My Fiancé Butt-Dialed Me Mid-Affair, So I Married His Brother novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: Nine Minutes

Hayes's POV

My father sat at his desk in the green cardigan I had given him the Christmas before.

He looked thinner than I remembered, and he looked tired.

"Constance," he said on the screen. "Put that down. I'm telling you, I will not sign."

The camera was low, on a shelf or the edge of the desk.

My stepmother's voice came from somewhere off to the side.

"It's only a clause in the trust, darling. Brandon is your son too."

"Brandon is a boy who golfs," my father said. "Hayes is the one I'm leaving the house to. He gets the shares at thirty-six, if he marries. I want him to have a wife who loves him, and I want him to have the vote."

"Without me, you mean."

"With you. As a trustee. Nothing more."

"You're leaving me with nothing."

"I'm leaving you a very comfortable house and a very large allowance. Constance, I'm calling the lawyer on Monday."

I felt Joanna's hand close tighter on mine.

I could not take my eyes off the screen.

My father put his hand flat on his chest.

It was a small movement, and I knew it at once.

I had seen him do it on the boat the summer I was fifteen, when the wind was wrong.

"Constance," he said. "My pills. In the drawer."

She did not move.

She stood in the corner of the frame, with her back to the lens and her pearls on, and looked at him.

"Constance."

"The bottom drawer," he said again, and his voice went high.

She took one step toward the desk.

Then she stopped.

"You were going to call the lawyer on Monday," she said, very softly.

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