"You're right," I agree. "The past does have a way of coming back to haunt you."

"Mine did." He leans back in the chair, tipping his chin towards the guard. "Mine came back in the form of Frederick Beckett."

Chapter 10

"Did you work with him?" I cast my gaze to the floor as I ask the question. This is the point in the conversation when I should tell my father that I know Frederick's son. I should confess that he's the man I've been dating and falling for but I don't.

"No." His voice is husky. "We never worked together. Until I was arrested, I'd never heard of the man."

"He didn't work for Buckland Insurance?" I train my eyes at his face now.

He adjusts his glasses on his nose to keep them from falling forward. I watch the motion of his hand. It's a gesture he does countless times a day but I doubt he's even aware of it.  "The police told me Frederick handled investments for a firm based in Boston. I never dealt with them."

"On the news they said that he told the police things," I stop myself because I don't want to sound accusatory. I can't ignore what I heard on television or what I've read online since my father's arrest but I want to hear the truth from him, directly. "They said that Frederick gave them information that helped them build a case against you."

"I suppose that he did." His posture stiffens in the chair. It's a slight shift but it's enough that I notice the change. "My lawyer told me that Frederick had thousands of documents in a safe deposit box. Some of those documents relate to me."

"What documents?" I ask impatiently. "Insurance documents?"

"I signed things." He pinches his index finger and thumb together as he sweeps them over the top of the table, mimicking a signature. "When I first made district manager, I signed so many things. I didn't read them all."

I sigh heavily. Maybe the only thing my father is guilty of is poor judgment.  I know from my own personal experience, that attention to detail isn't his strong suit.

"Did you sign something back then that you shouldn't have? Is that what this is about?"

"It started that way." He glances back at the guard. "My secretary brought me stacks of things to sign and I did just that. Day after day I signed hundreds of policies without looking them over."

How can he be held accountable for a simple oversight? If something was amiss in one, or more, of those policies, that can't possibly warrant parading my father on television in front of photographers along with accusations that he's a mastermind behind some plot that involves a missing person.

I'm suddenly glad that my brother hired Everett to represent my father. He needs the best if he's going to fight this.

"Why are the police accusing you of so many horrible things if you only signed a few policies that you didn't even write up? Can't you make them see that it was all a misunderstanding?"

His breathing stalls for a brief second before his eyes lock on mine. I see quiet resignation there. I feel it before he even speaks. "I did those things, Tess. I'm not innocent. I'm far from it."

***

The guard had called a ten minute warning to us after my father told me that he was guilty. I was grateful when he interrupted us because it gave me a moment to silence my heart's beat. I thought my dad, and the guard, would hear its steady rhythm. It was pounding, just as my mind was. I didn't expect this.

I knew when I arrived that I'd have answers to many of my questions. I didn't know that my father proclaiming his guilt would answer almost all of them in one fell swoop.

"I loved your mother, Tess." He smiles gently. "I loved her so much but something changed."

His declaration may have been welcomed in the middle of their contentious divorce, but today I don't want to hear any of it. I want to know more about the man who broke the law and then lived his life as if nothing was amiss.

"They said you are involved in the case of a missing woman," I say the words recklessly, not tempering the edge of anger that's there, in my voice. "Who is she? What happened?"

The muted accusation pushes him back in his chair. His eyes drop to my mouth before they settle back on my eyes. "I had nothing to do with that. I have no idea where she is or what happened to her."

That's more than I know. I hadn't taken the time or put in the effort to learn more about the woman in question. I had done that with purpose. I didn't want to catch a glimpse of her or see her name in print. I wanted her to be faceless and nameless so I wouldn't torture myself with imagined scenarios about what had become of her.

"Who was she?" I repeat the question.

"I'm trying to get to that." He sighs. "She was one of the agents who worked in my division. She wrote up those policies I told you about. She started everything in motion."

"Why didn't you go to the police then?" I push my palms against the edge of the table. "You should have gone to the police, dad. They would have arrested her."

"I couldn't do that." His weathered hands reach towards me, desperately seeking mine. "I cared for her, Tess. I thought I loved her."

Chapter 11

Since my parents divorced I've never heard either of them talk about loving someone else. I didn't expect my mother to seek out a new partner. She'd found her soul mate in the sorrow that she's immersed in since her marriage ended.

I always expected my father to date. He's an attractive man. He works out, he takes care of his appearance and his charm is undeniable.

I once asked him why he never pursued any of the women he'd met in the gym or why he wasn't interested in the beautiful brunette he always talked about from his book club.

The timing isn't right, he'd tell me. She's not really my type, he'd say.

It seems as though his type was an insurance broker writing fake policies who lured him right into her trap. She managed to do all that while he was married to my mother.

"Her name was Lydia. Lydia Keeley. She needed help. I helped her."

His voice is vulnerable in a way I've never heard before. I knew that the passion in my parent's marriage had waned. I assumed it was an inevitable part of life when two people settle into a routine with one another.

Now, the time my father bailed on our family vacation to North Carolina makes more sense. I don't have to question why he was always the one holding the camera when we stood in front of the fireplace for our annual family holiday photo. My brothers would run to get the tripod, but my father would wave them back to their places next to my sister, my mother and me.

He'd tell them that the lighting wasn't right with the tripod and he could always find our best angles. My mother's smile in those images wasn't as bright as it had been years before when he'd proudly stood next to her after asking the neighbor to step in to take the photograph for us.

They were small things that illustrated a major shift in the dynamic of their marriage. None of us noticed what was happening right in front of our eyes.

"What happened?" I push my hair back over my shoulders. "Where is she?"

He shakes his head, his shoulder slumping forward with the movement. "She left the office on a Monday afternoon to go meet a client. She never got there. They found her car in a parking lot a week later."