"Is very clear. Very damning. Very much still in my possession." I smile, all teeth. "Along with the financial records, the yacht footage, and about fifteen other pieces of evidence that prove you helped murder my father."
"I didn't help?—"
"Your name is on the account that paid Ivan Olegov. Your signature. Your money funding Dad's assassination." I stand, moving toward the window, forcing her to turn and follow. "So let's skip the part where you pretend ignorance. You're herebecause you know I can destroy you. The question is what you're willing to offer to stop me."
Mother rises from the chair, moving to pour herself another scotch. Her hands aren't as steady as before. Good.
"Delete the recording. All of it. The financial records, the testimony, everything." Her voice drops, almost pleading. "I can give you Matthew. Full cooperation. I'll testify against him—say he manipulated me, threatened me, whatever you need. He goes to prison, you get your justice, and I..."
"Walk free? After helping to murder your husband?"
"I didn't know what he was planning?—"
"Stop." The word cracks through the room. "Stop lying. I'm so goddamn tired of your lies."
She flinches. Actually flinches. Catherine Davenport, who hasn't shown genuine emotion since I was six years old, flinches at her daughter's voice.
"You want to make a deal?" I advance on her slowly. "Fine. But first, you're going to tell me the truth. The whole truth. Not the sanitized version you've been peddling. Not the 'I didn't know' bullshit. The real story of how you and Matthew decided my father needed to die."
"Isabelle—"
"Now. Or I call Wesley, and every piece of evidence I have hits the press before you make it to your car."
She sinks onto the arm of the chair, suddenly looking older than her years. The Dior can't hide the exhaustion anymore. The pearls look like chains.
"You don't understand what it's like," she whispers. "Being married to a man who loved his ideals more than he loved you. Who chose charity galas and philanthropic boards over his own wife. Who looked at soup kitchens with more passion than he ever looked at me."
"So you found someone who looked at you the way you wanted."
"Matthew and I—" She stops. Starts again. "We fell in love, Isabelle. Real love. Not the sanitized version your father offered. Not scheduled dinners and polite conversation and separate bedrooms for the last decade of our marriage. We were passionate. Alive. He made me feel wanted. Seen. Like I was more than just the Davenport name and the Davenport fortune."
"How romantic. An affair that lasted fifteen years and ended in the murder of your husband."
"I didn't want him dead!" The words explode out of her. "Not at first. I loved Richard once—before the distance, before the neglect, before he made it clear that saving the world mattered more than saving his marriage. I wanted a divorce. A clean break. Matthew and I would've been happy?—"
"But Dad found out about the embezzlement."
She goes pale. "How do you?—"
"Gerald Hartman. Before Matthew's men killed him." I let that land. "Dad wasn't just discovering an affair, was he? He found the money you and Matthew had been skimming. The offshore accounts. The years of theft disguised as miscellaneous expenses."
"We weren't stealing?—"
"Two million in a joint Cayman account. Your signature right next to Matthew's. The same account that paid Ivan Olegov to tamper with Dad's boat." I'm close enough now to see the mascara starting to smear, the cracks in her perfect foundation. "That's not redistribution, Mother. That's embezzlement and conspiracy to commit murder."
"Richard was going to destroy everything." Her voice breaks. "Not just expose the affair—he found the financial discrepancies. He was building a case. He would've sent us both to prison, taken everything Matthew and I had built?—"
"So you killed him first."
"Matthew killed him." She's crying now. Real tears, not the elegant weeping she performed at the funeral. Ugly, desperate tears that streak through her makeup. "I told him there had to be another way. That we could reason with Richard, offer him something, make him understand?—"
"Understand what? That his wife had been stealing from him while fucking his brother-in-law?"
"Matthew said it was the only way." She's pacing now, heels clicking against hardwood, words tumbling out like she's been holding them for months. "He said Richard would never stop. Would never forgive. Would never let us be together. He said we'd lose everything—the company, the money, each other. He said one quick solution and all our problems would disappear."
"Dad. Dad was the 'quick solution.'"
"I told him to find another way." Her voice cracks. "I begged him. But he said the boat was already handled. That it would look like an accident. That no one would ever know."
