Chương 13
He laughed bitterly.
"That's the part that keeps getting me."
"What?"
"I looked."
He stared at his hands.
"I actually opened the airline app and looked."
I didn't move.
"There was a seat."
His voice cracked.
"I could've been here."
I looked at him then.
Tears had filled his eyes.
He wiped them angrily.
"I didn't come."
I thought I had wanted this confession.
For three days I had imagined shoving the funeral photographs into their faces and making them understand.
Now Jared understood.
It did not put him beside me at the cemetery.
It did not put him beside Gemma.
It changed nothing.
And somehow it changed him.
"I don't forgive you," I said.
He nodded.
"I know."
"I don't know if I ever will."
"I know."
"But I believe you didn't know about the trust."
He looked up.
That hurt him too.
Maybe because it was less forgiveness than he wanted and more mercy than he expected.
"Thank you."
I stood.
"Don't make me regret it."
"I won't."
Claire gave him a look.
He corrected himself.
That sounded more believable.
My phone rang again.
This time the caller ID showed Martin Keller.
I answered.
"Naomi Hale?"
"Yes."
"My name is Martin Keller."
"I know."
There was a pause.
"Rebecca just called me."
I looked at Johnny's letter on the table.
"Did Johnny tell you my mother had him followed?"
"No."
My stomach tightened.
"But he told me something else."
Jared and Claire watched my face.
"What?"
Martin's voice lowered.
"Three days before the accident, Johnny came to my office with a photograph."
I gripped the phone.
"A photograph of what?"
"Your mother meeting with the private investigator."
I sat down before my legs could decide for me.
"What photograph?"
Martin hesitated.
"The investigator was leaving a restaurant with your mother."
"That doesn't tell us anything."
"No."
His answer came quickly.
"By itself, it tells us almost nothing."
I closed my eyes.
"Who took it?"
"Johnny."
The room went silent again.
Claire lowered herself into the chair across from me.
Jared leaned forward with his forearms on his knees.
Martin continued.
"He followed Susan after she left his office."
My eyes opened.
"He followed my mother?"
"That is what he told me."
"Why?"
"Because she had just threatened to ruin him."
I stopped breathing for a second.
Jared looked at me.
Claire whispered, "Put him on speaker."
I did.
Martin's voice filled the kitchen.
"He came to see me on April ninth."
"Three days before the accident."
"Yes."
"What did she threaten?"
"His job first."
I frowned.
"How?"
"She claimed she had enough connections with his employer's largest client to create problems."
Johnny worked in corporate risk management for an insurance company.
He had complained about office politics constantly, but never about my mother reaching into his workplace.
"Did he believe her?"
"Not really."
"What else?"
"She said she could make sure the house became part of a legal dispute."
I looked around my kitchen.
"This house?"
"He wasn't certain what she meant."
Jared swore softly.
Martin continued.
"Then she said something about Gemma."
The room changed.
It was immediate.
Physical.
Claire stood.
I gripped the edge of the table.
"What did she say?"
Martin went quiet.
"Tell me exactly."
"He wrote it down afterward."
My voice came out thin.
"Exactly."
Martin inhaled.
"She said, 'You have a daughter, Johnny, so maybe start behaving like a man with something to lose.'"
Jared rose slowly.
Claire covered her mouth.
I heard the words and then heard nothing else.
The refrigerator was humming.
A car passed outside.
Somewhere upstairs, the old air vent clicked.
My daughter had been seven.
She hated mushrooms.
She slept with one sock on and one sock off because she said both choices were uncomfortable.
She had cried for an hour when a caterpillar disappeared from our porch.
My mother had used her as a sentence.
"Naomi?"
Martin's voice sounded very far away.
"I'm here."
"Johnny did not interpret it as a threat against Gemma's physical safety."
I looked at the phone.
"How would you know?"
"Because I asked."
"What did he say?"
"He thought she meant exposure, custody pressure, financial damage, anything she could use to frighten him."
"Custody?"
Claire's voice sharpened.
"How exactly was Susan planning to interfere with custody?"
Martin paused.
"I don't know."
"Then why mention it?"
"Because Johnny had concerns about fabricated claims."
My stomach turned.
"What claims?"
"Drug use."
Jared stared at me.
I almost laughed from disbelief.
"Johnny barely drank."
"I know."
"He wouldn't even take cold medicine if he had to drive."
Martin said, "He told me the same thing."
Claire folded her arms.
"So Susan threatened to invent something."
"Johnny believed she might."
"Why didn't he tell Naomi?"
Martin's silence hurt more than any answer.
Then he said, "He thought he was protecting her until he had enough proof."
I stared at the tabletop.
The scratches near the edge were from Gemma learning to use a fork without throwing it.
Johnny had sanded them once and stopped halfway because I told him I liked them.
Protecting me.
Everybody had been protecting me.
Dad protected me by helping steal from me.
Mom protected the company by stealing from me.
Johnny protected me by keeping danger outside my field of vision.
I was beginning to hate the word.
"What happened after he saw Mom with the investigator?"
I asked.
"He photographed them from across the street."
"Did they see him?"
"He didn't think so."
"You have the picture?"
"Yes."
"Send it to me."
"Now."
"Naomi."
"Now."
He was quiet for a moment.
"All right."
My phone vibrated less than a minute later.
The photograph was grainy but clear enough.
My mother sat at an outdoor table beneath a red awning.
Across from her was a man in a dark jacket.
A white envelope rested between them.
Mom's hand covered one edge of it.
May you like
The man was looking down at something on his phone.
I zoomed in until the pixels blurred.
