Chapter 7 - SEVENTEEN MISSED CALLS FROM THE FATHER WHO ABANDONED ME
By December 31, my father had called seventeen times.
I watched his name appear on my phone while Maisie sat beside me coloring a picture of three houses.
One yellow.
One blue.
One pink.
“Mommy, which one is ours?”
I looked at the page.
“Which one do you like?”
“The blue one.”
“Then that's ours.”
She smiled and drew a crooked heart above its roof.
I wanted to promise her that nobody would ever frighten us again.
But promises had become complicated.
My phone vibrated for the eighteenth time.
This time, I answered.
“Sloane!” Dad sounded breathless. “Thank God.”
“What's wrong?”
“Everything!”
I stayed silent.
“The bank has frozen the monthly payments. Preston's been suspended from his job pending an investigation. Our mortgage payment is due, and Dashiell says he can't help us until this mess is resolved.”
I looked toward Maisie.
Seven days earlier, I had stood in his dining room with an injured face.
He had told me to return to the man who hurt me.
Now his financial security was threatened.
And suddenly he needed his daughter.
“Dad, did you call because you're worried about me?”
He hesitated.
“Of course I'm worried.”
“Have you asked whether Maisie is sleeping? Whether we're safe? Whether I've seen a doctor?”
“Sloane, please. This isn't the time.”
I closed my eyes.
“Then nothing has changed.”
“Your mother hasn't stopped crying.”
“Neither had I when you sent me away.”
His breathing became uneven.
“We could lose the house.”
I remembered that house.
Christmas mornings.
Summer birthdays.
My grandfather teaching me how to wind the silver pocket watch.
The thought of losing it hurt.
But the house had become a place where my suffering was negotiable.
“Why did you sign those certifications?” I asked.
Dad went quiet.
“Don't lie to me again.”
He exhaled.
“Dashiell said the paperwork was routine. He told me the relocation accounts had already been reconciled.”
“You were a banker.”
“I know.”
“You knew not to verify payments you hadn't checked.”
His voice cracked.
“I did.”
For the first time, my father admitted responsibility without immediately defending himself.
But I needed more.
“Did you know Mom was signing my name?”
Another silence.
“I suspected something wasn't right.”
“When?”
“After the first group of reports.”
My stomach dropped.
“Three years ago?”
“Yes.”
“You knew for three years?”
“I told Celestine to stop.”
“But you didn't tell me.”
“Dashiell said if the project collapsed, Preston would be blamed. He said investigators would think we had all participated.”
“Because you had.”
Dad made a broken sound.
“I know.”
It was the first time I had ever heard him say those words.
Still, I couldn't rescue him from the consequences.
“If you want my help, you need to tell the truth to the people investigating.”
“What will happen to us?”
“I don't know.”
He sounded older than his seventy years.
“Your mother will never forgive me.”
I looked at Maisie's drawing.
“Dad, you have been more afraid of disappointing Mom than of losing your daughter.”
He didn't argue.
After a long silence, he said, “There may be something Preston kept.”
“What?”
“The original payment registers. He told me copies were being destroyed after a systems migration.”
I sat straighter.
“Where are they?”
“I don't know. But he kept an old records box when he cleaned out the Eastbank office.”
“Why didn't he hand it over?”
“Because he was afraid Dashiell would blame him.”
I almost laughed.
Everyone in my family was afraid of the same man.
Yet they had left me alone to face him.
That afternoon, Preston agreed to meet me at the community center.
He arrived without his expensive watch.
There were deep shadows beneath his eyes.
“Dad told me you kept something,” I said.
Preston looked toward Octavia.
“I'm not handing anything over without understanding what happens next.”
Octavia folded her hands.
“Anything you provide should go directly to the appropriate investigators, with its history preserved. We're not offering you immunity.”
He swallowed.
“I know.”
“Then why did you keep it?” I asked.
He looked miserable.
“Because one day I noticed two payments carrying the same relocation reference number.”
“What does that mean?”
“One was listed as money paid to a resident. The other went to Greyhaven.”
“Could it have been an error?”
“I thought so. Then I found more.”
“How many?”
“Seventeen.”
He rubbed his face.
“I told Dashiell the numbers didn't balance. He said Greyhaven handled the resident payments and everything had already been approved.”
“Did you believe him?”
“I wanted to.”
I felt a terrible familiarity in those words.
I had wanted to believe Dashiell too.
Preston reached into his coat.
He removed a small brass key attached to a faded red ribbon.
“There's a storage cabinet in the old project office. I paid to keep the contents when they closed the building.”
I looked at the key.
“What's inside?”
“Original carbon copies, payment logs, and meeting records.”
“Why are you telling me now?”
He looked toward Iris Moreno, who was arranging chairs for the evening support meeting.
“Because she came into the office three times asking about her money. I kept telling myself someone else would fix it.”
His voice lowered.
“Last night, I realized I was waiting for someone else to become the person I should have been.”
He placed the key in my hand.
Then he said something that made my blood run cold.
“Sloane, the $3,000 your parents received every month was only a small part of it.”
I stared at him.
“How much are we talking about?”
May you like
Preston swallowed.
“Possibly more than a million dollars.”
