Chapter 15 - REBECCA LEARNED ETHAN HAD BEEN PREPARING TO LEAVE TABITHAWalter Dane’s investigation contained a draft separation agreement.
Ethan never signed it.
But he had asked another attorney—not Caleb—to prepare it.
Date:
Ten days before the plane crash.
Rebecca stared.
“He was leaving her.”
Rachel nodded.
“At least considering it seriously.”
Why?
Financial dishonesty.
Northline payments.
Her secret relationship with Caleb’s advisory work.
Questions about Lucas’s trust.
Ethan had also discovered Tabitha lying about debt.
The draft gave her fair marital property.
Not the mansion outright.
No control over Lucas’s trust.
No role in Mercer Audio voting.
Rebecca felt strange.
Not satisfaction.
Not vindication.
Sadness.
Ethan had been trying to clean up a life he didn’t fully understand before time ended.
Walter’s notes recorded Ethan saying:
“I don’t know whether she loved me or whether I was an assignment that got complicated.”
That sentence haunted Rebecca.
Because evidence suggested both.
Tabitha entered Ethan’s life intentionally.
Then genuinely bonded with him.
Then betrayed him financially.
Human emotion did not erase manipulation.
Manipulation did not make every affectionate moment fake.
Rebecca thought about whether Lucas should ever know.
Not now.
Maybe much later.
At six, he needed a father who loved him.
That part was true.
Ethan loved him.
Everything else could wait.
Then investigators reopened one issue people kept whispering about.
Ethan’s plane crash.
Rebecca objected to speculation.
So did the prosecutor.
Still, because Caleb, Tabitha, and Marshall now had proven financial motive surrounding Ethan, authorities reviewed the aviation investigation.
The result remained the same.
Maintenance failure.
A fractured fuel fitting.
Documented mechanic error.
No evidence of tampering.
The mechanic had replaced the wrong part.
He had admitted it.
Physical evidence matched.
Rebecca felt relief mixed with grief.
No murder mystery.
No hidden assassination.
Just an accident.
Sometimes terrible timing is only terrible timing.
Tabitha had not killed Ethan.
Caleb had not.
Marshall had not.
Their fraud continued because his death removed the person blocking them.
That was bad enough.
Rachel told Rebecca:
“I’m glad.”
“That sounds strange.”
“I know.”
Rebecca understood.
Knowing Ethan wasn’t murdered did not make him alive.
But it kept Lucas’s history from becoming even darker without evidence.
Then prosecutors discovered something about Ethan’s final Memphis trip.
He planned to meet a federal contract attorney regarding Signal Labs.
Not to report crime.
To ask whether Northline’s planned resale raised national-security or export concerns.
That explained his resistance.
Signal Labs manufactured acoustic sensors used in aviation.
Certain contracts required approval before foreign-controlled transfer.
Marshall wanted to buy cheap and resell.
Ethan suspected regulatory complications.
Northline may have lost profit if regulators intervened.
Again.
Motive for financial pressure.
Not murder.
The company’s independent board decided to spin Signal Labs into a protected subsidiary.
Lucas’s trust retained ownership.
No sale before full regulatory review.
The immediate financial crisis ended.
Rebecca expected to feel lighter.
Instead, Lucas had nightmares.
Not every night.
Enough.
He dreamed about trash.
About his father’s videos disappearing.
About Rebecca boarding airplanes and not returning.
Dr. Naomi Greene, a child psychologist selected independently with Rebecca’s consent, helped.
One afternoon Lucas asked:
“Are you going to Dallas again?”
Rebecca paused.
“Someday.”
His eyes filled.
“Why?”
“Because I work.”
He looked down.
Tabitha’s voice still lived inside the question.
Your mother chose her job over you.
Rebecca sat beside him.
“Do you think me working means I’m choosing work instead of you?”
Lucas shrugged.
“Sometimes.”
Honest.
Rebecca nodded.
“That makes sense after what Tabitha said.”
“Is it true?”
“No.”
“But I leave.”
“Yes.”
“Then?”
Rebecca thought carefully.
“People can leave a house and still come back.”
“Work is something I do.”
“Being your mom is who I am.”
Lucas considered.
“What if I need you?”
“You call.”
“What if you’re in a meeting?”
“You call.”
“What if I call five times?”
“I will probably think someone is trying to sell me something.”
Lucas smiled.
Then:
“But you answer?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca had already changed procedures.
If she traveled, Lucas stayed with his grandmother or trusted nanny.
Never someone tied to litigation.
Video calls scheduled by Lucas too.
Not only by Rebecca.
He had a simple emergency contact list.
Alma.
Grandmother.
Rachel.
No one adult controlled access.
Dr. Greene said:
“Do not stop traveling forever because Tabitha weaponized travel.”
Rebecca frowned.
“Why?”
“Because then Lucas learns fear dictates the family.”
That was hard.
“But I don’t want him afraid.”
“Then build predictability.”
Not disappearance.
Rebecca listened.
Two months later she took a one-night trip to Atlanta.
Lucas cried before she left.
Rebecca almost canceled.
Dr. Greene had warned that changing every plan in response to fear could confirm that danger was real.
So Rebecca stayed gentle.
Showed hotel reservation.
Return flight.
Who would be home.
Lucas helped set an alarm for the evening call.
When Rebecca returned the next afternoon, Lucas ran to her.
“You came back.”
“Yes.”
He smiled.
Then corrected himself.
“I knew.”
That mattered more.
Meanwhile Tabitha accepted a plea negotiation on some charges while contesting others.
She agreed to testify against Caleb and Marshall.
In exchange, prosecutors would consider cooperation.
But child-abuse conduct remained separate.
Rebecca supported that.
No corporate evidence should purchase erasure of what happened in the bathroom.
Then Tabitha asked to send Lucas a letter.
Rebecca wanted to say no.
Dr. Greene said:
“Ask Lucas if he wants to know one exists.”
So Rebecca did.
“Tabitha wrote something.”
Lucas went still.
“Do I have to read it?”
“No.”
“Can you throw it away?”
“Yes.”
He thought.
“Can we keep it until I’m older?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca sealed it in a legal file.
Lucas’s choice.
No forced forgiveness.
No emotional reunion.
Tabitha would have to live without access to the child she had tried to control.
May you like
And Rebecca began to understand that protecting Lucas did not mean deciding every future feeling for him.
Sometimes protection meant preserving the right to choose later.
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