Chapter 5: What She Said Next
My mom didn't answer right away.
She reached down beside her chair and lifted a manila folder onto the table.
Set it in front of her without opening it.
Linda's eyes went to it immediately.
"What is that?" she said.
"A proposal," my mom said.
"I put it together this morning."
"This morning." Linda's voice had a new edge.
"You planned all of this."
"I planned for several possibilities," my mom said.
"This is the one I hoped we'd reach."
Daniel leaned forward.
"What's in it?"
My mom opened the folder.
Inside were three printed pages, stapled in the top corner.
She slid one copy toward Linda, one toward Robert, and kept the third in front of herself.
I read over Daniel's shoulder.
It was a repayment agreement.
Simple language.
No legal jargon.
It listed the total from Robert's notebook — thirty-one thousand, two hundred dollars, plus last night's eleven thousand, four hundred — and proposed a structured repayment over twenty-four months.
Equal installments.
Starting the first of next month.
At the bottom, a line for each signature.
Linda.
Robert.
My mother.
"You want me to sign this," Linda said.
"I want us all to sign it," my mom said.
"Robert has already agreed to co-sign, which means the obligation is shared."
Robert nodded once without looking up from the page.
Linda set the paper down.
"And if I don't?"
My mom's expression didn't change.
"Then I take Robert's notebook and last night's guest list to a family attorney on Monday morning and ask what my options are.
I'm not threatening you, Linda.
I'm telling you what happens if we don't resolve this tonight."
"You'd do that to Daniel," Linda said.
"To your own daughter's marriage."
"I'd do it to protect my daughter," my mom said.
"Which is different."
Linda turned to Daniel.
"Say something."
Daniel looked at the agreement.
He turned to the second page.
Read it.
"Sign it, Mom," he said.
"Daniel—"
"You took money from Frank Okafor.
He's sixty-seven years old and he worked thirty years to retire.
You took money from Patrice.
From Jenna." He set the page down.
"Sign it."
Linda's eyes filled.
Not tears, exactly.
Something closer to the pressure before tears, held back by effort.
"I was in a difficult position," she said.
"With money.
With your father.
You don't know everything."
"Then tell me," Daniel said.
"Right now.
Tell me."
The table waited.
Linda pressed her lips together.
She looked at Robert.
Robert looked back at her evenly.
"Tell him," Robert said.
"Or I will."
Something passed between them.
Old and heavy and long-settled on one side, still raw on the other.
Linda picked up the paper.
"There's something you need to know first," she said.
"About the money.
Where it went."
My mom's hands were still on the table.
She didn't move.
"It didn't go into our account," Linda said.
"Most of it."
Daniel frowned.
"Then where?"
Linda set the paper down again.
She reached into her bag — the same tote bag she'd carried to the wedding — and pulled out her phone.
Opened something.
Slid it across to Daniel.
He looked at the screen.
His face changed.
I leaned over.
It was a bank transfer history.
Dozens of entries.
Small amounts, some larger.
All going to the same account number.
A name at the top of the screen I didn't recognize.
"Who is Marcus Hale?" Daniel said.
The room went very still.
Robert closed his eyes briefly.
May you like
Opened them.
"That," he said quietly, "is what I've been trying to find out for two years."
