Chương 4
“You didn’t even check.”
“I asked Lauren.”
Rachel stared at him.
“You asked the person he was accusing.”
“She had run the accounts for years.”
“So?”
“So I trusted my daughter.”
“Which one?”
Walter’s mouth tightened.
Rachel turned away.
A compressor clicked somewhere in the back room.
She walked to a rack of clamps, then back.
“What did Lauren say?”
“That Harold was confused. That Evan had been making corrections because he was helping with a software migration.”
“And that satisfied you.”
“Yes.”
Rachel touched the edge of the workbench.
“Did Evan know Harold suspected her?”
“I don’t know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I know.”
“Then what do you know?”
Walter reached under the bench.
He lifted a cardboard document box onto the surface.
Inside were bank statements, envelopes, handwritten notes, and several company ledgers.
He took out a yellowed envelope.
Harold Bell was written across the front.
The handwriting was Walter’s.
“I found this Tuesday.”
Rachel did not touch it.
“Where?”
“In a locked file drawer in the old records room.”
“Your drawer?”
“Yes.”
“Who had the key?”
“Me. Lauren. Your mother.”
Rachel looked at him.
Walter did not defend Eleanor.
He opened the envelope.
Inside were copies of account statements.
Several transfers had been highlighted.
The amounts were small.
Two thousand.
Thirty-eight hundred.
Six hundred.
Then larger.
Twelve thousand.
Nine thousand five hundred.
Rachel recognized the account ending in 4418.
It had appeared in every accusation made against Evan.
“What am I looking at?”
Walter pointed.
“Those aren’t Evan’s authorizations.”
“They have his initials.”
“On the copies Lauren printed.”
He slid another page beside it.
An original bank statement.
The transfer reference number was different.
The destination account was different.
Rachel stared.
“Whose account?”
“A vendor called Lark Home Services.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“Neither had I.”
“Does it exist?”
“It did.”
Walter placed another document down.
A state business registration.
Lauren Elise Hayes.
Rachel read it twice.
Then a third time.
“No.”
Walter said nothing.
“Lauren owned it?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“On paper? Design consulting.”
“Did she do design consulting?”
“Not through Lark.”
Rachel looked back at the bank statements.
“How much?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“You said eighty-six thousand disappeared.”
“That’s what we believed.”
“What do you believe now?”
Walter rubbed his face.
“That some of it went to Lauren.”
“Some?”
“Possibly most.”
Rachel pushed the papers away.
Her hands had begun shaking.
“And Evan?”
Walter’s silence answered before he did.
“There are transfers he approved.”
Rachel looked at him.
“So he was involved.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Stop.”
Walter closed his mouth.
Rachel picked up the highlighted statement.
Near the bottom, Harold had written in pencil:
Ask E.M. why he signed after L.H. changed vendor.
Rachel read it again.
“E.M.”
“Evan.”
“He signed something.”
“Yes.”
“And Harold knew.”
“Yes.”
Rachel sat down for the first time.
Relief had come too quickly.
She hated herself for it.
For about thirty seconds she had wanted Evan to be completely innocent. Not because she still loved him. She did not know what she felt about him anymore.
Because innocence was clean.
Innocence meant Lauren had destroyed them.
Complicity meant the destruction had help.
“What happened to Harold?”
“Heart attack.”
“You’re sure?”
Walter’s eyes hardened.
“Yes. Rachel. I’m sure. I saw the medical report. He had severe heart disease.”
She nodded.
The question embarrassed her.
The story had already become ugly enough that her mind was beginning to reach for uglier things.
Walter picked up the train.
“He repaired this for years. Collected mechanical toys. Brought this one in because the spring had cracked.”
“Why was it at your house?”
“After he died, Lauren told me Harold had meant to give it to me.”
“And you believed her.”
“Yes.”
“Again.”
Walter placed it down.
“Yesterday Sophie picked it up. Lauren reacted before I could.”
“You already knew then?”
“I knew the train was Harold’s. I knew about Lark. I didn’t know what Lauren would admit.”
“So you put it beside your plate.”
Walter looked ashamed.
Rachel understood.
“You were testing her.”
“Yes.”
“You used Thanksgiving dinner to test your daughter with evidence.”
“Yes.”
“While my child was sitting there.”
“I didn’t expect Sophie to touch it.”
“Children touch toys, Dad.”
“I know.”
“No. Apparently you don’t.”
Walter stood.
Rachel did too.
“You could have called me Tuesday.”
“I wanted more facts.”
“You wanted control.”
“That too.”
The admission stopped her for a moment.
Walter rarely admitted ugly motives.
He went to a metal filing cabinet.
“There’s something else.”
Rachel almost laughed.
“Of course there is.”
He took out a printed email.
Not old.
Two years old.
From Evan Miller.
To Daniel Hayes.
Rachel recognized Evan’s email address.
Her body reacted before her mind did. A sudden drop in her stomach, the same sensation she used to get when his name appeared on her phone during the first months after he left.
She took the paper.
Daniel,
I know I have no right to ask you anything. I’m not asking Rachel to forgive me and I’m not asking you to tell her where I am.
I just need to know if Sophie is okay.
If she asks about me, please don’t tell her I left because I didn’t love her.
I left because I was scared and because I made decisions I’m ashamed of. Lauren knows why. Your dad may know part of it.
I’m sober now. Eleven months.
Please just tell me if Sophie is okay.
Evan
Rachel read it without breathing.
Then she folded the page in half.
Very carefully.
“Why do you have this?”
“Daniel gave it to me this morning.”
Rachel looked at the date again.
Two years.
“Daniel never told me.”
“No.”
“Did you know?”
“No.”
“Mom?”
Walter hesitated.
Rachel felt the answer in that hesitation.
“Did Mom know?”
“She knew Evan had contacted Daniel.”
Rachel dropped the paper onto the bench.
“Of course she did.”
“Rachel—”
“Don’t.”
She walked toward the door.
Walter followed her.
May you like
“Where are you going?”
“To talk to my brother.”
