Chapter 4 - The Letters Behind the Wall
I wanted to follow Malcolm.
Every part of me wanted to drag an answer out of him before he reached the driveway.
I didn’t.
Because Evelyn collapsed into the porch chair.
“Grandma!”
Nia rushed to her.
I crouched beside Evelyn.
“Can you breathe?”
She nodded.
Barely.
Deacon brought water.
Miles called a nurse he knew and kept her on speaker while we checked that Evelyn wasn’t having a medical emergency.
Ten minutes later, her color started returning.
“I’m fine,” she insisted.
“No,” I said. “You’re not.”
“I have survived worse.”
“That doesn’t mean you keep volunteering.”
Something flickered across her face.
For a moment, she almost smiled.
Nia knelt beside her.
“I’m sorry.”
Evelyn touched her granddaughter’s cheek.
“For what?”
“I should’ve told you.”
“Told me what?”
Nia looked at me.
Then at the house.
“Dad has a box.”
My pulse jumped.
“What kind of box?”
“Old papers.”
Evelyn stared.
“Where?”
“He used to keep it in his office.”
Celeste and Malcolm lived fifteen minutes away.
Nia shook her head.
“He moved it here.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. A few weeks ago, Mom told him somebody might search their house if the bank started asking questions.”
Deacon and I exchanged looks.
“Where is it?” I asked.
“In Grandpa Henry’s old study.”
Evelyn gripped the arms of her chair.
“That room stays locked.”
Nia nodded.
“Dad changed the lock.”
Evelyn’s face tightened.
“In my house?”
“He said the door was broken.”
“It wasn’t.”
I stood.
“Do you want us to look?”
Evelyn nodded.
“Yes.”
The study was at the back of the first floor.
A dark oak door.
New lock.
Deacon examined it.
“We don’t break anything.”
“It’s my door,” Evelyn said.
“That helps.”
Nia disappeared into the kitchen and returned holding a tiny brass key.
“I took this from Dad’s key ring last month.”
I looked at her.
“You’ve been planning for this?”
Her eyes filled.
“I didn’t know what I was planning.”
The key turned.
Inside, dust floated through narrow bands of sunlight.
Henry Brooks had apparently loved books.
Shelves covered three walls.
A framed photograph of Evelyn with a broad-shouldered man sat on the desk.
Henry.
Her second husband.
The man who had known she once had another son.
Nia moved toward a cabinet.
“It was here.”
Empty.
My stomach sank.
“Malcolm moved it.”
“Maybe.”
Deacon ran his fingers over the shelf.
“Victor.”
He pointed toward the baseboard.
Fresh scratches.
We moved a bookcase.
Behind it was a square section of drywall that looked newer than everything around it.
Nia whispered, “Oh my God.”
I looked at Evelyn.
“Permission?”
She nodded.
Deacon used a screwdriver from his bike kit.
We removed the panel carefully.
A metal document box sat inside the wall.
Nia started crying.
“That’s it.”
It wasn’t locked.
I carried it to the desk.
Evelyn stood beside me.
“Open it.”
Inside were bank statements.
Copies of checks.
A power-of-attorney form.
Several envelopes.
And one yellowed letter.
Evelyn recognized the handwriting immediately.
She made a sound like someone had struck her.
“Lorraine.”
The envelope was addressed to:
Evelyn Brooks.
Postmarked seventeen years earlier.
Unopened.
I stared at it.
Seventeen years.
The same year Lorraine died.
Evelyn covered her mouth.
“I never got this.”
Nia whispered, “Dad had it.”
My fingers went numb.
There were three more envelopes beneath it.
All addressed to Evelyn.
Different dates.
None opened.
The earliest was twenty-one years old.
I had to sit down.
Evelyn picked up the oldest.
“I searched for her for decades.”
Her voice broke.
“She wrote back.”
I looked toward the window.
Malcolm had known.
He had intercepted them.
Why?
Money?
Jealousy?
Control?
I didn’t understand.
“Open it,” I said.
Evelyn’s hands shook too badly.
She handed it to me.
I opened the envelope.
The paper inside was covered in Lorraine’s familiar handwriting.
I recognized it instantly.
Birthday cards.
Lunchbox notes.
Reminders taped to the refrigerator.
I began reading aloud.
“Evelyn, I don’t know if this letter will reach you.”
My voice cracked.
I stopped.
Deacon placed a hand on my shoulder.
I continued.
“I have spent years trying to decide whether keeping Victor away from the past was protection or cowardice.”
My throat tightened.
Evelyn sobbed quietly.
“Isaiah’s brother found us once when Victor was thirteen. He threatened to take him. I moved us again and decided I would not tell Victor until I knew the danger was gone.”
I remembered that move.
Middle of seventh grade.
No warning.
Lorraine had packed our apartment overnight.
“She told me the landlord sold the building,” I whispered.
Evelyn touched the desk.
I read on.
“Victor believes I am his mother. I allowed that because he needed a mother more than he needed a history full of fear.”
I pressed my lips together.
“She loved you,” Evelyn whispered.
“I know.”
That was what made it hurt.
I continued.
“I am sorry. I know what I took from you.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“But I also know what Isaiah threatened to take from him.”
The next lines blurred.
I wiped my eyes angrily.
“I intend to tell Victor everything when I am certain it cannot hurt him.”
The letter ended with an address.
An address where Lorraine and I had lived for almost four years.
Evelyn could have found us.
She should have.
If Malcolm had delivered that letter, she would have.
I opened the second.
Five years later.
Lorraine had written again.
This one was shorter.
She wrote that I had joined the military for a few years.
That I was stubborn.
That I had bought my first Harley.
That I laughed like Evelyn.
I stopped there.
Evelyn put her face in her hands.
The third letter was sent after my divorce.
The final one was written months before Lorraine died.
I couldn’t open it.
Not yet.
Deacon examined the other documents.
“Victor.”
His voice changed.
“What?”
He lifted a photocopy.
“This power of attorney.”
Evelyn looked up.
“What about it?”
“It gives Malcolm control over your accounts and property.”
“I never signed that.”
Nia stepped closer.
“But there’s a signature.”
Evelyn stared at it.
“That is not mine.”
Another paper sat behind it.
A copy of a deed transfer application.
Her house.
Malcolm had been preparing to move ownership into a company called CB Holdings.
Celeste Brooks.
I felt cold rage settle inside me.
Not hot.
Cold.
Useful.
“We call the police,” I said.
Evelyn hesitated.
“He’s my son.”
“So am I.”
The words escaped before I could stop them.
The room froze.
Evelyn stared at me.
I stared at her.
I wasn’t ready to call her Mom.
I wasn’t even sure what being her son meant yet.
But the truth had come out anyway.
Her mouth trembled.
Then Nia whispered, “There’s more.”
She pulled a bank statement from the bottom of the box.
Dozens of transfers.
Small at first.
Then larger.
Five hundred.
Two thousand.
Seven thousand.
Twenty-five thousand.
Miles added them with his phone calculator.
“Eighty-six thousand dollars.”
Evelyn looked sick.
“All from Grandma?” Nia asked.
“Looks like it,” he said.
Deacon pointed at the destination account.
CB Holdings.
Celeste Brooks.
Nia stepped backward.
“No.”
I looked at her.
She shook her head.
“My mom told me they were struggling.”
Evelyn reached for her.
“Nia.”
But the girl was staring at the papers.
“She bought a new SUV last month.”
Nobody spoke.
Then we heard tires on gravel.
A car stopped outside.
Deacon moved to the window.
“It’s not Malcolm.”
A woman in a navy blazer climbed out holding a file folder.
She walked to the porch and knocked.
Evelyn looked at me.
I opened the door.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Reed?”
That surprised me.
“Yes.”
“My name is Angela Harris. County Adult Protective Services.”
My stomach tightened.
She glanced past me toward Evelyn.
“I’m here because a family member filed an emergency complaint.”
Evelyn went pale.
“What complaint?”
May you like
Angela looked directly at her.
“That you’ve been taken hostage in your own home by a motorcycle gang.”
