Danielle Steel - Amazing Grace

“What about you? Where are you in all this?” Seth asked her, looking worried, after Parmani took the children upstairs for a bath. The conversation had been over Molly's head anyway, and Ollie was a baby.

“I don't know,” Sarah said thoughtfully. Henry had told him that it would be important for her to attend the hearings and the trial. Whatever look of respectability they could give him was crucial to them now.

“I'm going to need you through the trial,” he said honestly, “and even more after that. I could be gone for a long time.” Tears filled her eyes as he said it, and she got up to put the baby's dishes in the sink. She hadn't wanted her children to see her cry, or even him. But Seth followed her to where she stood. “Don't leave me now, Sarrie. I love you. You're my wife. You can't bail on me now.” He was begging her.

“Why didn't you think of that before?” she said in a whisper as tears rolled down her cheeks, as she stood in the beautiful kitchen, in the house she loved so much. Her problem with their current state was that this wasn't about saving their house or their lifestyle, but about being married to a man who was so corrupt and so dishonest that he had destroyed their life and their future, and said he needed her now. What about what she needed from him? And their children? What if he was gone for thirty years? What would happen to all of them? What life would she and the children have?

“I was building something for us,” Seth explained to her weakly, standing near her at the sink. “I was doing it for you, Sarah, for them.” He waved vaguely toward their children upstairs. “I guess I tried to do it too quickly, and it all blew up in my face.” He hung his head and looked ashamed. But she could see that he was manipulating her now, and just as he was willing to betray his friend, this was more of the same. It was only about him. The rest of them could burn.

“You tried to do it dishonestly. That's different,” Sarah reminded him. “This wasn't about building something for us. This was about you, being a big shot and a big winner, whatever it took, at everyone else's expense, even the kids'. If you go to prison for thirty years, they'll never even know you. They'll see you once in a while for visits. For chrissake, you might as well be dead,” she said, finally angry, instead of just heartbroken and afraid.

“Thanks a lot,” Seth said, with something ugly coming to light in his eyes. “Don't count on it. I'm going to spend every penny I have paying for the best attorneys I can get, and appeal it forever if I have to.” But they both knew that sooner or later the price of his crimes would have to be paid. This last time would lead the way to all the other times he and Sully had done the same thing. They were going down, together, and hard, and Sarah didn't want him taking her and their children with him, whatever it took. “Whatever happened to ‘for better or worse'?”

“I don't think that was meant to include securities fraud and thirty years in prison,” Sarah said, her voice shaking.

“It was meant to include standing by your husband when he's up to his neck in shit. I tried to build a life for us, Sarah. A good one. A big life. I didn't hear you complaining about the ‘better’ when I bought this house and let you fill it with art and antiques, and bought you a shitload of jewelry, expensive clothes, a house in Tahoe, and a plane. I didn't hear you telling me it was too much.” She couldn't believe what he was saying to her now. Just listening to him made her feel sicker.

“I told you it was too expensive and I was worried,” she reminded him. “You did it all so fast.” But now they both knew how. He had done it with ill-begotten gains, conning investors into believing he had more than he did so they would give him more money for risky investments. And for all she knew, he had skimmed some of it off the top. Thinking about it now, she realized he probably had. He had stopped at nothing to rise to the top, and now he was going to take a fatal fall to the bottom. Maybe even fatal for her, after he destroyed their life.

“I didn't see you giving any of it back, or trying to stop me,” he reproached her, and she looked him in the eye.

“Could I have stopped you? I don't think so, Seth. I think you were driven to do what you did by your own greed and ambition, whatever it took. You crossed all the lines here, and now we all have to pay the price.”

“I'm going to be the one sitting in prison, Sarah, not you.”

“What do you expect when you do shit like this? You're not a hero, Seth, you're a con. That's all you are.” She was crying again, and he stormed out of the room and slammed the door. He didn't want to hear that from her. He wanted to know that she was going to stick by him whatever happened. It was a lot to ask, but he felt he deserved it.

It was a long, agonizing night for both of them. He stayed locked in his office till four A.M., and she stayed in the guest room. He finally lay down on their bed at five o'clock that morning, and slept till noon. He got up in time to dress for the meeting with his attorney and the FBI. Sarah had already taken the children to the park. She still didn't have a car after losing both of theirs in the earthquake, but Parmani had her ancient Honda, which they were using to do errands. Sarah had been too upset to even rent a car, and Seth wasn't going anywhere so he hadn't rented one either. He was locked up in their house, too terrified about his future to move or go out.

They were on the way back from the park when Sarah had an idea, and asked Parmani if she could borrow her car to do an errand. She told her to take the children home for their naps. The sweet-natured Nepalese woman said that Sarah was welcome to it. She knew that something was wrong, and feared that something bad was happening to them, but she had no idea what, and would never have asked. She thought maybe Seth was having an affair, or they had a problem in their marriage. It would have been inconceivable to her that Seth was about to be indicted and might go to prison, or even that they could lose their house. As far as she knew, they were young, rich, and solid, which was exactly what Sarah had thought two and a half weeks before. Now she knew they were anything but. Young maybe, but rich and solid had gone out the door with an earthquake of their own. She realized now that he would have gotten caught sooner or later. You couldn't do what he had done, and not have it come out at some point. It had been inevitable, she just hadn't known.

When Parmani lent her the car, Sarah drove straight down the hill north on Divisadero. She turned left on Marina Boulevard, and drove into the Presidio past Crissy Field. She had tried to call Maggie on her cell phone, but it was turned off. She didn't even know if Maggie was still at the field hospital there, but she needed to talk to someone, and couldn't think of who else. There was no way she could tell her parents about the disaster Seth had caused. Her mother would have been hysterical, her father furious at Seth. And if things got as bad as they feared they would, her parents would read about it soon enough. She knew she'd have to tell them before it made the news, but not yet. Right now she just needed a sane, sensible person to talk to, to pour out her heart and share her woes. She knew instinctively that Sister Maggie was the right one.

Sarah got out of the small battered Honda outside the field hospital, and walked inside. She was about to ask if Sister Mary Magdalen was still working there, when she saw her hurrying toward the back of the room, carrying a stack of surgical linens and towels that was almost taller than she was. Sarah walked back toward her, and as soon as she saw her, Maggie looked up in surprise.

“How nice to see you, Sarah. What brings you here? Are you sick?” Emergency rooms in all of the city's hospitals were fully operative again, although the field hospital in the Presidio was still in use. But it wasn't quite as busy as it had been even a few days before.