Chapter 27 - The Jailhouse Bargain
At one o'clock in the afternoon, Arthur and I returned to the Lew Sterrett Justice Center.
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Ryan was brought back into the glass partition booth, but the orange jumpsuit looked two sizes too large on his frame. His hands were raw from wringing them against the metal chain of his waist belt.
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When the deputy pushed him into the chair, Ryan didn't look at the document in my hands. He looked at Arthur.
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"Is it true?" Ryan asked, his voice cracking against the glass divider. "The lawyer they appointed me said... he said Judith isn't my mother. He said I was bought."
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Arthur sat down slowly on the steel visitor stool, his cane resting between his knees. For the first time, I saw tears glaze the older man's steel-gray eyes.
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"You were Miriam's boy, Ryan," Arthur said gently. "She searched every hospital registry in North Texas until the day she died. She thought you slipped away in the delivery room."
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Ryan buried his face in his cuffed hands, his shoulders shaking with violent, silent sobs. "I helped her do it, Dad... I helped Judith file the emergency guardianship. I thought I was protecting the company. I thought Nora was trying to take Lily away from me!"
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"You were an instrument in a forty-year extortion racket, Ryan," I said, leaning toward the intercom. "Judith used you to hold down the Texas acreage. And now she’s attempting to use your cousin Caleb to drain the offshore reserves before the federal indictment lands."
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Ryan lifted his head, his face blotchy and red. "Caleb? Thomas's son?"
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"You knew about him?" Arthur demanded, straightening in his chair.
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"I didn't know his name," Ryan choked out. "But three weeks ago, Judith made me sign an emergency corporate power of attorney for an entity in Zurich. She said if anything happened to her health, a 'secondary beneficiary' would activate the transfer. She kept the execution code in her safe at the Highland Park house."
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