Ashley protested about the money.
“Most of it was paid by my mother,” I replied.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
Later, I overheard her talking to Melissa, her maid of honor.
“I didn’t want that woman touching my dress. That gown costs more than her car.”
I stepped inside.
“Since when is my mother ‘that woman’?”
Ashley complained about Mom’s old car, casual clothes, and habit of talking about freight at dinner.
I left with Diane.
The next morning, Ashley apologized to me but refused to apologize to Mom without conditions.
So I asked what Mom had actually done to her.
Ashley listed three grievances.
Mom wouldn’t help buy us a house worth more than $3 million.
She’d refused Ashley access to the company’s private sports suite for a party.
And she hadn’t added Ashley to a family trust.
Every complaint was about money.
That afternoon, I visited my cousin Rachel, a corporate attorney at Bennett Freight.
I asked one question.
“Has Ashley ever questioned you about my assets or what happens to my shares after we’re married?”
Rachel’s hand froze above her legal pad.
She set down her pen.
“Why are you asking me that?”
I stared at her.
“Because my wife has been talking about things I never told her.”
Rachel glanced toward the glass wall of her office. Outside, forklifts moved between warehouse doors, and a dispatcher was arguing into a headset beside a loading schedule.
Then she closed the notebook in front of her.
“Close the door, Nathan.”
I did.
Rachel was three years older than me. We’d grown up spending summers at the freight yard while our parents worked, playing cards on the office floor and learning which drivers always brought candy back from their routes.
