Chapter 5 - The Name My Father Couldn't Finish
Thomas survived.
The wound looked worse than it was.
At the hospital, Martinez questioned him after doctors cleared him.
He remembered walking outside after receiving a text claiming someone had information about Andrew.
Then someone struck him from behind.
He never saw the attacker.
The catering jacket might have been planted.
Suddenly Evan looked less like a suspect and more like a convenient distraction.
Martinez asked about my father's unfinished sentence.
Susan must never trust—
Thomas knew nothing.
My mother did.
When I showed her the page, she began crying.
"There was one person Michael trusted with everything."
"Who?"
"His business attorney."
"Name?"
"Richard Hale."
Ryan went silent.
I noticed.
"You know him?"
Ryan nodded.
"He's Emily's family's attorney."
Thomas confirmed it.
Richard had represented Bennett Development for almost twenty years.
He'd also represented my father.
"Where is he tonight?"
Thomas looked toward the wedding venue.
"He was invited."
My blood ran cold.
Richard Hale had been sitting twenty feet from me during dinner.
But when security checked the guest list, Richard was gone.
Martinez issued an alert.
The wedding was effectively over.
Guests left gradually after giving statements.
Emily and I returned to the empty reception tent around midnight.
Candles had burned low.
Our wedding cake remained untouched.
She stood across from me.
"What happens to us?"
I didn't know.
"I love you," she said.
"I know."
"Do you still love me?"
That was harder.
"Yes."
Her eyes filled.
"But love doesn't erase what you did."
"I know."
"You had six months."
"I know."
"I would've stood beside you."
"I was afraid."
"That's exactly when you were supposed to trust me."
She nodded.
Then she removed her wedding ring.
My chest tightened.
She placed it on the table.
"I'm not giving this back."
I looked at her.
"I'm taking it off until you decide whether the promises we made today still mean anything."
Then she walked away.
I remained alone beneath the lights.
Ryan approached later.
"You should sleep."
"Not happening."
He sat beside me.
"You did the right thing," I said.
He looked surprised.
"I hated you for about thirty minutes."
"Only thirty?"
"Don't push it."
He smiled faintly.
Then his phone rang.
Daniel.
Ryan answered.
His expression immediately changed.
"What?"
He put the phone on speaker.
Daniel sounded breathless.
"I found Richard."
"Where?"
"Not him. His name."
"In what?"
"The old company records."
Daniel had returned to Thomas's office.
A series of payments had gone to a shell company.
The company belonged to Richard Hale.
Not Andrew.
Andrew had stolen money, but someone else had helped him hide it.
Richard.
Then Daniel found something worse.
A payment dated October 18.
The morning my father died.
Twenty-five thousand dollars.
Paid to a towing and salvage company.
Martinez traced the company.
Its former owner had been questioned after my father's crash.
The original accident report said my father's vehicle had been removed from the scene before investigators could conduct a full mechanical inspection.
Richard had paid the company that removed it.
"Why?" I whispered.
Ryan stared at me.
"Maybe because there was something on that car he didn't want police to find."
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
Silence.
Then a man's voice.
"Jason."
"Who is this?"
"You've spent tonight asking the wrong question."
"What question should I ask?"
"Don't ask who killed your father."
My hand tightened around the phone.
"Ask why your mother lied about where he was going that night."
The call ended.
I slowly turned toward Ryan.
May you like
Because according to everything I'd been told, my father had left the Bennett house and driven home.
But apparently that wasn't where he had been going at all.
