Chapter 2 - THE WHISPERED CONFESSIONS AND THE HIDDEN KEYS
"Happy?" Emma let out a bitter, wet laugh that tore right through my chest. "Ethan, the day she arrived with her suitcases, she called me into the kitchen, locked the door behind us, and told me that a woman who didn't contribute financially to a household was nothing more than an expensive housemaid."
My breath caught. "Why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you pack a bag and go to your sister's?"
"And say what?" Emma squeezed her eyes shut, a fresh tear tracking down her pale cheek. "That your saintly mother—the widow who raised her brilliant son all by herself—was a tyrant behind closed doors? You would have tried to mediate. You would have made excuses. You always made excuses for her, Ethan. Every time she criticized my cooking, every time she threw away my sketchbooks because 'art doesn't pay the mortgage,' you told me to let it go. So I learned to stop talking."
Behind us, my mother finally hauled herself up from the wet floor, her expensive blouse soaked through with ginger water, her face contorted in purple-faced fury.
"Ethan Thomas Brooks!" Margaret screeched, pointing a trembling, manicured finger at me. "Have you lost your absolute mind? You are pushing your own mother—the woman who sacrificed everything for you—onto the floor for a lazy, ungrateful parasite who does nothing all day but eat our food and lie around like an invalid!"
I didn't turn around. I couldn't bear the sight of her face. Instead, I carefully scooped Emma up into my arms, ignoring the dull ache in my back as I lifted her heavy, pregnant frame off the cold marble.
"Ethan, put me down, I can walk—"
"Quiet," I whispered, my voice terrifyingly calm compared to the roaring storm inside my head. "You're not walking another step in this house."
I carried her past my mother, stepping right through the puddle of dirty water.
"Ethan! Don't you dare walk away from me when I am speaking to you!" Margaret shrieked, trotting after us like an enraged terrier. "That girl has poisoned your mind! She's manipulative, she's unappreciative, and if you had any spine left, you’d throw her out on the street right now before she bleeds your company dry!"
I stopped at the base of the grand staircase, turning my head just enough to look my mother dead in the eye.
"Pack your bags, Mother," I said, each word dropping like a lead weight into the silence of the foyer. "You have two hours. My driver will take you to the airport and fly you back to Louisville. If you are still in this house when I come back downstairs, I will have the security detail remove you and your belongings onto the front lawn."
Margaret stopped dead in her tracks, her mouth opening and closing like a landed fish. "You... you're kicking me out? For her? I am your mother! I raised you! This house belongs to your family, not to some gold-digging stranger!"
"This house," I said coldly, "is mine and Emma's. And you are never stepping foot inside it again."
I carried Emma up the stairs, ignoring her muffled protests, and brought her straight to our master bathroom. I gently set her down on the plush velvet vanity stool, filled a soft washcloth with warm water, and knelt before her—not in servitude, but in deep, agonizing penance. I washed the ginger water and salt from her swollen ankles, kissing every bruise and red mark my mother's abuse had left behind.
"I am so sorry," I choked out, the tears finally breaking free. "God help me, Emma, I was completely blind."
"I know, honey," she whispered, resting her trembling hand on the back of my head. "Just... please, let's just get her out of the house. I don't feel safe with her here anymore."
"She's leaving," I promised, kissing her knuckles. "I swear to you on our unborn child, she is leaving right now."
I stood up, walked into our bedroom closet, and retrieved two heavy Samsonite suitcases from the top shelf. I dragged them down the carpeted hallway and marched straight into the guest suite my mother had occupied for the past year.
Margaret was sitting on the edge of the guest bed, red-faced and huffing, still muttering curses under her breath about ungrateful daughters-in-law.
"Get up," I said, grabbing her designer leather overnight bag from the closet and tossing it onto the mattress.
"Ethan, you are making a massive mistake," she hissed, standing up and trying to regain her authoritative posture. "That woman has been plotting against me since day one. She pretends to be sweet, but behind closed doors, she mocks my southern accent, she throws away my recipes, and she tells me—"
"Shut up," I whispered.
The simplicity and absolute finality of my tone cut her off mid-sentence. She blinked, genuinely shocked.
"I trusted you," I said, throwing her dresses, folded sweaters, and toiletries into the suitcase with ruthless efficiency. "I moved you into my home, I gave you a monthly allowance that exceeded what most families live on, I let you remodel the north wing, and all the while, you treated my wife like an animal. You assaulted the mother of my child."
"She's lazy!" Margaret screamed, losing her temper completely as she lunged forward to grab a handful of her sweaters back. "She doesn't respect the sacrifices I made for you! Do you know how hard it was raising you alone after your father died? And you throw me out like trash for a twenty-eight-year-old girl?"
"You're done, Mother," I zipped the suitcase shut with a sharp zip. I grabbed the second bag, threw her remaining shoes inside, and locked it as well. "The driver is downstairs. Go."
I grabbed both heavy bags by their handles, dragged them out of the guest room, down the stairs, and right out the front double doors, dropping them neatly beside the stone fountain in the driveway.
When I walked back into the foyer, Margaret was standing by the console table, grabbing her purse and muttering venomous threats. But as I passed the table, something caught my eye—something lying half-hidden beneath a stack of mail and decorative brochures.
It was a small, leather-bound checkbook and a printed monthly bank statement bearing the letterhead of Franklin National Bank.
Ordinarily, I wouldn't have looked twice at my mother's personal mail. But something about the address window on the envelope made my stomach drop.
It was addressed to Margaret Brooks, but the mailing address listed beneath her name wasn't her old Louisville home, nor was it our Franklin estate.
It was a residential property address located in downtown Nashville.
A high-end luxury condominium in The Gulch district.
Property value: 1.4 million dollars.
Purchased six months ago.
Paid in full. Cash.
My hands grew instantly cold. I picked up the statement, flipped open the cover, and began reading the transaction history.
My mother, who had lived entirely off the modest survivor's pension of my late father and the allowance I sent her every month, had somehow accumulated over two million dollars in liquid transfers over the past eighteen months.
And every single incoming wire transfer—amounting to tens of thousands of dollars every two weeks—originated from a corporate operating account belonging to Brooks & Vance Tech Innovations.
May you like
My company.
The company Emma and I had founded in our garage five years ago.
