Chapter 10 - THE VERDICTThe jury deliberated for eleven hours.
The defense began with experts.
A neurologist testified that trauma can distort memory.
A mountain-safety specialist said weather and ice conditions made accidental falls plausible.
A marriage counselor who had never treated us discussed generalized pregnancy stress until the judge limited his testimony.
Then came Dr. Andrew Keller.
Nathan's old college roommate.
I hadn't seen Andrew in six years.
He testified that Nathan had called him shortly before the mountain trip.
According to Andrew, Nathan sounded afraid of me.
“He said Claire was becoming unstable.”
My stomach turned.
Nathan had been preparing witnesses.
“Did he say she threatened herself?” Pike asked.
“Yes.”
“Did she threaten him?”
“He implied it.”
On cross-examination, the prosecutor asked Andrew one question.
“When did Mr. Cole first tell you his wife was unstable?”
Andrew checked his memory.
“About three weeks before she disappeared.”
The prosecutor displayed Nathan's deleted mountain map.
Creation date?
Five weeks before the disappearance.
The implication was devastating.
Nathan had started building his alibi after planning the location.
Andrew looked sick.
“I didn't know.”
“I understand.”
Then the defense surprised everyone.
Nathan testified.
His attorneys had advised against it.
We learned later he insisted.
Control.
Always control.
He took the oath.
Then told the jury he loved me.
He admitted the affair.
Admitted financial crimes.
Admitted lying to police.
But denied trying to kill me.
According to Nathan, our argument became physical because I tried walking dangerously close to the edge.
He grabbed me.
I pulled away.
I slipped.
He froze.
Rebecca panicked.
They believed I was dead.
He lied because he feared blame.
Every incriminating statement afterward?
Shock.
Dark humor.
Poorly worded conversations.
Financial opportunism after a tragedy.
Horrible behavior, he admitted.
But not murder.
For nearly two hours, Nathan painted himself as morally bankrupt but technically innocent of attempted homicide.
It was clever.
If jurors believed even part of it, they might compromise.
Then the prosecutor stood.
“Mr. Cole, you said you tried to catch your wife.”
“Yes.”
“Show us.”
A courtroom assistant stood near her.
Nathan demonstrated.
Hands forward.
“Like that?”
“Yes.”
“Interesting.”
She displayed a forensic photograph of the back of my coat.
Two bruising patterns had been documented beneath my shoulder blades.
Not fingers wrapping around from the side.
Two concentrated palm impacts from behind.
The prosecutor asked, “You caught her by pushing both palms between her shoulder blades?”
Nathan hesitated.
“I don't remember exactly.”
She moved on.
“You reported your wife missing at 2:17 p.m.”
“Yes.”
“You testified you searched approximately twenty minutes.”
“Yes.”
Wildlife camera timestamp showed Nathan's vehicle leaving at 1:43.
Call records placed him nineteen miles away by 2:09.
“So when exactly did you conduct this twenty-minute search?”
Nathan shifted.
“I was confused.”
“You were confused while driving?”
“Yes.”
“Were you confused when you removed Mrs. Cole's phone from the mountain?”
His face tightened.
“I found it.”
“And hid it?”
“I panicked.”
“And drafted a suicide note from it?”
“I was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Being blamed.”
The prosecutor looked at the jury.
“Before anybody had blamed you?”
No answer.
Then came the mountain map.
“Did you create this?”
“I research hikes.”
“Did you normally mark cellular dead zones?”
“I like preparation.”
“Did you normally label weather windows ‘best window’?”
Nathan stared.
“No.”
“Best window for what?”
“Photography.”
The prosecutor enlarged metadata.
An earlier deleted filename appeared.
CLAIRE_FINAL_ROUTE
Nathan's lawyer objected.
Overruled.
“Photography?”
“I don't remember naming it.”
Then the prosecutor brought up the attempted poisoning.
Nathan denied instructing Rebecca to give me anything dangerous.
“She misunderstood.”
“Rebecca misunderstood your message saying, ‘If Claire loses the baby, selling gets easier’?”
Nathan looked toward the jury.
“It was a cruel joke.”
“Another joke.”
“Yes.”
“You joke about your wife miscarrying.”
“I said things I regret.”
“You joke about her death.”
“Yes.”
“You joke about your son's death.”
Nathan's jaw tightened.
“I was under extreme stress.”
“And when you said, ‘She wouldn't fall, so I helped’?”
His attorney objected.
The judge allowed the question.
Nathan went pale.
“It was sarcasm.”
The prosecutor paused.
Then smiled faintly.
“So your defense is that every time you confessed, you were joking.”
“I never confessed.”
“You just have a very specific sense of humor.”
Pike objected.
Sustained.
The prosecution appeared finished.
Then she walked back toward her table.
Stopped.
Turned.
“One final question, Mr. Cole.”
Nathan looked exhausted.
“When did you learn your son was male?”
My breath caught.
What?
Nathan blinked.
“During pregnancy.”
“When?”
“Ultrasound.”
“Which one?”
“I don't remember.”
The prosecutor looked toward me.
I suddenly understood.
We had chosen not to learn the sex.
I had known only because the helicopter medic announced it after birth.
Nathan had not.
The prosecutor said, “Mrs. Cole testified that you referred to the baby as ‘him’ during a conversation with Rebecca before the birth.”
Nathan stared.
Then Pike shot to his feet.
“Objection! Mischaracterizes evidence.”
The judge asked the prosecutor to approach.
After a sidebar, she returned.
She didn't pursue it.
But something had changed.
During a recess, Desai found me.
“What was that?”
I asked.
“We discovered a prenatal genetic lab access.”
My stomach dropped.
“What?”
Nathan had secretly accessed results from a chromosome screening performed months earlier.
The report included fetal sex.
I never requested that information.
Nathan had.
“Why?”
Desai's expression was grave.
“Because your trust documents distinguish inheritance if you died before delivery.”
I felt sick.
Nathan knew I was carrying a son because he'd been studying how Eli affected inheritance.
But that wasn't the worst discovery.
The laboratory account showed another download.
My full prenatal genetic report.
Including a rare blood-marker trait.
Nathan had sent it to someone.
Who?
A private investigator named Joel Mercer.
Investigators searched Mercer's records.
There, they found the secret Nathan had kept even from Rebecca.
Nathan had hired Mercer to investigate whether he was Eli's biological father.
There was no reason to suspect otherwise.
But Nathan had become convinced that if Eli wasn't his, killing me alone would be enough to secure the company.
When prenatal information confirmed paternity was overwhelmingly consistent, his plan changed.
Both of us had to die.
I sat silently while Desai explained.
The attempted poisoning began after that report.
The mountain planning became more detailed.
Nathan hadn't viewed Eli as a child.
He had viewed him as an inheritance obstacle.
Then came one final file.
Mercer had recorded Nathan during a meeting.
Nathan asked:
“If the child survives but Claire doesn't, what happens?”
Mercer responded, “Legally? You'll likely manage the trust but the assets belong to the child.”
Nathan was silent.
Then he said:
“So that's not enough.”
Those four words eliminated the last illusion.
The prosecution reopened its case with court permission.
The recording played the next morning.
Nathan looked toward me.
For the first time, he didn't smile.
His face was empty.
The jury heard him decide that my death alone would not satisfy him.
My baby had to die too.
When court recessed, I went into a restroom and locked the stall.
I cried silently.
Not because I feared losing the case.
Because Eli would someday grow old enough to ask about his father.
What could I possibly tell him?
That Nathan wanted money more than he wanted his son alive?
My therapist later gave me the answer.
“You tell him age-appropriate truth.”
“What truth?”
“That his father made terrible choices and that those choices are not Eli's inheritance.”
I held onto that.
Nathan could give my son his DNA.
He could not give him his destiny.
Closing arguments were scheduled for Monday.
Afterward, the jury would decide.
For the first time since the cliff, there was nothing left for me to do.
No evidence to find.
No company to rescue.
No testimony to give.
May you like
Only wait.
And waiting, I discovered, could be its own kind of fall.
