The lake house transfer was valid.
Preston and Amelia owned it jointly.
I could not simply take it back because I regretted the gift.
“Was there fraud?” Martin asked.
I stared at the black drive on my desk.
“Possibly.
But not in the way you’re thinking.”
I told him enough to understand the situation.
Martin was quiet for a long time.
Then he said, “Do nothing impulsive.
Preserve everything.
And James, before anyone starts making accusations about paternity, your son needs facts, not assumptions.”
He was right.
The footage proved deception.
It did not prove who the baby’s father was.
That distinction mattered.
I called Preston and asked him to meet me at my office without Amelia.
He arrived just before noon wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, still carrying the exhausted happiness of a newlywed.
“Everything okay?” he asked.
“Mom said your prescription got messed up.”
Even that small lie felt poisonous now.
I locked the office door.
“Sit down.”
His smile disappeared.
“Dad?”
I placed the external drive on the desk.
“There is something you need to see.
I wish more than anything that I didn’t have to be the person showing it to you.”
He watched both recordings without speaking.
When Amelia’s voice said, “He thinks it’s his,” Preston stopped breathing for a second.
Then he reached over and paused the video himself.
“Play that again.”
I did.
He listened twice.
The third time, he stood so quickly his chair rolled backward and struck the wall.
“She knew?”
He was not asking about Amelia.
“Your mother appears to have known before the wedding.”
“Mom knew?”
His face changed in a way I had never seen before.
Anger arrived first.
Then humiliation.
Then something worse—grief without anywhere to go.
“You gave us the house after she knew.”
“Yes.”
“And Mom stood there.”
“Yes.”
He walked to the window.
“Did you know?”
The question cut deeper than I expected.
“No.”
He turned.
“Swear to me.”
“I swear.”
He nodded once, but his eyes were wet.
Then he called Amelia.
