Chapter Six
Caity
I looked around my father’s office. The file cabinets I hadn’t yet gone through. The bookshelves lined with books that could hold secrets. I couldn’t help but feel this room held more secrets than it should. I’d been in here for a week, going through my father’s desk. The information I’d given to Brian weighed heavily on my heart, but the alternative was harder to grasp.
I didn’t know what it would do to my brother when he learned the truth. I just didn’t want him to learn it from me. In fact, I didn’t ever want him to know that I knew.
I stared at the multiple stacks of files on the desk. One stack was negligible. Contracts and forms about the house. Receipts for work done and items bought. All superficial information that wasn’t important to anyone but the occupants.
Which was only me. Maddie still wouldn’t speak to me. Cian hadn’t been back since he’d seen me with Brian. He suspected something, but he’d left it alone. I was confident Brian would never tell him anything. Brian dealt only with Sal. He said he had enough of his own men to keep corralled, and that unless Sal needed him to step in, he wouldn’t.
The second stack of folders was work-related. I would hand those over to Sal. I still didn’t understand why he’d left this office untouched all these years. Surely, he’d needed the information to run the many businesses. There were bank account statements, personnel records, and client files. All of it untouched for two decades. It just didn’t make sense.
Then there was the third stack.
The one that physically made me sick. Ledgers of sales, men and women trafficked. Children taken from their parents, raised in a place that was so heinous, I wanted to bring my father back to life so I could kill him myself.
I prayed Maddie didn’t know this side of her grandfather and the man she thought was her father. Was this the reason she’d hidden Henry? Was she afraid Nolan would traffic him? Steal him away from her? I didn’t want to believe my father had been that kind of man, but the truth was staring me in the face. The people he’d worked with. How had no one figured this shit out?
And what would I do with it now?
Most of the people in these files were dead, but there were a few still alive. What would they do if they knew my father had kept these records? What would they do if they knew I’d found them? And what about the victims? Where were they now? Had they escaped? Were they even still alive?
Some of the shit I’d read in those folders was so heinous, so disgusting that I had to take a break so I could throw up. The idea of my father being involved in something so baseless, so degrading, didn’t fit with the man I knew and loved. Sure, I knew he was a criminal. He ran the fucking Mob. But I’d been naïve to think the worst thing he was involved in was money laundering and extortion.
Had Sal known the files were here? Is that why he hadn’t cleaned out the office? But if he knew, surely he would have found what I’d given to Brian. He’d have known the truth.
I leaned back in my father’s chair. “Why were you such a bastard?” I whispered aloud.
I heard the front door open and quickly left the office, locking the door behind me. When I made it to the front room, Sal was there. He looked around the room, taking in the changes I’d made.
“What did you do with the things you didn’t want?”
“I donated them,” I answered, waiting to see what he wanted.
“It looks good in here. Brighter.”
I looked around the room, taking it in the way he might. I’d painted the dark burgundy walls a soft grey that had a hint of blue in the undertones. Gone were the heavy drapes and oversized furniture, replaced with sheer curtains and blinds underneath that could be lowered for privacy.
The furniture was dark blue with white pillows that had a navy floral print. I’d had the carpet stripped off and the wooden floors refinished.
“It was depressing before. Dark and foreboding.” I pressed my lips together to avoid saying something I shouldn’t.
“Well, that was Eamon. Dark and foreboding,” Sal agreed. “What’s your plan for the kitchen?”
“Something similar, maybe green or yellow,” I answered as we walked toward the back of the house. “Do you want coffee?”
“Thank you.”
My brother sat at the table while I set the coffeemaker. When I turned around, he was watching me.
“Are you ready to talk about everything?”
I sighed. “What is there to talk about? I cheated on my husband, had another man’s baby, and never told him about it.” I shrugged. What else could I say? Was what I did wrong? Of course it was. Did I care? Not anymore.
I’d let the guilt eat away at me for years. Let the secrets I held keep me from living the life I wanted. But now there was no room for those secrets; there were new ones to keep. There was no room for that guilt because it had been replaced by the guilt of knowing I was responsible for what my daughter had endured.
“Have you talked to Maddie? Tried to explain why you kept her from Cian all these years?”
