Chapter 4 - What My Father Hid
“You funded him?”
Dad pulled out a chair, but I stayed standing.
“A fund managed by my firm invested four years ago. He knew the fund’s name. He didn’t know I approved the investment.”
Four years.
The same year Adrian persuaded me to leave my restoration job because his business needed me more.
“You let him tell me he built everything alone.”
“I wanted you to have stability.”
“You could have called.”
“So could you.”
The words landed between us.
Dad closed his eyes.
“That was unfair,” he said.
“I was your father. I should have called.”
For years, I had imagined that conversation ending in a hug.
Instead, Rachel needed the dining table for a stack of documents, and I needed water because my hands would not stop shaking.
By morning, Northbridge had supplied its file.
The loan was six months old.
The owner consent carried my signature and a copy of my driver’s license.
The supposed verification email came from an address one letter different from mine.
“That isn’t my account.”
Rachel marked the discrepancy.
Attached to the consent was an invoice for roof repairs.
I recognized the amount immediately.
“I approved that repair last spring.”
“Do you still have your copy?”
“In my project binder.”
Adrian had laughed at those binders.
He called them souvenirs from my little career.
I had kept them anyway.
The cabinet in my old office was empty.
For a second I could hear him: You lose everything, Olivia.
Then I remembered moving the binders when we cleared the room for the nursery.
They were upstairs, inside the cedar chest beneath the baby blankets.
I found the roof approval.
My signature leaned slightly upward.
One tiny ink dot sat under the final letter.
The same dot appeared on the consent.
Rachel placed both pages side by side.
“This gives us something concrete to examine.”
My phone buzzed with a message from Nina, Adrian’s payroll clerk.
I heard what happened. Please check Camille’s vendor account.
May you like
Before I could answer, a second message appeared.
He just told me to delete it.
