Chương 7
He did not call Anna.
That helped.
Maya returned after lunch carrying a proposed agreement.
Not a settlement.
A protocol.
Alexander would provide voluntary DNA for an accredited sibling relationship test if Anna wanted it. He would direct the Hale family archive to preserve records concerning Margaret Mercer. He would not seek a confidentiality agreement. He would not condition payment of Anna’s medical expenses or wages on any statement about the assault.
In exchange, he wanted nothing.
Anna read the last page twice.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing obvious,” Maya said.
“That makes me nervous.”
“It should.”
“Would you sign it?”
“It does not require your signature unless you want the DNA test.”
Priya sat cross-legged on the second bed eating takeout noodles.
“Do it.”
Anna looked at her.
“You are not my counsel.”
“No. I’m your roommate. I want to know whether our rent is about to become historically insignificant.”
Maya smiled despite herself.
Anna did not.
“What happens if he’s my brother?”
“Biologically?”
“Yes.”
“You will know something you don’t know now.”
“That’s it?”
“That is the only outcome I can promise.”
Anna looked again at Alexander’s signature.
His handwriting was smaller than she expected.
She thought of him in the laundry room, reaching for a jacket he was not wearing.
“Do it.”
The test took six days.
The results arrived on a Thursday morning.
Maya insisted Anna open them herself.
Priya insisted on making coffee first.
Anna insisted both of them stop talking.
The report used percentages and relationship indexes and language so clinical that for several seconds the meaning hid inside the numbers.
Then she saw it.
The tested individuals were strongly supported as sharing a half-sibling relationship.
Anna sat at the kitchen table.
Their actual apartment felt strange after the hotel. Smaller, louder, more honest.
The radiator knocked three times.
Priya whispered, “Well?”
Anna slid the paper across the table.
Priya read it.
“Oh.”
That was all.
Anna had imagined this moment too.
She had expected triumph.
Grief.
Anger.
Some cinematic certainty.
Instead she noticed a coffee ring on the table and wiped it with her sleeve.
Maya called Alexander’s attorney.
Twenty minutes later, Alexander sent a message through counsel.
I would like to meet her whenever she is ready. No press. No lawyers if she prefers. Any place she chooses.
Anna read it.
Then put her phone facedown.
She went grocery shopping.
Priya followed her through the produce aisle in silence until Anna snapped, “You can say something.”
“I’m trying not to.”
“That’s worse.”
“I was going to ask whether billionaires buy regular bananas.”
Anna stared at her.
Priya shrugged.
“I’m giving you space badly.”
Anna picked up a bunch of bananas.
“My brother probably has someone buy them for him.”
The word brother landed between them.
Anna put the bananas back.
Then picked them up again.
She met Alexander the following Tuesday at a diner on Thirty-Fourth Street.
Her choice.
Not private.
Not elegant.
Not connected to the Hale family.
Alexander arrived five minutes early and looked ridiculous in the booth.
He wore a dark coat over a charcoal suit. No emerald green. No security visible, though Anna assumed they existed somewhere.
He stood when she approached.
She sat before he could decide whether to offer a handshake.
He sat too.
A waitress came over.
“Coffee?”
Anna said yes.
Alexander said no.
The waitress looked at him.
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“We have tea.”
“No, thank you.”
“Suit yourself.”
She walked away.
Anna watched her go.
Alexander said, “You come here often?”
“No.”
“Right.”
Neither spoke.
Anna poured cream into her coffee.
Alexander folded and unfolded the paper wrapper from a straw.
Finally Anna said, “You’re bad at this.”
“At what?”
“Being normal.”
He looked at the straw wrapper in his fingers.
“I’m out of practice.”
“That’s depressing.”
“Yes.”
The answer surprised her.
She drank her coffee.
He looked older than he had in the ballroom. There were gray hairs at his temples she had never noticed. A pale line cut through his left eyebrow.
She hated herself for cataloguing resemblance.
Their eyes were different.
Their hands were not.
Both had long fingers and narrow nails.
Anna tucked hers into her lap.
“I got the result.”
“So did I.”
“And?”
Alexander looked at her.
“My father was your father.”
“Biology really does simplify conversation.”
His mouth moved slightly.
Then flattened.
“I’m sorry.”
“For him?”
“For not knowing.”
“How could you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then don’t apologize for it.”
He nodded.
Anna picked at the corner of a paper napkin.
“Did you find records about my mother?”
“Yes.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What?”
“Payroll records. A separation agreement. Two checks from my father personally. One for twenty-five thousand dollars in 1999. One for seventy-five thousand in 2000.”
Anna stopped moving.
“For what?”
“The first memo line says medical and relocation expenses. The second references an agreement.”
“What agreement?”
“We have a copy.”
“And?”
Alexander looked toward the window.
“Margaret agreed to resign from Hale Properties and not publicly identify my father as your father.”
Anna stared.
“Publicly.”
“Yes.”
“So she could tell me.”
“I assume so.”
“You assume.”
“Yes.”
“What did he agree to?”
“Financial support.”
“For me?”
“Yes.”
Anna’s laugh came out sharp.
“That’s funny.”
Alexander did not ask why.
“He didn’t support me.”
“The agreement says he would.”
“Well, then either the agreement is fake or Nathan Hale was bad with monthly commitments.”
“I found payments.”
Anna’s fingers stopped.
“What?”
“Quarterly transfers for about four years.”
“To who?”
“An account in your mother’s name.”
Anna sat back.
“No.”
“I have copies.”
“She would have told me.”
Alexander did not answer.
“Show me.”
He reached slowly into his leather folder.
Anna’s shoulders tightened anyway.
He noticed and stopped.
“May I?”
She hated the question.
She hated that he needed to ask it.
“Yes.”
He placed photocopies on the table.
Margaret E. Mercer.
Deposits.
Amounts.
Dates.
Anna recognized the name of her mother’s old bank.
“What happened after four years?”
“The payments stopped.”
May you like
“Why?”
“I don’t know yet.”
