The notary placed his finger on the first document and slowly turned it toward Nathan.
Nathan leaned forward with the irritated expression of a man expecting one more meaningless form between himself and fifty million dollars.
Then his eyes stopped moving.
The fountain pen with crushed black diamonds lay beside my hand.
For the first time that afternoon, Nathan did not have something cruel to say.
Madison stepped away from the windows.
“What is it?” she asked.
Nathan ignored her.
The old notary adjusted his glasses and looked at me instead.
“Do you remember this pen, Emma?”
I did.
I had not seen it since the year my parents died.
My father used to keep it in the top drawer of his desk.
He believed important promises deserved to be signed with something that could outlive the people making them.
When I was a child, I thought the crushed black diamonds inside the barrel looked like pieces of the night sky.
After my parents were gone, the pen disappeared with the estate documents.
I had assumed it had been lost.
The old man had kept it.
Nathan stared at me.
“You know him?”
I looked at the notary.
“Yes.”
One word.
That was all it took to remove the confidence from Nathan’s face.
The old man closed the folder halfway.
“I knew Emma’s parents,” he said.
“I witnessed documents for their family for many years.
After their deaths, I also witnessed the transfer of several assets into the trust established for their daughter.”
Madison gave a small, impatient laugh.
“So she had a trust fund.
Is that supposed to matter?”
The notary turned his eyes toward her.
Madison’s laugh stopped.
Nathan recovered faster.
“If Emma has some inheritance, wonderful.
That has nothing to do with CloudAxis.”
“No?” the notary asked.
He reopened the folder.
Nathan looked at the clock on the wall.
1:57 p.m.
His investors would arrive at any moment.
He stood abruptly.
“We can discuss Emma’s family history another day.
Stamp the documents.”
The old man remained seated.
“I have not yet completed my review.”
“There’s nothing to review.
We both signed.”
“You signed,” the notary said.
“And during the signing you made several statements about why you required the divorce to be completed before today’s investment meeting.”
Nathan’s jaw tightened.
“What statements?”
I almost smiled.
For more than an hour he had spoken as though everyone in the room existed beneath him.
Now he was discovering that words did not become harmless simply because the speaker was wealthy.
The notary glanced at his handwritten notes.
“You described your wife as an embarrassment to investors.
You said removing her would improve the company’s image before the proposed public offering.
You characterized the divorce as a business decision connected to the financing scheduled today.”
“That was private conversation.”
“It occurred during a formal signing witnessed by me.”
Nathan looked at me.
“You planned this?”
“No.”
That answer was true.
I had come prepared to sign the divorce papers and leave.
I had known that Nathan’s investor meeting was scheduled for two.
I had also known more about the money behind that meeting than he realized.
What I had not known was that the notary would be here.
Nathan had arranged that himself.
Madison moved to Nathan’s side.
“Whatever inheritance
