Chapter 8 - Eleanor’s Version of Love
Eleanor Mercer did not answer questions.
She hired lawyers.
By the next morning, three attorneys from Charleston had arrived in Cedar Hollow.
They issued statements calling Julian emotionally unstable.
They accused Garrison of pursuing a personal vendetta.
They accused me of exploiting confidential medical records.
Then they made their biggest mistake.
They sued Chloe.
The complaint claimed she had stolen corporate property from Julian’s laptop.
That flash drive.
The filing was meant to frighten her.
Instead, it made the drive evidence in active litigation.
Rebecca smiled when she saw the complaint.
“She just helped us preserve everything.”
Chloe did not smile.
She remained in the hospital on bed rest.
Her baby was stable, but doctors warned that stress could trigger early labor.
I visited every afternoon.
At first, our conversations were awkward.
Then one day she asked, “Did you hate me?”
“Yes.”
She nodded.
“I deserved that.”
“No.”
She looked surprised.
“I hated the version of you Julian created for me.”
“That version was partly real.”
“You slept with my husband.”
“Yes.”
“You helped him lie to me.”
“Yes.”
“So I’m not saying you did nothing wrong.”
She looked down.
“But?”
“But you’re here now.”
She touched her stomach.
“I keep thinking about this baby.”
“Of course.”
“What am I going to tell him someday?”
“The truth.”
“What if the truth is ugly?”
“Then tell him the part where you chose differently.”
She looked at me for a long time.
“You should be the angry one.”
“I am.”
“You don’t seem angry.”
I almost laughed.
“I am furious.”
“With me?”
“With everyone.”
That included myself.
Not because I had caused any of it.
Because I had ignored how often Julian made me smaller.
The first time he corrected me in front of friends.
The first time he mocked my salary.
The first time he called my grief over a miscarriage “dramatic.”
Cruelty rarely arrived wearing its final face.
Sometimes it introduced itself as a joke.
The state investigation moved quickly after Julian’s statement.
Bellweather’s old pharmacy logs were recovered.
My medication administration history showed three unauthorized entries.
Two corresponded with unsuccessful fertility cycles.
One corresponded with my third pregnancy.
The nurse listed as administering the medication had died three years earlier.
But another employee was still alive.
Her name was Diane Webb.
Garrison remembered her immediately.
“She handled inventory.”
Rebecca arranged an interview.
Diane lived four counties away in a mobile home beside a lake.
She was sixty-eight.
When we showed her Eleanor’s photograph, her hands began shaking.
“I wondered when she’d come back.”
My heart pounded.
“She came to the clinic?”
“Many times.”
“Why?”
Diane looked toward Garrison.
“You were sheriff.”
“Yes.”
“You asked me questions back then.”
“You told me you didn’t know anything.”
“I had two children in college.”
“So?”
She laughed bitterly.
“You think fear disappears because someone wears a badge?”
Garrison did not argue.
“What did Eleanor do?”
Diane stared at me.
“She selected patients.”
My stomach turned.
“Selected?”
“Women connected to Mercer accounts. Executives’ wives. Family members.”
“For what?”
“Delaying pregnancies.”
The words sounded clinical.
Almost harmless.
They were neither.
“Did she order medication changes?”
“She gave names to Martin Hale. Hale handled files. Doctors signed whatever appeared in the system.”
“Why didn’t doctors notice?”
“Most orders looked routine.”
“What about mine?”
Diane looked directly at me.
“I remember you.”
My breath caught.
“Why?”
“You cried in the hallway after your second failed cycle. Your husband was late picking you up.”
I remembered.
He had said a meeting ran long.
Diane continued.
“Mrs. Mercer saw you.”
“Eleanor?”
“She stood behind the nurses’ station.”
“What did she say?”
Diane’s eyes filled with shame.
“She said some women needed to learn when to let go.”
My stomach twisted.
“Did she alter my medication?”
“I saw her give Hale a handwritten instruction.”
“Do you still have it?”
“No.”
My hope collapsed.
“But…”
She stood.
Walked into another room.
Returned with a small metal box.
Inside were old photographs, pay stubs, and notebooks.
“I kept logs.”
Garrison leaned forward.
“Inventory?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because controlled medication went missing.”
She opened one notebook.
Dates.
Dosages.
Initials.
Then a line.
E.M. — SPECIAL PATIENT — 4/18.
My third pregnancy.
The date I received what I had believed was a vitamin infusion.
My vision blurred.
Rebecca asked, “What does E.M. mean?”
Diane whispered, “Emma Mercer.”
I gripped the table.
“Who administered it?”
“Hale.”
“He wasn’t a doctor.”
“No.”
The room went cold.
“You let an administrator inject me?”
“He told us a physician approved it.”
“Did Eleanor watch?”
Diane nodded.
That answer broke something.
I remembered Eleanor arriving unexpectedly that afternoon.
She had brought flowers.
White lilies.
She sat beside me during the infusion and told me Julian was lucky I was willing to keep trying.
Three days later, I started bleeding.
I ran to the bathroom.
Diane’s voice faded beneath the memory.
The hospital.
Julian crying.
Eleanor holding my purse.
My baby gone.
I stood so quickly the room tilted.
Garrison caught me.
“I need air.”
Outside, I bent forward and tried to breathe.
He did not touch me until I reached for him.
Then his hand rested between my shoulder blades.
“She watched,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“She watched me lose the baby.”
His jaw clenched.
“I know.”
I started crying.
Not gracefully.
Not silently.
Years of grief came out at once.
Garrison stood with me until there were no tears left.
That evening, Diane agreed to testify.
The state investigator obtained her notebooks.
And for the first time, prosecutors publicly acknowledged they were examining potential criminal conduct involving Bellweather.
Cedar Hollow exploded.
News vans appeared.
Mercer Holdings stock fell.
Board members demanded answers.
Eleanor issued another statement.
She called the accusations lies created by “a vindictive former daughter-in-law.”
Former.
She had already erased me.
Then Julian disappeared.
His attorney claimed he did not know where he was.
Police found his car near the county line.
Empty.
His phone was inside.
So was his wallet.
On the passenger seat sat one thing.
A photograph of Sarah Blackwood.
May you like
And written across it in red ink were four words:
YOUR FATHER DIDN’T ACT ALONE.
