“Did you?”
“No.” He looked down. “Not then.”
Daniel stood a few feet away, listening carefully.
“What happened after?” he asked.
Thomas glanced toward him.
“I argued with Jason. The nurse threatened to call the police if they prevented me from seeing Iris. Evelyn took me aside. She showed me documents.”
“What documents?” Daniel asked.
“Patent transfer papers. Corporate agreements. Medical evaluations claiming Iris was emotionally unwell and that any public dispute might damage her credibility. Evelyn said if I challenged Jason, Iris would be painted as unstable in court, her work discredited, her privacy destroyed. She said Jason would make sure no hospital, no research center, no company would ever take her seriously again.”
My hands curled into fists.
“She said that?”
Thomas nodded. “And I believed she could do it.”
“She could,” Daniel said quietly.
My father looked at me.
“I was angry enough to fight anyway. Then Evelyn told me Jason had contacts investigating old grant money from my school program. She implied they could accuse me of misusing funds. It wasn’t true, but it would have destroyed the program and dragged your mother into years of legal trouble.”
