Chapter 31 - The Man Who Always Knew
Thomas Weller called three times before I turned my phone facedown.
Rebecca watched the movement.
“You haven’t spoken to him?”
“Not today.”
“Good.”
Sarah lifted one hand.
“Let’s stay with what you know, Rebecca. Not what either of us suspects.”
Rebecca nodded and opened another folder.
Thomas had attended the charity dinner as an invited guest of my father. That part did not surprise me. He had been present at so many important moments in our family that I had stopped noticing him in photographs.
Birthdays. Hospital visits. The reception after my mother’s funeral.
He always stood slightly behind the people grieving or celebrating.
Close enough to help.
Close enough to hear.
“Did he know Julian before that evening?” Sarah asked.
“I don’t know,” Rebecca said. “But they spoke as if they did.”
“What did you hear?”
“Thomas asked whether Julian had looked over the information.”
“What information?”
Rebecca shook her head.
“I assumed they meant a project.”
My phone vibrated again.
This time, a message appeared.
Audrey, I understand Rebecca Sloan has been in contact. Please don’t let a confused woman reopen matters your father considered settled.
I read it aloud.
Rebecca went very still.
Sarah asked permission to photograph the message.
I handed her the phone.
“How does he know she’s here?” I asked.
No one answered immediately.
Outside Sarah’s office, a copier started. Her assistant laughed quietly at something near the reception desk.
I looked toward the closed door.
Sarah followed my gaze.
“We’re not going to decide that everyone around us is involved,” she said. “We’re going to establish who knew about this meeting.”
Rebecca’s attorney had contacted Thomas two days earlier to request records.
That explained his knowledge of her renewed inquiries.
It did not explain the timing.
Sarah made a note rather than turning uncertainty into a conclusion.
I tried to do the same.
It was becoming harder.
For years, Thomas had translated financial documents into words I could understand. He had told me which questions mattered. Which pages required attention. Which complications were ordinary.
I had thanked him for making things simple.
Now I wondered how much of simplicity was deciding what someone else never saw.
Sarah asked Rebecca to preserve everything and avoid contacting Thomas directly. Then she called Evelyn.
Within an hour, my father’s former adviser had become a subject of formal questions.
Not a convicted criminal.
Not even, so far as I knew, a person charged with anything.
A man whose access required examination.
That distinction mattered.
I repeated it to myself on the drive home.
At the bungalow, Clara was helping Leo cut paper leaves for a school project. Claire sat on the floor, placing wooden blocks inside Barnaby’s water bowl.
The dog watched with exhausted dignity.
“Your daughter is improving the plumbing,” Clara said.
I laughed before I could stop myself.
Leo looked up.
“Did the meeting go okay?”
“It was tiring.”
“Did you eat?”
I stared at him.
Sarah’s words in my son’s mouth.
Clara looked away.
I sat beside him.
“You don’t have to check whether I’m taking care of myself.”
He pressed a paper leaf flat.
“Somebody should.”
The sentence hurt more than Thomas’s message.
I pulled a chair closer.
“You’re right that people need help sometimes. But Clara and Sarah and other grown-ups can help me. Your job is to be six.”
“Almost seven.”
“Almost seven,” I agreed.
That evening, after both children were asleep, I searched my email for Thomas’s name.
Not to investigate him myself.
To identify what I had already shared.
Trust summaries. Foundation budgets. The purchase of the bungalow. A photograph of Claire beside her first birthday cake.
He had replied to that photograph.
Your father would have loved this.
I closed the laptop.
Clara sat across from me.
“Was he involved?”
“We don’t know.”
“Do you think Dad knew?”
“We don’t know that either.”
She nodded.
For once, neither of us tried to improve the answer.
At nine, Sarah called.
Thomas had sent her a letter.
He expressed concern that I was being influenced by people with unresolved grievances. He offered to meet privately and explain the historical arrangements without creating unnecessary expense.
“Privately?” I repeated.
“Without Rebecca. Without Natalie. Preferably without Evelyn.”
“And you?”
“He says my involvement may complicate the tone.”
I looked at the refrigerator.
Leo’s paper leaves were drying beneath a magnet.
“What did you tell him?”
“That any explanation worth giving can survive the presence of counsel.”
For the first time that day, my shoulders loosened.
Then Sarah continued.
“Evelyn contacted the independent trustee. Thomas requested a complete copy of your current account schedule this morning.”
“Did they give it to him?”
“They’re reviewing what authority he claimed.”
I stood.
Outside, Barnaby barked at something in the dark.
Sarah waited until I stopped moving.
“Audrey, the request included a document you need to see.”
“What document?”
“A standing authorization.”
I gripped the edge of the counter.
May you like
“Whose signature?”
“Yours.”
