Chapter 7 - The Truth About My FatherMy father had been dead for nine years.
At least, that's what I believed.
His name was Daniel Wellman.
He had died in what our family called a boating accident.
I remembered the funeral.
I remembered my mother's grief.
I remembered Austin standing beside her.
But now my mother was telling me that my father had been involved in the fraud.
“How?”
She sat down.
“Your father didn't die in an accident.”
I felt the world tilt.
“What are you saying?”
“He disappeared.”
“Mom.”
“I lied.”
The detectives remained silent.
My mother explained that Daniel had discovered the insurance scheme.
He wanted to expose it.
But before he could, he disappeared.
Austin was nineteen at the time.
My mother was terrified.
Dr. Hale had threatened them.
He said if Daniel talked, everyone would be arrested.
“So you told us he died?”
She nodded.
“Why?”
“Because I thought it would keep you safe.”
I couldn't speak.
Nine years of grief.
Nine years of believing my father had abandoned us.
Nine years built on a lie.
Then my mother handed me a photograph.
It showed Daniel standing outside a motel in Nevada.
The date was six months after his supposed death.
“He was alive.”
My hands shook.
“Where is he now?”
“I don't know.”
The detectives began searching old records.
A lead emerged.
Daniel had used an alias.
He had worked briefly in Arizona.
Then Nevada.
Then vanished again.
But there was one recent financial transaction connected to his old account.
Six months earlier.
Someone had sent money to my father.
And the sender was Austin.
I confronted my brother through the police.
He refused to speak.
But Naomi discovered something.
Austin had been visiting a private rehabilitation center in Nevada.
Under a false name.
We traveled there with detectives.
The facility director recognized the photograph.
“Yes,” she said.
“Daniel Wellman was here.”
My heart stopped.
“Where is he now?”
“He left three months ago.”
“Did he say where?”
She handed me a note.
It contained one sentence.
If Monica ever comes looking, tell her I was trying to protect her.
I cried.
For the first time in years, I cried for my father.
Not because I knew he was alive.
Because I finally understood why he had disappeared.
He had been trying to save us.
But there was another message.
The director gave it to me.
It contained an address in Arizona.
We drove there the next morning.
An old house stood alone beside a dry riverbed.
I knocked.
Nothing.
Then I heard a voice.
“Monica?”
I froze.
The door opened.
An older man stood before me.
Gray hair.
Tired eyes.
A face I had seen in photographs every night of my childhood.
“Dad?”
He began to cry.
So did I.
I stepped into his arms.
For a few seconds, the entire world disappeared.
Then he whispered:
“You shouldn't have come.”
“Why?”
“Because Austin knows I'm alive.”
I stepped back.
“What?”
My father looked toward the road.
“He found me months ago.”
“Why didn't you contact me?”
“Because he threatened you.”
I felt the old fear return.
“What does he want?”
My father looked at me.
“The original ledger.”
“The one we found?”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“The real ledger is still with Austin.”
And suddenly we understood.
The evidence in the storage unit could expose the fraud.
But Austin still possessed the one document that could reveal every person involved.
Including someone much more powerful than Dr. Hale.
Someone who had been protected for years.
May you like
Someone whose name I never expected to see.
My mother.
