Chapter 9 - Claire’s Letter
The storage unit was six feet by ten feet and smelled like plywood and cold metal.
Priya came with me the next morning.
Dad’s key opened a green military-style lockbox under a stack of moving blankets.
Inside were certified records, photographs, a microcassette recorder, a bank envelope, and a cream-colored letter with my name written in blue ink.
For Grant, when he is old enough.
My biological mother’s handwriting.
I sat on the concrete floor.
Priya moved away to give me privacy.
The letter was only three pages.
It destroyed me.
Claire wrote that she was sorry she might not be brave enough to leave David forever. She wrote that Raymond was the safest person she knew. She wrote that if anything happened to her, she wanted me raised by someone who understood that love was work, not ownership.
Then I reached the line that made my vision blur.
Ray will probably tell you he is not good with children. Do not believe him. He has been taking care of people since he was twelve.
I covered my mouth.
For thirty-four years, Dad had kept that letter.
For thirty-four years, he had not used it to make himself look noble.
He had simply done the work.
Priya waited until I folded the pages again.
“Ready?” she asked.
“No.”
“Neither am I. But we should keep going.”
The bank envelope contained a canceled check for $25,000.
Payable to Natalie Mercer.
Issued by Ashford Renewal Consulting.
Dated six months earlier.
My heart stopped.
“Consulting?” I said.
Priya’s face hardened.
“Did she ever tell you about this?”
“No.”
The microcassette recorder still worked.
There were three tapes.
On the second one, Dad’s voice appeared, rough and angry.
Then another voice.
Elaine Foster.
Natalie’s mother.
“You need to stop,” Elaine said. “Grant is happy. Natalie is happy. You’re going to blow up their marriage over land he never knew existed.”
Dad answered, “Then tell your daughter to give back the money.”
My stomach twisted.
Elaine lowered her voice.
“She didn’t know what she was signing up for.”
“She knew enough to cash the check.”
A chair scraped.
Then Elaine said, “You don’t understand Leonard. He has judges, brokers, title people. If you keep pushing, he will bury you.”
Dad’s answer was quiet.
“I’ve been buried under worse things than men like Leonard Shaw.”
The tape ended.
I stared at the canceled check.
Natalie had looked me in the eyes the day before and said she had been trying to protect me.
She had never mentioned twenty-five thousand dollars.
My phone buzzed.
A text from her.
I’M AT THE HOSPITAL. YOUR DAD ASKED TO SEE ME ALONE.
I stood so fast the lockbox tipped over.
At the bottom, beneath the papers, was one final document.
A handwritten statement signed by Dad.
May you like
If anything happens to me, check Grant’s home safe. Natalie has been inside it when Grant was not home.
