He Sent Me Overseas to Marry Her, I'm Staying Overseas to Never See Him Again novel · Chapter 16 of 32

Chapter 16: The Sketchbook

Oliver read the papers sitting on the bottom stair in his boxers, with his hair standing up.

He read every page.

"Theft of company designs," he said. "Which designs?"

"All of them, apparently." I sat down beside him in his shirt. "The carry-on. The white weekender. Anything I've drawn since I was twenty-four."

"You drew the carry-on."

"Pierce sketched it on a napkin. It's in every interview he's ever given."

"Then show them where you drew it."

"In my head," I said. "In a dorm in Philadelphia. Nine years ago."

He put the papers down on his knee.

"So that's two million dollars."

"That's two million dollars I haven't got. I've got three hundred and eleven pounds and a partner share in a firm with no money till December."

He was quiet for a moment.

Then he put his arm around me on the stair, and I let my head fall onto his shoulder.

"Right," he said. "Breakfast first. Then we'll be angry."

Zoe found it on Sunday.

She was sitting cross-legged on Peggy's front-room rug, going through my things for the lawyer we couldn't afford yet.

My old brown sketchbook was in her lap.

She'd been turning the pages for ten minutes in total silence, which for Zoe was a medical event.

"Laura," she said. "Come here."

"I've seen it. It's just school stuff."

"Come here right now."

I went and knelt beside her.

She had it open about two-thirds of the way through.

A carry-on bag, drawn from three sides in soft pencil.

The handle wrapped twice. A brass zip pull shaped like a little key. Notes in my old handwriting down the margin: navy or sand?? needs to stand up on its own.

In the bottom corner, in pencil, a date.

The March of my last year at design school.

Nine years ago.

"You met Pierce seven years ago," Zoe said.

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