I could hear machinery in the background behind Michael’s voice.
A saw, perhaps.
Then a door shut, and the noise disappeared.
“Are you still there?” he asked.
“Yes.”
My voice barely worked.
Daniel moved toward the hallway, giving me space.
Michael exhaled.
“I wasn’t sure you’d ever call.”
“You knew about me?”
A pause.
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“Since I was sixteen.”
Ten years.
My younger brother had known I existed for a decade.
I walked toward the window.
“Why didn’t you contact me?”
“Dad asked me not to.”
I almost laughed.
Apparently asking people not to contact me had become a family tradition.
Michael heard the silence.
“I know how that sounds.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
“You’re right.”
His answer disarmed me slightly.
He continued.
“My dad said contacting you could hurt you. That your mother had made it clear she didn’t want him in your life.”
“My mother is dead.”
“I know.”
“You knew that too?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Thomas.”
His name tightened something in my chest.
“You met him.”
“Three months ago.”
I looked at the photograph.
“What did he want?”
Michael was quiet long enough that I thought the call had dropped.
Then he said, “He came to ask Dad whether he was finally willing to tell you everything.”
I pressed the phone closer.
“Everything about what?”
“Not just why he left.”
My skin prickled.
“What else is there?”
“I don’t know all of it.”
Of course.
Everyone in my life apparently possessed one piece of a story nobody would tell me whole.
“What do you know?”
Michael sighed.
“I know Dad got scared when Thomas showed up.”
“Scared of Thomas?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Of you finding out what happened before he left.”
I thought of the brick through the window.
The creditors.
The threatening photograph.
“I know about the gambling.”
“That isn’t all.”
My heartbeat accelerated.
“What else?”
“I think somebody got hurt.”
The room seemed to narrow around me.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Michael.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
His voice sharpened.
“I grew up knowing Dad had another daughter. I grew up knowing something happened in another state before I was born. But nobody sat me down and gave me a file.”
I closed my eyes.
He sounded angry too.
Different history.
Same inheritance.
“Where is David?”
I finally asked.
Michael did not answer.
“Is he there?”
“No.”
“Where is he?”
“At home.”
“Can I speak to him?”
Another silence.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
My anger rose.
“You don’t get to decide that.”
“I know.”
“Then put him on the phone.”
“He isn’t here.”
“Give me his number.”
Michael breathed in slowly.
“Sarah, Dad had a stroke two months ago.”
The words landed with physical force.
I sat on the edge of the desk.
“What?”
“He survived.”
I shut my eyes.
“He can talk?”
“Some days better than others.”
“Does he know who people are?”
“Yes.”
“Then I want to talk to him.”
Michael’s voice softened.
“I think he wants to talk to you too.”
I stared at the photograph of David with Thomas.
“Why hasn’t he called?”
“He tried once.”
“When?”
“After Thomas visited.”
My pulse jumped.
“What happened?”
“He dialed the number Thomas gave him and hung up before it connected.”
I felt something between fury and grief.
“Of course.”
“He was afraid.”
“I’m tired of everyone being afraid.”
“I understand that.”
“No, Michael, you don’t.”
He was silent.
Then he said, “Actually, I might.”
That stopped me.
“My mother died four months ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Before she died, she told me she always knew about you.”
I said nothing.
“She said Dad kept your photograph in the drawer beside their bed.”
My throat tightened.
“She knew he wrote you letters.”
I closed my eyes.
“She also knew he never stopped wondering whether he should go back.”
Michael’s voice cracked slightly.
“My mother spent thirty years living with someone who had part of himself somewhere else.”
That complicated everything.
David’s second wife had known about me.
Michael had known.
Thomas had known.
My mother had known.
I was the only person at the center of my own history who knew nothing.
“When Thomas came,” Michael said, “he and Dad talked for hours.”
“What about?”
“You.”
I gripped the edge of the desk.
“Thomas asked Dad if he wanted you to know him as the man he really was or as the story everyone had built around him.”
That sounded exactly like Thomas.
“What did Dad say?”
“He said he didn’t know which man was worse.”
I looked toward Thomas’s backpack.
That answer sounded more honest than anything else I had heard.
“Then Thomas asked him something else.”
“What?”
Michael paused.
“Whether he was willing to tell you about the night someone died.”
I stood.
“Someone died?”
“Yes.”
My mother’s recording had said nothing about a death.
Thomas’s letter had not mentioned one.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Michael.”
“I swear.”
I walked to the door.
“Daniel.”
He returned immediately.
I covered the phone.
“Did any death happen at this house before David left?”
His expression changed.
“I don’t know.”
“Find out.”
He nodded and took out his phone.
I returned to Michael.
“When did this happen?”
“The same week Dad left.”
“Did he kill someone?”
“I asked him that.”
My stomach twisted.
“And?”
“He said no.”
I closed my eyes briefly.
“Do you believe him?”
“Yes.”
The certainty surprised me.
“Why?”
“Because Dad is many things. He lies by omission. He runs when he should stay. He lets shame make decisions for him.”
Michael stopped.
“But when I asked whether he killed someone, he looked me straight in the eye and said no.”
That was not proof.
But it was something.
“What did Thomas believe?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he say?”
“He told Dad that silence had already cost enough.”
My eyes burned.
Even dying, Thomas had been trying to force open a truth my mother had sealed.
“Did Thomas know he was sick then?”
“Yes.”
I looked at the photograph again.
“How sick?”
“Pretty bad.”
The idea of Thomas traveling to Vermont while his heart was failing made me unexpectedly furious.
“He shouldn’t have gone.”
“I told him that.”
Despite everything, I smiled faintly.
“What did he say?”
Michael laughed once.
“He said dying was not a scheduling conflict.”
That was Thomas.
For several seconds neither of us spoke.
Then Michael asked, “Did he marry you?”
I went still.
“How do you know about that?”
“He told Dad he might ask.”
I almost dropped the phone.
“What?”
“He said if he had enough time, he wanted to spend some of it actually knowing you.”
My anger returned.
“So the marriage was planned?”
“I don’t think so.”
“What exactly did he say?”
Michael thought.
“He said he had spent most of his life being connected to you through other people.”
I swallowed.
“And?”
“He said he wanted, just once, for whatever existed between you and him to belong to the two of you.”
My eyes filled.
That sentence hurt more than almost anything else.
The seven days had been real.
Whatever secrets surrounded them, they had been ours.
Daniel reentered.
His face was serious.
I covered the phone.
“What did you find?”
“There was a death.”
My stomach turned.
“Who?”
“A man named Raymond Cole.”
I repeated the name.
Michael went silent on the other end.
Then he whispered, “That’s him.”
“You know the name?”
“Dad has said it in his sleep.”
I sat down.
Daniel continued.
“Cole was thirty-eight. He died twenty-nine years ago from injuries sustained in an assault.”
“Where?”
Daniel looked at me.
“One block from this house.”
My mouth went dry.
“Was David charged?”
“No.”
“Thomas?”
“No.”
“Anyone?”
Daniel shook his head.
“The case remained unresolved.”
I relayed it to Michael.
His breathing changed.
“Sarah.”
“What?”
“I need to tell you something.”
I waited.
“When Thomas came here, he brought an old newspaper clipping about Raymond Cole.”
My eyes moved toward the remaining boxes.
“What did Dad do when he saw it?”
“He started crying.”
My heart pounded.
“Then he told Thomas, ‘Elizabeth should have told her.’”
I looked at my mother’s tapes.
“About what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Michael.”
“I don’t.”
His voice rose.
“But Thomas asked Dad who struck Raymond.”
The room went perfectly still.
“And what did David say?”
Michael hesitated.
“Dad said, ‘Not me.’”
I waited.
“There was someone else there.”
“Who?”
Michael inhaled.
“Thomas.”
I looked at Daniel.
He had heard the name.
My skin went cold.
Michael continued.
“And according to Dad, Thomas was the last person anyone saw standing over Raymond Cole while he was still alive.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 8: The Truth About Raymond Cole Shattered the Story I Had Built Around Thomas, Until My Mother Revealed Who Actually Threw the Fatal Blow
The Stranger With the Green Backpack Asked Me for One Impossible Kindness Before His Heart Had Time to Fail
Part 7 of 10
