“You are not medically cleared to conduct corporate warfare.”
Victoria swung her feet off the bed.
“Can I walk?”
“Barely.”
“Then I’m cleared enough.”
Rachel stared.
“Billionaires are exhausting.”
Taylor said:
“Try working for one.”
They left through the rear entrance.
Taylor drove.
Victoria sat beside him.
Rachel followed in her own car for ten minutes before turning toward the hospital to deliver Victoria’s blood samples for formal toxicology.
Taylor drove through early Washington traffic.
Neither spoke.
Then Victoria said:
“Megan loved you.”
Taylor tightened his grip on the wheel.
“Don’t.”
“She did.”
“Don’t use her to make me trust you.”
“I’m not.”
“Then why say it?”
Victoria looked out the window.
“Because the last thing she said to me about you was that if anything happened, you would think she left.”
Taylor’s hands tightened.
“What exactly did she say?”
Victoria closed her eyes.
“She said Gregory understood people better than systems.”
“That if he wanted to destroy evidence, he’d destroy trust first.”
Taylor stared ahead.
Victoria continued.
“She said, ‘If I disappear, they’ll make Taylor hate me before he has time to look for me.’”
Taylor’s vision blurred.
He pulled over.
Hard.
The car stopped near a row of closed shops.
Victoria looked at him.
Taylor pressed both hands against the steering wheel.
He could not speak.
Seven years of anger collapsed all at once.
Not disappeared.
Collapsed.
He remembered the night Megan vanished.
Sophie nineteen months old.
Megan late getting home.
Then later.
Then midnight.
Her phone off.
Taylor driving every route between her office and their apartment.
Police.
Morning.
The note.
Her wedding ring left beside it.
A detective saying:
“Sometimes people plan exits for a long time.”
Taylor screaming that Megan would never leave Sophie.
Megan’s parents refusing to believe him.
News coverage fading.
Searches ending.
Then years.
Sophie’s questions changing with age.
Where is Mommy?
Why did Mommy leave?
Did Mommy not like being my mom?
Taylor telling her:
“No. Never think that.”
Even while part of him wondered.
Now Megan’s words returned through Victoria.
They’ll make Taylor hate me.
Taylor covered his face.
Victoria waited.
No apology.
Good.
He could not have tolerated one.
After several minutes, Taylor whispered:
“I did.”
Victoria knew.
“I hated her.”
He swallowed.
“Not all the time.”
“Sometimes.”
“I hated her because it was easier than believing somebody took her.”
Victoria looked toward him.
“She knew that might happen.”
“That makes it worse.”
“I know.”
Taylor almost snapped at the phrase.
Then stopped.
Victoria did know this part.
Maybe not his pain.
But Megan’s fear.
He looked at her.
“What was she like that night?”
Victoria’s expression softened.
“Terrified.”
“Anything else?”
“Angry.”
Taylor smiled weakly.
“That sounds like her.”
Victoria nodded.
“She told me I was spoiled.”
He laughed unexpectedly.
“What did you say?”
“That I was aware.”
“She probably hated that.”
“She did.”
For one moment Megan became alive in the car.
Not missing.
Not evidence.
Not a photograph.
Megan.