Chapter 5 - The Mistress Who Wanted to Speak
Kendra Mercer was not the person I wanted to see while recovering from childbirth.
She had smiled at me at holiday dinners while carrying on a relationship with my husband.
She had stood beside him in photographs while he told me I was imagining his distance.
She had sent a picture of her infant to me at the exact moment I needed peace.
Still, when Rachel said Kendra was willing to speak through counsel, I agreed that we should hear what she knew.
I did not agree to meet her at the hospital.
We arranged a recorded attorney-to-attorney interview in which Kendra had independent legal advice.
The distinction mattered because she might be a participant, a witness, or both.
Her attorney, Sonia Bell, began by saying Kendra had information about Beacon Communications and feared that records were about to disappear.
Kendra's voice shook as she described how Garrett approached her two years earlier.
He praised her marketing work, asked her to work late on expansion campaigns, and gradually crossed boundaries that should never have been crossed.
Their affair was a choice both of them made.
Kendra did not pretend otherwise.
But she said Garrett had also told her his marriage was effectively over and that Brooke was financially secure.
"He said you had a trust fund," she told me.
"He said the house was paid for and you wanted nothing to do with the company."
I felt a bitter laugh rise in my throat.
I had never had a trust fund.
My consulting income paid groceries, utilities, and eventually medical expenses Garrett refused to share.
Kendra admitted that she had helped select Beacon based on presentations Garrett had brought her.
Later, when she asked for evidence that Beacon's campaigns had been delivered, Garrett directed her to approve vague summary reports.
He told her the missing detail was commercially sensitive.
"Why did you sign the $155,000 authorization?" Rachel asked.
Kendra hesitated.
"He said it was the final installment on a campaign already completed."
"Did you verify the work?"
"No."
Her answer was quiet.
Then she made an admission that changed the direction of the interview.
"He told me to sign it because my baby's future depended on it."
There was a long silence.
"What did that mean?" Sonia asked.
Kendra said Garrett promised to buy a house for her and their son after the payment cleared.
He had shown her a bank transfer schedule and claimed an investor would reimburse the company.
When she questioned why the transfer record mentioned Brooke's name, he said Brooke had previously approved an account structure that allowed efficient payments.
"I thought she was involved," Kendra said.
I looked at the two bassinets beside my bed.
"You could have asked me," I replied.
"I know," she whispered.
That admission did not undo the betrayal.
But it suggested Kendra had been manipulated about the financial arrangements even while she had willingly helped hurt me.
Rachel asked for her personal copy of communications, subject to her attorney's advice.
Kendra offered messages in which Garrett instructed her not to involve compliance staff.
She also had an audio message in which he threatened to withdraw support for her son if she refused to sign.
Rachel reminded everyone that any recording and its legal admissibility would need separate review.
No one would assume the evidence proved everything before it was authenticated.
Kendra then asked to speak to me directly.
"I'm sorry," she said.
I looked toward the window, where early sunlight fell across the hospital courtyard.
"You participated in breaking my marriage," I answered.
"That's something I won't minimize."
"I understand."
"And your son doesn't deserve to be punished for it."
She began crying.
I did not forgive her.
I did not promise friendship.
I simply refused to turn another child into a weapon against a parent.
After the interview, Rachel told me the financial case was becoming more serious.
The records suggested possible unauthorized access, false approvals, and diversion of company funds.
Those questions belonged to independent investigators and, if appropriate, law enforcement.
My father's company would have to treat Garrett as an executive subject to the same procedures as anyone else.
Kendra's confession left me with questions I knew she might never answer.
How many evenings had she spent listening to Garrett describe me as an obstacle?
Had she seen the ultrasound picture on his phone and believed the daughter he dismissed was not quite real?
Did she ever wonder why a man who spoke so proudly about family treated one unborn child as an accounting inconvenience?
I could have made myself sick collecting imagined scenes.
Instead, I asked Rachel which facts would matter to the legal proceedings and which questions belonged to the private work of healing.
She explained that not every cruel moment was relevant evidence.
Some losses needed to be acknowledged even when they couldn't be entered into a court record.
After our conversation, I opened the drawer where I kept wedding photographs.
There was Garrett smiling beneath a canopy of flowers, his palm against my cheek.
For years I had looked at the image as proof that the happier version of him had been real and might return.
Now I saw the young woman beside him as someone who had trusted a promise and deserved compassion for doing so.
I didn't tear the photograph.
I placed it in an envelope and wrote the date on the front.
One day the children might want to know how their parents met.
I would not pretend their history started with a courtroom.
But I also wouldn't hide the truth to protect an illusion.
That night I asked Maya for advice on recognizing when exhaustion was affecting my mood or recovery.
She discussed ordinary postpartum support and encouraged me to keep talking with the medical team about any concerns.
I realized that seeking help was the opposite of the weakness Garrett had accused me of showing.
It was an act of care for the people who depended on me.
When Eli finally settled against my chest, I told him that being brave did not mean refusing help.
It meant knowing when to ask.
At four that afternoon, Walter called from his office.
The board's audit committee had placed Garrett on administrative leave pending the investigation.
His access to financial systems was suspended.
Walter's voice was steady, but I heard the exhaustion underneath.
"I hired him," he said.
"I trusted him."
"We both did," I replied.
He paused.
"There's something else."
A storage account used by Beacon had begun deleting project files minutes after Garrett's access was removed.
The company had requested preservation through counsel.
But a newly recovered invoice revealed Beacon was connected to a shell company registered using a variation of my former legal name.
May you like
It was no longer merely a stolen password.
Someone had been building an entire paper trail to make me the villain.
