Chapter 6 - THE WIFE HE HAD CHOSEN DID NOT CHOOSE HIM BACKTrevor came to our house Sunday night.
Alone.
Catherine did not want to see him.
I did.
That became our first disagreement since the wedding.
“I need to know what he says.”
Catherine looked at me.
“And then?”
“Nothing. I’m not asking you to forgive him.”
She eventually agreed to let me speak with him in the den.
Trevor looked exhausted.
No tuxedo.
No wedding glow.
His marriage was less than thirty hours old and he already looked like a man returning from a funeral.
“Where’s Madison?”
“At the hotel.”
“Why?”
“She’s angry.”
I almost laughed.
“At us?”
“At me.”
That surprised me.
Trevor sat.
“Dad, I screwed up.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t forge Mom’s signature.”
I said nothing.
He looked at me.
“I signed her name, but Madison told me Mom had already approved the exact consent and the signature page had been corrupted when the document was converted.”
I stared.
“You signed Catherine’s name.”
“As a replacement signature page.”
“That is forging her signature.”
“I didn’t think of it that way.”
“That is not a defense.”
Trevor put both hands over his face.
He said Madison had presented it as an administrative emergency.
Charles needed the consent before a lender call.
Catherine supposedly had already agreed.
Trevor thought he was repairing paperwork.
“Why didn’t you call your mother?”
“She was in Boston.”
“So?”
Trevor looked away.
Because he knew Catherine would ask questions.
Because even if Madison lied about prior approval, some part of Trevor understood he was doing something he did not want Catherine to see.
I asked about the financing clause.
He looked confused.
“What clause?”
That confirmed it.
Richard had been right.
Trevor had not read the full side agreement.
I showed him a copy.
His face changed line by line.
The certification section stated that any unauthorized representation provided by Hale personnel would remain the responsibility of the submitting officer and would not bind Whitmore or its affiliates absent independently verified corporate authority.
Trevor’s name appeared beneath it.
“Madison knew?”
“Apparently.”
He stood.
“No.”
“Sit down.”
“She told me the financing protected both sides.”
“Sit.”
He paced instead.
Then he called Madison.
Speakerphone.
She answered.
Trevor asked one question.
“Did you know the side agreement put the consent on me?”
Silence.
Then Madison said, “We’re not discussing legal documents with your father listening.”
Trevor’s face went gray.
He ended the call.
I almost pitied him.
Then I remembered Catherine in the mud.
“You don’t get to make yourself the victim now.”
Trevor looked at me.
“She used me.”
“And you used your mother.”
That landed.
May you like
He sat down again.
For the first time in his life, there was nobody available to soften the equation.
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