yes.”
The word landed hard.
Grant looked away.
His hands moved to his hips.
For a few seconds, he said nothing.
Then he asked the question I knew would come.
“Who is the father?”
“We don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
Daniel spoke.
“We initially suspected Adrian.”
Grant turned sharply.
“Adrian?”
I showed him the photograph.
Sloane leaving the New York hotel.
Adrian beside her.
Grant stared at it.
Then laughed once.
Not because anything was funny.
Because sometimes betrayal is too large for the first emotion it creates.
“My cousin.”
“Grant—”
“My cousin.”
He looked at me.
“He was at my house last Christmas.”
I said nothing.
“He gave Sloane a birthday gift.”
Still nothing.
“He told me I deserved to be happy.”
His voice cracked on the last word.
Then Daniel said quietly, “The genetic comparison doesn’t support Adrian as the father either.”
Grant froze.
“What?”
“We tested a sample.”
“And?”
“Not a match.”
Grant rubbed both hands over his face.
“So she was sleeping with him, but the babies belong to someone else?”
“We don’t know exactly what happened,” I said.
“You seem to know more about my life than I do.”
“That should bother you.”
“It does.”
His eyes met mine.
“But not for the reason you think.”
For one dangerous second, I saw the Grant I had once loved.
The man who cried with me after our first miscarriage.
The man who carried me upstairs after surgery.
The man who sat beside me all night while I slept.
Then I remembered Sloane’s hand inside his.
I picked up my purse.
“You need to talk to her.”
Grant didn’t move.
“Come with me.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“She is no longer my problem.”
“She lied to both of us.”
I looked at him.
“You lied to me first.”
That ended the argument.
Grant lowered his eyes.
For the first time since entering the café, he looked ashamed.
“I know.”
Those two words should have mattered once.
Now they only made me tired.
He turned toward Daniel.
“What else do you know?”
Daniel hesitated.
“Someone has been sending Claire messages.”
I gave him a look.
Grant immediately focused on me.
“What messages?”
“It’s handled.”
“Show me.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“I know I don’t have the right to ask you for anything.”
“Good. We agree.”
“But if someone is threatening—”
“Not threatening.”
I stopped.
The wording mattered.
The messages weren’t overt threats.
They were warnings.
Warnings designed to frighten me away from something.
Daniel showed Grant the message about my miscarriages.
Grant read it.
Everything inside him changed.
“What is this?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
“Why would I know?”
“Because it says to ask you.”
Grant stared at the photograph of us in the hospital.
“I’ve never seen this picture.”
“It was taken privately.”
“Eleanor had photographers document family events.”
“A miscarriage wasn’t a family event.”
He looked up.
“No.”
“Then how did someone get it?”
“I don’t know.”
A strange silence followed.
Then Grant’s face changed again.
“What did you mean when you said your pregnancies?”
I hesitated.
“I remember something from the hospital.”
“What?”
“Your mother arguing with a nurse.”
Grant frowned.
“When?”
“Second miscarriage.”
“I wasn’t there?”
“You were talking to the doctor.”
“What did my mother say?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
“Claire.”
“She said something about medication.”
Grant’s eyes narrowed.
“What medication?”
“I don’t remember.”
He picked up his phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling Dr. Keller.”
My stomach turned.
Dr. Stephen Keller had been my fertility specialist.
Fifty-eight.
Respected.
Expensive.
The man who had sat across from Grant and me after my third miscarriage and said there was no obvious medical reason we couldn’t eventually have a successful pregnancy.
Grant called.
Straight to voicemail.
He called again.
Nothing.
Daniel watched him.
“When did you last speak to Keller?”
“Maybe two years ago.”
“After Claire stopped treatment?”
“Yes.”
Grant looked at me.
“Why?”
I didn’t answer.
Because I remembered something else.
A letter.
After my third miscarriage, I had received an envelope from the clinic.
Inside was a note from a nurse named Rebecca.
Three sentences.
I’m sorry.
You deserve answers.
I can’t work here anymore.
At the time, I assumed she meant emotionally.
Maybe she had blamed herself.
Maybe she had simply cared.
I had thrown the letter into a drawer.
I told Daniel.
His expression immediately sharpened.
“Do you still have it?”
“I think so.”
Grant looked at me.
“Where?”
“At the house.”
“Our house?”
“The Lakeview house.”
The home where Grant and I had lived before moving into the penthouse.
After we separated, I stayed there occasionally.
Most of my personal things were still inside.
Grant reached for his coat.
“We’re going.”
I stared at him.
“We?”
“If that letter has something to do with what happened—”
“It happened to me.”
His face tightened.
“It happened to us.”
“No, Grant.”
My voice became quiet.
“You got to leave the hospital eventually.”
He froze.
“I had to live inside the body everyone blamed.”
For once, Grant had no answer.
Daniel placed a hand on my shoulder.
“We’ll go.”
Grant looked at his hand.
Jealousy flashed across his face.
I almost found it insulting.
Then his phone rang.
Sloane.
We all saw the name.
Grant stared at the screen.
He declined it.
She called again.
He declined it again.
A message appeared.
Grant read it.
His expression hardened.
“What?”
He showed us.
Come home. We need to talk before Eleanor finds out.
Daniel nodded.
“She knows.”
Grant typed something.
I couldn’t see what.
Then another message arrived.
This one made him go still.
Please. The babies are innocent.
Grant read it twice.
Then looked at me.
“I’m going to see her.”
I nodded.
“You should.”
“Will you come?”
“No.”
“Claire—”
“No.”
He accepted it this time.
Before leaving, he stopped.
“Friday.”
I knew what he meant.
“The courthouse.”
His eyes moved toward Daniel.
“Are you marrying him?”
Daniel looked at me.
I looked at Grant.
There were a thousand possible answers.
I chose the simplest.
“No.”
Something like relief crossed Grant’s face before he could hide it.
I hated that I noticed.
“Then what’s Friday?”
“That isn’t your business.”
Grant nodded slowly.
“You’re right.”
He turned toward the door.
Then stopped.
“For what it’s worth, I never wanted you erased.”
I looked at him.
“You signed the papers too.”
He left.
Daniel waited until Grant disappeared outside.
“You still love him?”
I stared through the café window.
“That question isn’t useful.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
I gathered the folders.
“Let’s find Rebecca’s letter.”
Two hours later, we were standing inside the Lakeview house.
Everything looked strangely preserved.
Wedding photographs.
Books.
A bowl Grant had bought in Italy because I once said I liked the color.
A marriage turned into objects.
I went upstairs.
The letter was exactly where I remembered.
Inside an old jewelry box.
Daniel opened it carefully.
Rebecca’s handwriting trembled across the page.
Claire, I’m sorry. You deserve answers. I can’t work here anymore. If you ever decide you want the truth, find me.
Below it was a phone number.
Daniel called.
Disconnected.
He searched the nurse’s full name.
Rebecca Nolan.
Former fertility nurse.
No recent professional profile.
Then he found something.
An address in Wisconsin.
Grant called while Daniel was searching.
I answered this time.
“Claire.”
His voice sounded different.
“What happened?”
“Sloane admitted Adrian.”
My stomach tightened.
“She was sleeping with him?”
“Yes.”
“But he isn’t the father.”
Grant went silent.
“Grant?”
“She says she knows that.”
“What?”
“She says Adrian can’t be the father.”
“Then who—”
“She won’t tell me.”
Daniel looked toward me.
Grant continued.
“And Claire?”
“Yes?”
“My mother knew.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“Knew what?”
“That Sloane had been seeing Adrian.”
I closed my eyes.
“How long?”
“Before the pregnancy.”
“Why would Eleanor hide that from you?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Grant said something that made my blood run cold.
“Sloane told me Eleanor introduced them.”
Daniel and I stared at each other.
“What?”
“She says my mother arranged meetings between them last year.”
“Why?”
“That’s what I’m going to find out.”
I looked at Rebecca’s letter in my hand.
“Grant, don’t confront her yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because I think your mother is connected to something else.”
I told him about Rebecca.
He went silent.
Then a soft sound came from downstairs.
The front door.
Daniel immediately turned.
“Were you expecting someone?”
“No.”
Footsteps entered the foyer.
I stepped toward the bedroom door.
A woman called my name.
“Claire?”
I froze.
The voice was unfamiliar.
Daniel moved ahead of me.
“Stay here.”
We went downstairs together.
A woman stood inside the foyer.
Mid-fifties.
Brown coat.
Gray streaks in her hair.
Nervous eyes.
She looked at the letter in my hand.
Then at me.
“I wondered when you’d find that.”
My heart began pounding.
“Rebecca?”
She nodded.
“Yes.”
Daniel stepped closer.
“How did you know we were here?”
Rebecca swallowed.
“I’ve been waiting for someone to start asking questions.”
“About what?” I asked.
She looked toward the wedding photograph on the wall.
Then back at me.
“Your miscarriages.”
I couldn’t breathe.
Rebecca’s eyes filled with tears.
“Claire, you were never infertile.”
The room became completely still.
“What?”
“You were capable of carrying a healthy pregnancy.”
I stared at her.
“That isn’t what Dr. Keller said.”
“I know.”
“Then why—”
Rebecca looked terrified.
“Because someone paid him to make sure you never gave Grant Whitmore a child.”
And then she said the name.
May you like
“Eleanor Whitmore.”
---
