Dad stared at it.
“I was short four thousand,” Derek said. “I expected another client payment Friday.”
I looked at him.
“You were paying it back?”
“Yes.”
“Without telling them you took it?”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
“That’s not repayment, Derek. That’s covering tracks.”
“I know.”
His voice was quieter.
“I know that now.”
Dad did not say anything.
Then I noticed a framed photograph above Derek’s workbench.
Dad, maybe thirty years younger, standing beside a walnut dining table.
Next to the photograph was a handwritten note.
BUILD IT SO IT LASTS LONGER THAN YOUR PRIDE.
I recognized Dad’s handwriting.
“You kept that?”
Derek glanced toward it.
“He wrote it after I ruined a cabinet door when I was sixteen.”
Dad’s expression softened.
“I remember.”
“I didn’t.”
Derek gave a humorless laugh.
“Not until last year.”
A car pulled into the alley.
Veronica stepped out.
The moment she saw my car, she stopped.
Then she entered slowly.
Nobody raised their voice.
That somehow made the room feel smaller.
She looked at Derek.
“You told him?”
“Most of it.”
“Most?”
“There’s one more thing.”
Derek turned to Dad.
“I found out what Granddad meant.”
Dad’s face changed.
“What?”
“The trust.”
“No. Not the trust.”
Derek walked toward the old sideboard.
He opened a small drawer and removed an envelope.
It was yellow with age.
Dad stared at it before Derek even crossed the room.
“Where did you find that?”
“Inside one of Granddad’s old cabinets.”
Dad took it carefully.
His name was written across the front.
