Chapter 9: Thursday at Ten
Diane arrived seven minutes late.
Gerald's receptionist showed her into the conference room where Gerald and I were already seated.
Rosalind Vance sat to Gerald's left.
Diane saw Rosalind and stopped walking.
"Who is this?" she said.
"Please sit down, Diane," Gerald said.
"I'd like to know who this is before I sit down anywhere."
"Her name is Rosalind Vance," I said.
"She's a senior investigator with the state attorney general's office."
Diane's face went through several expressions in quick succession.
The one that settled was one I recognized from childhood — the particular look she used when she had decided to be very, very careful.
She sat down.
"I came here as a family matter," she said.
"I'm not sure what that has to do with—"
"You called Franklin Marsh's legal team fourteen days after my mother's funeral," I said.
She placed her hands flat on the table.
"I don't know what you think—"
"We have the phone records, Diane."
Her hands didn't move.
"What you told them," Gerald said, picking up the thread smoothly, "allowed them to attempt a preemptive legal claim on the trust documents.
The action at the bank last week was a direct result of information you provided."
"I want a lawyer," Diane said.
"You're welcome to call one," Rosalind said.
Her voice was entirely neutral.
"You're not under arrest.
You're here voluntarily.
But a lawyer is always a reasonable choice."
Diane looked at me.
Her eyes were sharp and tired at the same time.
"You sold the Mustang to get rid of the key," I said.
"You had her documents for fifteen years and you held them like something to bargain with.
You called the man who coerced your sister-in-law and handed him a head start." I leaned forward slightly.
"What did he give you for it, Diane?
What was the agreement?"
"I don't have to answer that."
"Not today.
Eventually you will."
She looked at the table.
Something was happening in her face that I hadn't expected to see there.
Not remorse, exactly.
But something that was adjacent to it.
Something old.
"She should have told the family," Diane said, finally, quietly.
"She should have told your father from the beginning.
Instead she lied for thirty years and I found out by accident and I was the one who had to carry it."
"So you sold her out to the man who started all of it."
"I didn't — it wasn't like that.
I didn't tell him where the documents were.
I told him they might exist.
I thought if there was pressure, she would finally deal with it.
Talk about it.
Let it be resolved."
"She was dying, Diane."
Diane's jaw tightened.
"I know that."
"You contacted his lawyers two weeks after she was gone.
She was not available to deal with anything."
Silence.
"Whatever your reasons were," Rosalind said, "the outcome was that you provided advance warning to a subject under investigation.
That has consequences that extend beyond this family."
Diane looked at Rosalind for a long moment.
Then she looked back at me.
"What happens now?" she said.
"That depends on how cooperative you choose to be," Rosalind said.
"We're interested in Marsh.
If you can provide detail about what was communicated and when, that's information we can work with."
"You want me to testify against him."
"We want you to tell the truth about what you know."
Diane was quiet for a long time.
The room held it.
Then she said, "He called me first.
Three weeks after Rebecca's diagnosis.
He'd heard somehow — I still don't know how.
He said he understood there might be documents he had an interest in, and that if they were to surface after Rebecca passed, there could be significant legal difficulties for the whole family."
She said it to the table, not to any of us.
"He was threatening you," Gerald said.
"He was suggesting.
He was very good at suggesting." Her voice had changed — older, flatter.
"I panicked.
I went looking in Rebecca's things while she was resting.
I found the copies.
I called his team because I thought — I thought if he knew where they were, he'd back off.
That he'd leave us all alone."
"And instead," I said, "he spent the next two years figuring out how to get to them."
Diane looked at me.
"I'm sorry, Nora."
I held her gaze.
"I know you are."
It wasn't forgiveness.
It wasn't absolution.
But it was the truth, and the truth was enough for the moment.
Gerald slid a document across the table.
"Diane," he said, "this is a cooperation agreement.
I'd recommend you read it carefully.
And then I'd recommend you call a lawyer before you sign anything."
She looked down at it.
Rosalind stood.
"I'll step out and give you some privacy." She nodded at me as she passed.
"You did well today."
I waited until it was just Diane and me.
"She kept everything," I said quietly.
"Every payment.
Every letter.
The original agreement.
She built the whole case herself, alone, over thirty years, and she still found a way to make sure I'd have access to it after she was gone."
Diane looked up from the document.
"She was protecting you," she said.
Not a question.
May you like
"She was," I said.
"She always was."
