Chapter 4 - BOX SEVENTEEN
Colonel Reed led us to my father’s study.
I had not been allowed inside that room for years.
After the funeral, Camilla locked it.
Later, she let decorators turn half of it into a wine room.
But one wall remained untouched.
My father’s books.
His military photographs.
The old olive-green dispatch box he had carried through three deployments.
It sat on the lowest shelf.
Dust covered the lid.
Reed walked straight toward it.
“Box Seventeen,” he said.
Camilla stared.
“That thing?”
“You knew about it?”
“I knew Andrew kept old papers in it.”
Gavin gave a tired smile.
“Marcus, if you are expecting some cinematic revelation—”
Reed slid the brass key into the lock.
It turned.
Gavin stopped talking.
Inside the box lay four objects.
A faded photograph.
A blue leather ledger.
A child’s drawing.
And a sealed envelope with my father’s handwriting.
My hands started shaking.
I picked up the drawing first.
Crayon figures stood beneath a crooked pink banner.
PROM.
One stick figure wore a long dress.
The other had enormous shoulders and six yellow circles drawn across his chest.
I remembered making it.
I had been eleven.
My father had teased me after I complained about an eighth-grade dance.
“One day you’ll want me there.”
“I will not.”
“You will.”
“Never.”
“Prom. I’m escorting you.”
“You’ll embarrass me.”
“That’s the job.”
So I had drawn us at prom.
And he had kept it.
Six years after his death, my childish handwriting stared back at me.
DADDY + NORA. NO BAD JOKES.
I covered my mouth.
Paige moved closer.
She didn’t touch me.
She only stood there.
For once, that was enough.
Colonel Reed opened the blue ledger.
Camilla leaned over his shoulder.
“What is that?”
“Andrew’s private audit book.”
Gavin laughed.
“Andrew hated bookkeeping.”
“Exactly.”
Reed flipped through several pages.
Numbers filled the paper in neat columns.
Dates.
Account codes.
Initials.
Transfers.
Camilla’s name appeared repeatedly.
My stomach turned.
“Those are trust withdrawals.”
She looked at me.
“I used money to run the house.”
“Thirty thousand dollars for jewelry?”
She flinched.
“Not everything I did was defensible.”
That was the closest thing to an admission I had ever heard from her.
Then Reed stopped at another section.
The amounts were larger.
Much larger.
$180,000.
$240,000.
$510,000.
All paid to Mercer Asset Management.
Gavin’s company.
Camilla turned slowly toward her brother.
“You told me those were tax restructuring payments.”
“They were.”
Reed shook his head.
“No tax authority received these funds.”
Gavin’s voice sharpened.
“You’re a soldier, Marcus. Not an accountant.”
“No. But Andrew was obsessive about evidence.”
He tapped the margin.
Three transactions had small red circles beside them.
One had my father’s initials.
Not copied.
Not stamped.
Signed.
I knew the way he made the A lean backward.
“That’s his signature,” I said.
Camilla stared at it.
“So Andrew was paying Gavin.”
For one brief, ugly second, relief crossed Gavin’s face.
“Yes.”
Reed looked at him.
“Why?”
“Investment services.”
“Half a million dollars?”
“We managed corporate assets.”
“You managed a financial firm with four employees above a dentist’s office.”
Gavin’s face hardened.
I picked up the old photograph from the box.
My father stood beside Thomas Mercer.
They were younger than in the photograph Reed had shown us.
Thomas had one arm around my father’s shoulders.
On the back, my father had written:
Brothers are the men who carry you home.
Camilla sat down.
She pressed the photograph to her lips.
I wanted to hate her.
I did hate her.
But hatred became harder when the person you hated started bleeding in places you could recognize.
Reed opened the envelope.
Inside was one page.
He read it silently.
Then again.
“What?” I demanded.
He handed it to me.
My father’s handwriting filled the page.
Marcus—
If I do not return, do not accuse Camilla until you trace the three marked transfers. She is angry enough to make bad choices, but Gavin is the one watching the house.
I read that sentence three times.
Camilla covered her face.
“He knew.”
Reed nodded.
“He knew there were problems.”
“He knew I was angry.”
“He knew Gavin was handling the trust.”
I looked at Camilla.
“Did he know how you treated me?”
She dropped her hands.
For the first time, she could not meet my eyes.
“I don’t know.”
That hurt more than if she had lied.
Brooke picked up the ledger.
“What are the red circles?”
Reed turned several pages.
“Andrew used markings when he wanted a transaction followed.”
Gavin stepped forward.
“You have no authority to interpret his private notes.”
One of the military police officers quietly moved between them.
Gavin stopped.
Reed reached the final page.
His expression changed.
“What?”
He didn’t answer.
I moved beside him.
The final entry was dated two days before my father died.
$480,000.
Recipient initials:
G.M.
Beside it, my father had written two words.
ROUTE DATA.
My stomach turned cold.
Camilla whispered, “Route?”
Brooke looked at Gavin.
Paige backed away from her uncle.
I could hear the rain beating against the windows.
My father had died when his convoy was attacked overseas.
Everyone knew that.
Camilla looked at Reed.
“Are you telling me Gavin sold Andrew’s route?”
“No,” Reed said immediately.
But he was staring at the page.
“I’m telling you I need to understand why Andrew wrote those words.”
Gavin’s voice came from behind us.
Low.
Controlled.
“You all wanted a villain.”
He looked directly at me.
“Be careful what you decide before you know what your father was really doing.”
Colonel Reed closed the ledger.
May you like
Then he said the one thing that made my blood run colder.
“Andrew made that payment forty-eight hours before he was killed.”
