“It is signed by the chief of pathology at Boston General,” I said. “And it proves June cannot possibly be your biological child.”

Carter looked down at the papers as if they were burning his hands.

“But you needed an heir,” I continued, looking directly at the Hartwell board members seated at the front table. “The Hartwell family trust dictates that if Carter does not produce a biological heir by his thirty-fifth birthday next week, the entire principal reverts to the maritime charity.”

Lydia stood up from her seat near the grand piano and walked over to my side.

She held a black leather folio in her hand.

“The trust document is very specific,” Lydia told the room. “It requires a direct, biological descendant of the Hartwell bloodline. Adoption or legal presumption of paternity is expressly excluded.”

I watched Carter’s chest rise and fall in rapid, shallow breaths.

“That is why you married me,” I said to him. “And that is why, when I became pregnant through a donor clinic, you convinced me to keep the procedure entirely secret.”

“Evelyn, stop this,” Carter muttered, his eyes darting toward the exits.