The Rose He Killed novel Chapter 236

Chapter 212: Margaret Confronted-1

Caleb POV

Claim

I did not tell Bella I was going to see them. I did not ask her permission because I knew she would tell me it was a waste of time. She would have said she was completely finished with Margaret and Richard. She would have been right, too. But I went anyway.

Margaret lived in a flat in the north of the city now. It was a decent place, but it was much smaller than the house Richard had owned during the good years of Hart Industries.

The building had a doorman, a small lobby with a fake plant, and a slow elevator. I had seen many buildings like this in my career. They were built for people who used to have money and were trying to hide how much they had lost.

The doorman called up to her flat. I waited, and Margaret let me in.

Richard was there too, I had expected that. He sat in an armchair near the window. He was thinner than the last time I saw him in court. His hair was still combed neatly. He looked like a man trying to keep up appearances when he had nothing else left. He looked at me when I walked in, but he did not speak.

Margaret stood in the middle of the living room. Her hands were held together in front of her. “Mr. Black,”

she said.

“Caleb is fine,” I said and sat down in a chair across from her without waiting for an invitation.

She sat on the sofa as Richard stayed in his chair by the window. I looked at both of them. These were the two people who had sold a twenty-three-year-old girl to me like a business deal.

They had kicked her out in the rain on her wedding night. For years after that, they had tried to use the children she loved against her. Looking at them, I felt a cold, quiet anger in my chest.

I did not come here to shout. Shouting is for people who need to let out their feelings. I did not need that.

“I want to be clear about what I know,” I said. “I don’t want any confusion about why I am here.” I placed my hands on my knees. My voice was calm, slow, and completely cold. “Elaine Voss. Geneva, 1997. She was pregnant and alone because she had nobody to tell. She died six months after Bella was born. Then your husband made a secret financial deal with the law firm. There was a sealed note from Elaine that named the real father.” I looked directly at Margaret. “I know everything. My investigator has the whole file. Bella

has it too.”

Margaret’s hands squeezed together in her lap.

“She also has Elaine’s letter,” I said. “The one from the law firm. It took years of moving through old addresses, but it finally reached her. She read it last week.”

Something quick and complicated passed across Margaret’s face, then disappeared.

“I am not here because Bella asked me to come,” I said. “She didn’t. She is finished with you, and I fully support her choice. I am here because I have two children. I need to understand exactly what you did to their mother before I close this chapter for good.”

“We did what we had to do,” Richard said from the window, his voice cold. He sounded like a man who

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Chapter 212 Margaret Confronted-1

had made a choice long ago and refused to feel sorry for it, no matter the cost.

looked at him. “You took money for a baby,” I said. “Don’t try to make it sound like anything else.”

He looked away.

Clam

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