I walked into my boyfriend’s family barbecue twenty-seven weeks pregnant / Chapter 8 / 63

Chapter 8 - Financial Audits and Stolen Trust

"Get out!" Denise screamed, pointing a trembling finger at me. "All of you, get out of my boardroom! This is family business!"

"Actually, it's not just family business anymore," Arthur Caldwell stated, crossing his arms. "Tyler, your father’s trust mandates that executive partners uphold the ethical standards of the firm. You allowed family personal drama to be blasted onto public boards while tagging our clients. And Denise, your access to the firm's discretionary accounts is suspended pending an independent audit."

Denise froze, her pale face suddenly turning ash gray. "You can't do that, Arthur. Those accounts are mine!"

"They belong to the trust," Tyler said, his voice shaking with realization. He turned toward his mother, horror dawning in his eyes. "That's why you did this, wasn't it?"

"Tyler, don't be ridiculous—"

"The trust terms!" Tyler yelled, stepping toward her. "Dad wrote into his will that when I turned thirty or when I had my first biological child, fifty percent of the Mercer trust assets transferred immediately and directly to me! You didn't care about my reputation! You wanted to prevent the baby from being verified so you could keep control of Dad's money!"

The truth hit the room like a physical blow.

Jenna leaned toward me and whispered, "I had my suspicions about the trust fund timing. She just confessed to financial motive for intentional emotional distress in front of seven independent witnesses."

Denise looked frantically around the room, but not a single person would meet her gaze. Even her cousins, who had gleefully mocked me on Facebook forty-eight hours earlier, were now staring at the carpet, sliding their phones into their pockets.

"Tyler, please," Denise pleaded, her voice dropping into a desperate, hollow whine. "I did it for us. You aren't ready to manage that kind of wealth. She would have drained you dry—"

"She never asked me for a single dollar, Mom!" Tyler shouted, tears spilling down his cheeks. "She asked me to paint the nursery! She asked me to buy a crib! And I threw her out into the rain because of your lies!"

He turned to look at me, his eyes pleading, filled with a sickening mix of remorse and desperation. "Claire... please. Let's talk. Let me fix this."

I looked at Tyler—the man I had once loved, the man who had abandoned his unborn child because his mother told him a bedtime story—and felt nothing but profound, liberating indifference.