Chapter 2 - The Secret Contract
I didn't board the plane to Florida.
Instead, I took my backpack, walked straight out of Terminal 4, and caught a bus toward downtown Los Angeles.
My mind was racing faster than the freeway traffic. $200 wasn't much, but it was enough for food and transportation for a few days if I was careful. But more importantly, I wasn't the scared, compliant child my mother thought she left behind.
I checked into a small, inexpensive motel near Koreatown that didn't ask too many questions about a teenager with a driver's permit paying cash. I locked the door, pulled out my laptop, and connected to the Wi-Fi.
My hands shook as I typed the name into the search bar: Arthur Fielding Montgomery.
The results appeared instantly, filling the screen with news articles, corporate profiles, and Wikipedia entries.
Arthur Montgomery wasn't just a father—he was a billionaire industrialist and founder of Montgomery Global Enterprises, one of the largest renewable energy and infrastructure conglomerates on the East Coast. He lived in a massive estate in Boston, Massachusetts, and sat on the boards of major university foundations.
According to public records, Arthur Montgomery had three grown children from his marriage to his late wife, Eleanor Montgomery.
And then there was me.
I scrolled further down, searching for any connection between Arthur Montgomery and my mother, Susan. Deep within public tax records and registry documents from fourteen years ago, I found a small footnote: Susan Vance (my mother's maiden name) had worked as a executive assistant at Montgomery Global's Los Angeles branch for eighteen months.
I sat back on the creaky motel bed, the blue light of the screen illuminating the walls.
It all began to make terrible, crystal-clear sense.
When Mom got pregnant with me, she didn't get abandoned. She made a business deal. She had signed a non-disclosure agreement—a secret contract with the Montgomery family trust—promising to keep me hidden, to never contact Arthur, and to never reveal his identity to anyone, including me. In exchange, the Montgomery trust sent her a massive monthly stipend.
That money was what paid for our lifestyle, even when Mom claimed she was working double shifts at her low-paying job. That money was what allowed her to put on fancy clothes and catch the eye of Todd, a mid-level real estate investor who cared deeply about status.
Mom hadn't protected me from a father who didn't want me. She had sold my right to know my father for a monthly check.
And now, with Todd's money securing her future, she had tossed me aside like an obsolete piece of paperwork.
I pulled out my phone and dialed Aunt Linda in Florida.
"Brinley?" Linda answered on the third ring. "Did your flight land already?"
"I'm not coming to Florida, Aunt Linda," I said firmly.
"What? Brinley, your mother said—"
"I know what Mom said," I interrupted. "She left me at the gate with two hundred dollars while she flew to Europe with Todd. But she left her copy of my birth certificate in the envelope. I know who my father is, Linda."
Silence deadened the line.
"Linda?" I asked.
"Brinley..." Aunt Linda’s voice dropped an octave, sounding terrified. "You shouldn't be poking around in this. You don't understand the kind of people involved. The Montgomery family... they are powerful. Susan signed papers. Legal papers."
"So you knew?" A wave of betrayal washed over me. "You knew the whole time?"
"It wasn't my place to tell you!" Linda pleaded. "Susan took the settlement so you two could live comfortably! If you try to contact Arthur Montgomery, the foundation will cut off the payments and sue your mother for breach of contract. Todd will find out, and he'll leave her!"
"She left me at an airport!" I shouted, tears finally spilling over my eyelashes. "She traded me for Todd's family! I don't care about her settlement, Linda. I want the truth."
I hung up the phone before she could reply.
I looked at the birth certificate on the motel table, then at the search results on my laptop. Arthur Montgomery’s primary residence was listed in Beacon Hill, Boston. His corporate headquarters were located in Downtown Boston.
I checked my phone's banking app. I had $200 in cash, plus $450 saved up in my own personal debit account from babysitting and tutoring jobs over the past two years. $650 total.
A red-eye bus ticket from Los Angeles to Boston cost $185. It would take four days across the country.
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I packed my laptop, grabbed my backpack, and headed toward the Greyhound terminal. I wasn't going to spend thirty days hiding in Florida while my mother toured Europe.
I was going to Boston to face my father.
