Chapter 1
I came home early and heard my wife scream before I even reached the living room.
My hand froze on the front door.
Emily was eight months pregnant.
She had never screamed like that.
I ran inside.
My sister Chloe stood near the fireplace with a leather strap clenched in her hand. Emily was backed against the wall, one arm protecting her stomach and the other covering her face.
My parents stood only a few feet away.
Neither of them was helping her.
“Ryan,” Emily whispered.
Her voice broke.
I saw the red mark across her arm.
Something inside me snapped.
“What happened?”
Chloe turned toward me without lowering the strap.
“She refused to sign.”
“Sign what?”
Emily reached toward the coffee table with shaking fingers.
Several documents were scattered across it.
I picked them up.
The first page made my stomach turn.
They were transfer papers.
My grandfather had created a twelve-million-dollar trust for my first child years before he died. The money would belong to our son when he was born.
The papers transferred control of that trust to Chloe.
I looked at her.
“You tried to make my pregnant wife sign away our son’s money?”
Mom stepped forward.
“Don’t make this dramatic.”
I stared at her.
“Dramatic?”
“Chloe needs the money now,” Mom said. “Your baby won’t need millions for years.”
Emily started crying.
“She told them I wouldn’t sign. Your father blocked the door.”
I looked at Dad.
He didn’t deny it.
Instead, he said, “Family money belongs to family.”
“My son is family.”
“So is your sister.”
Chloe lifted the strap again.
“She would’ve signed eventually.”
I moved before I even thought.
My fist caught Chloe across the jaw.
She stumbled backward and dropped the strap.
Dad charged toward me.
I shoved him away and stepped between all three of them and Emily.
“You attacked my wife for money.”
Mom screamed, “You hit your own sister!”
“And you watched her hit my pregnant wife.”
The room went silent.
Emily suddenly grabbed my arm.
“Ryan.”
Her face had gone pale.
“What?”
“My stomach.”
Fear replaced every other emotion.
I caught her before her knees gave out.
Then I called the police.
Dad tried to stop me.
“You are not sending your family to jail.”
“You stopped being my family the second you let this happen.”
I opened the hallway closet.
Three suitcases sat there.
Their suitcases.
That was when I understood.
They had planned to stay.
They thought Emily would sign.
They thought I would come home and accept whatever story they told me.
I dragged every suitcase outside.
Mom followed me, screaming that I was choosing Emily over the people who raised me.
I turned around.
“Yes.”
She stopped.
“Yes, I am choosing my wife and child.”
Police arrived minutes later.
Emily showed them the marks on her arm.
I showed them the transfer papers.
Then Emily quietly told an officer what I hadn’t known.
Chloe had been threatening her for three weeks.
My parents knew.
All three were led outside in handcuffs.
Chloe stared at me as the officer placed her in the patrol car.
“You’re going to regret this.”
I ignored her.
Then another officer approached me holding Chloe’s phone.
“Mr. Carter?”
“Yes?”
“You may want to see something we found open on your sister’s screen.”
I looked down.
It was a message thread.
And the newest message made my blood run cold.
If Emily refuses again, stop asking. We only need her signature before the baby is born.
The sender was saved under one word.
May you like
LAWYER.
Click to the blue list icon to read the NEXT chapter
