Chapter 6
Hollis stayed while I called Dad. I didn’t tell him what I’d found; I asked him to come to the lake house and bring the truth, whatever that meant. Then I set her phone on the kitchen table beside my pouch, its plastic crackling around the copied key and the list of dates.
Dad arrived alone. He stepped inside, looked at the two phones, and stopped as if he’d walked into a room where someone had already said his name.
“What’s this about?”
I took out the list and laid it between us.
“Start here.”
He scanned the dates. His mouth tightened at the first few, then eased, as though he’d decided the paper couldn’t hurt him.
“Those are family weekends,” he said.
“Some of them were while I was working in Charlotte.”
He looked up. “Your mother said you knew.”
“My mother said a lot of things.” I tapped Hollis’s payment history. “She told Hollis I’d agreed. She told her to keep the money between them. Did you know about that?”
Dad’s gaze moved to Hollis. She didn’t look away.
“I knew Keaton was collecting money,” he said. “He told me it was for groceries and upkeep.”
“Did you see receipts?”
“No.”
“Did you ask?”
His silence came quickly, and it answered more than he did.
I set the copied key on the table. It struck the wood with a small, hard click.
“Did you put this in the lockbox?”
Dad stared at it. The practiced patience fell out of his face.
“Yes.”
The word sat between us. I waited for the rest.
“Years ago,” he said. “I thought the family should have a way in if something happened. A storm. A pipe bursting. Your mother needed access, so I made a copy and installed the box.”
“You decided that without asking me.”
“I thought it was practical.”
“It’s my house.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?” I asked. “Because someone has been making plans for it while I’m at work. People have been sleeping in my rooms, using my towels, and paying my brother for something he had no right to sell.”
Dad rubbed both hands over his face. “I didn’t tell Keaton to schedule stays.”
“Did you tell Mom she could?”
“I gave her the key for emergencies.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He looked at the date list again. A breeze pushed at the screen door, making its latch rattle behind him.
“I didn’t tell her she could arrange weekends,” he said. “I didn’t tell her to invite twenty people. And I sure as hell didn’t tell Keaton to charge anybody.”
The distinction was real, perhaps. It was also too small to shelter him.
“You made the hidden entrance,” I said. “You gave her access, then didn’t ask where it led.”
His eyes flashed. “I was trying to help the family.”
“And I was trying to own one thing without the family taking it over.”
Hollis lowered her gaze to her hands. I didn’t turn to comfort her. This wasn’t hers to fix.
Dad leaned forward, palms braced on the table. “Nothing was ever meant to hurt you.”
I felt the old reflex stir—the urge to make his discomfort easier, to accept the intention and swallow the consequences. I had spent years doing that in small ways, the way I’d spent years picking up extra shifts and telling myself the ache in my back was just part of being useful.
“Whether you meant to hurt me doesn’t change what happened,” I said. “You gave people access to my home. You didn’t tell me. And when I asked about the lockbox, you looked me in the face and dodged the question.”
Dad’s jaw worked. For a moment, I saw the father who used to wait in the driveway when my old Honda came home after midnight. Then he looked down at the key, and the memory offered no comfort.
“I should have told you,” he said.
“Yes.”
The admission didn’t mend anything. It only stopped him from pretending the crack was somewhere else.
The porch boards creaked under a quick, heavy step. Keaton came through the open door without knocking, his cheeks flushed from the walk up the drive.
“So this is what we’re doing now?” he said. His eyes went from Dad to Hollis, then landed on the evidence spread across my table. “Putting everyone on trial?”
“No one’s stopping you from leaving,” I said.
He gave a short, bitter laugh. “You’ve got Mom sending screenshots, Hollis handing over messages, Dad sitting here like he’s done something terrible. You’re turning the family against each other over a house you barely use.”
“I use it when I want to.”
“You were never here.”
“I was working.”
“Exactly. You left it empty.”
“My house was not an invitation.”
Keaton swung toward Dad. “You know what this is. She wants somebody to blame, so she’s making up a scandal out of old family weekends.”
Dad looked as if he might answer. Keaton spoke over him.
“Everybody came. Everybody knew. Now she’s acting like I sneaked in and robbed her.”
I pulled the pouch toward me and felt the outline of the key through the plastic. “You tested the shed lock.”
His face changed, just for a second. Then his anger returned, louder.
“I was checking whether the lock worked.”
“You didn’t have permission to be there.”
“Neither did anyone else, apparently.” He spread his hands at the others. “Come on. We can all leave before this gets uglier. Unless you want to tell everyone that Arden’s decided we’re thieves.”
“I want everyone to know I said no,” I replied. “The rest is what you did after that.”
Keaton looked to Dad for backup. Dad’s eyes stayed on the payment history.
“Tell her,” Keaton said. “Tell her you gave Mom the key. Tell her the house was for the family.”
“I gave your mother access in case of an emergency,” Dad said. His voice was rough, but he didn’t look away from me. “I didn’t give you permission to arrange stays or collect money.”
Keaton’s face hardened. “You’re really taking her side?”
“I’m telling the truth.”
For a breath, nobody moved. Outside, a branch scraped the siding with a dry, papery sound. Keaton looked at me as if I’d made this happen by refusing to look away.
“You think you can stop us?” he said.
“I already did.”
He left without another word. The screen door slapped shut behind him.
Hollis stood, then hesitated. “I’m sorry.”
“I know,” I said. I didn’t add that sorry was enough.
She left a moment later. Dad stayed beside the table, eyes fixed on the key.
“I thought the lockbox was a sensible thing,” he said. “I didn’t know it had become this.”
“You didn’t know because you didn’t ask.”
He nodded once. His hand hovered over the key, but he didn’t touch it.
May you like
Then he lowered his voice.
“Your mother has another message,” he said. “One she won’t want anyone to see.”
