Chapter 6 - RACHEL FINALLY EXPLAINED WHAT NATHAN PAID HER TO DO
Rachel hired an attorney before agreeing to speak again.
Maya understood.
Rachel had participated in something appalling.
She had also become a witness against Nathan the moment Emma revealed the plan went further than Rachel had been told.
The meeting took place in Andrea’s office.
Rachel sat across from Maya without makeup, her face tired.
“I’m sorry.”
Maya did not respond immediately.
Rachel continued.
“I know that doesn’t fix anything.”
“No.”
“I shouldn’t have touched Emma.”
“No.”
Rachel swallowed.
“Nathan contacted me through a theater company I worked with last year.”
He told Rachel his wife suffered from episodes during which she became aggressive and later had no memory.
He claimed Maya had frightened Emma several times.
He said he was desperate to make Maya accept treatment.
Rachel initially refused.
Then Nathan sent her messages describing a mother “in denial” and a child supposedly protecting her.
“He made it sound like an intervention.”
Maya stared at her.
“You painted a fake injury on a child.”
“I know.”
Rachel’s eyes filled.
“I kept telling myself it was temporary. That nobody outside the family would see it.”
That detail mattered.
“What did Nathan say would happen?”
Rachel took a breath.
“He said you’d take your normal nighttime medication, go to sleep, and he would wake you later.”
Maya went rigid.
“He never asked you to give me anything?”
“No.”
“Did he say he was giving me anything?”
“No.”
Maya felt a small piece of terror loosen.
There was still no evidence Nathan had drugged her.
Rachel continued.
“He said you were usually hard to fully wake once you were asleep.”
That was true.
Maya’s prescribed medication often made her groggy.
Nathan knew it.
“He said in the morning Emma would show you the bruise and say you grabbed her.”
Maya looked away.
Rachel’s voice cracked.
“He said you would finally believe him.”
There it was.
Not a doctor.
Not a judge.
Not police.
Maya.
Andrea asked:
“What exact words did he use?”
Rachel looked at Maya.
“Something like, ‘She needs to see what she’s capable of before she takes Emma and leaves.’”
Maya stopped breathing.
Andrea leaned forward.
“He mentioned Maya leaving?”
“Yes.”
“Did he say where?”
“No.”
Rachel continued.
“He said Maya had started making plans behind his back.”
Maya felt exposed.
Her divorce consultation.
Nathan knew.
“How?”
Rachel shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
Then she gave them something else.
Nathan had asked Rachel whether she could make the mark look believable enough that Maya would not question it immediately.
Rachel had said makeup was never reliable proof of injury.
Nathan replied:
“It doesn’t need to fool a doctor. It needs to fool her.”
Maya closed her eyes.
That sentence removed the last ambiguity about the first stage of the plan.
Nathan’s target had been Maya’s perception of herself.
Rachel looked at her.
“I thought you really had episodes.”
Maya opened her eyes.
“So did I.”
Neither woman spoke for several seconds.
That was the part Maya had difficulty explaining later.
She hated Rachel for agreeing.
She also saw how Nathan had built two separate realities.
To Maya:
You are dangerous and forgetful.
To Rachel:
I am a desperate husband trying to make my sick wife accept help.
Both stories made Nathan the reasonable one.
May you like
Both made Maya unreliable.
And neither required anyone to ask Maya what she remembered before telling her what she had supposedly done.
