Chapter 6: What He Needed to Explain
I pulled into a gas station and put the car in park.
Amy looked at me.
I mouthed: *Robert.* Her expression didn't change, but her hand moved to Frederick's carrier in the back seat, as if checking the buckle.
"I'm listening," I said into the phone.
"I know how today looked," Robert said.
"I know you're angry.
But there are things you don't understand about what Teresa and I were trying to do."
"You installed a camera on my house."
A pause.
"That was Mason's idea.
For coordination."
"You forged a property transfer."
"It wasn't forged.
I have a legal basis for—"
"You don't have any basis.
You've been absent for six years.
Your name is on nothing.
My attorney confirmed it an hour ago."
Silence.
"Where are you?" I asked.
"That doesn't matter right now."
"It matters to the police."
"Connor." His voice shifted — lower, slower, the tone of a man trying to sound reasonable.
"I came back because I wanted to fix things.
Teresa told me about Amy.
About how she was spending your money.
About how she was isolating you from your family."
I looked at Amy, who was watching the windshield, one hand resting on Frederick's carrier.
"Amy has never isolated me from anyone," I said.
"That's what Teresa told me.
That Amy was controlling the household, keeping her away from you, refusing to let her see Frederick—"
"Teresa has been in my house every other week for the past year.
Amy cooked for her.
Amy let her host a party in our home today.
Amy was on a plastic stool scrubbing dishes while running a fever herself, because your sister-in-law told her to, and she was too afraid to say no." My voice was level.
I was surprised by that.
"Teresa lied to you, Robert.
And you believed her because it was convenient.
Because it gave you a reason to come back and take something."
"I wasn't trying to take anything.
I was trying to protect—"
"You were trying to get your name on my property.
That's all this was."
He didn't answer immediately.
When he did, the reasonable tone was gone.
"I'm your father."
"You were," I said.
"You stopped being that when you left."
"I made mistakes.
I'm trying to correct them."
"By fraud."
"By coming back.
By trying to make sure this family doesn't fall apart because of a woman you've known for three years."
There it was.
The thing underneath all of it.
"Her name is Amy," I said.
"She's my wife.
She's the mother of your grandson, who you have never met and will not meet under these circumstances.
If you want to have a conversation about the future, you call my attorney.
His name is Greg Halston.
I'll have him send you the contact information." I paused.
"And Robert — turn yourself in.
The police have the footage.
They have the texts.
They have Mason.
Whatever you think you can still walk away from, you can't."
"Connor, if you do this, you'll regret—"
I ended the call.
Amy was still looking at the windshield.
"What did he say?" she asked.
"He said Teresa told him you were isolating me from my family."
She turned to look at me then.
Something moved across her face — not surprise.
Something older than surprise.
"She told me almost the same thing about you," Amy said quietly.
"That you were starting to resent me.
That you were only staying because of Frederick.
That I should be grateful she was keeping the peace."
The gas station hummed around us.
A truck pulled in at the next pump.
"She was working both sides," I said.
"For two years," Amy said.
"At least."
I started the car.
We drove home in silence, but it wasn't a bad silence.
May you like
It was the kind that comes after something has finally been named.
What I didn't know yet was that Greg Halston would call me at seven the next morning with news that changed the shape of everything — because the deed transfer wasn't the only document Mason had been carrying in that folder.
