Chapter 4 - What My Brother Told Eldon
I met Eldon at a diner two towns over the next morning, because I didn’t want Beckett to see my car anywhere near his office.
Eldon was in his sixties, with gray stubble and hands that had done years of hard work.
He ordered coffee and didn’t touch it.
“Grant was my partner for nine years,” he said.
“And he was your brother, so I’m going to tell you what I know, and you can decide what to do with it.”
I nodded and kept my hands around my own cup.
“The summer before he died, Grant and Beckett had a fight,” Eldon said.
“A bad one.”
“About what?”
“About money and about a contract.
Beckett had loaned Grant some money for a job, and then he wanted a share of the business in return.
Grant didn’t want to give it to him.”
Eldon stirred his coffee without drinking it.
“Grant told me Beckett kept pushing him to sign something.
Some paper that would have given Beckett a piece of everything we built.”
I remembered that summer.
Grant had seemed tired and short-tempered, and I had assumed it was work.
He had come to my house one Sunday and we had sat on the back steps, and he had said something I hadn’t thought about in years.
“If something happens to me,” Grant had said, “check the insurance.”
I had laughed.
I had told him he was being dramatic.
He had smiled and changed the subject, and a few weeks later he was dead.
“Eldon,” I said, “did Grant ever tell you about the insurance?”
Eldon looked at me for a long moment.
“He did,” he said.
“He told me if anything happened to him, I should check the policy and the beneficiary.
He said Beckett had been asking too many questions about it.”
My throat closed up.
“And you never told anyone?”
“I told the police what I knew,” Eldon said.
“But the accident looked like an accident.
A guardrail gave way on a job site, and Grant fell.
There was no reason for anyone to look at Beckett.”
He paused.
“But I never liked him,” Eldon said.
“And I never trusted that loan.”
I sat there and let it all settle.
The policy on my life.
The forged signature on Grant’s estate.
The voicemail saying Beckett was never sterile.
And now Eldon telling me Grant had been worried about insurance and about Beckett pushing him to sign away a share of the business.
Beckett had told Ysolde he couldn’t have children.
Maybe that wasn’t just a lie to keep her around.
Maybe it was a story he had told himself, so he wouldn’t have to think about a baby, because a baby would complicate whatever plan he had.
And the policy on my life gave him another way out.
I felt sick.
“Eldon,” I said, “do you think Beckett had something to do with Grant’s accident?”
He didn’t answer right away.
“I think your brother was afraid of him,” he said.
“And I think you should be, too.”
I paid for my coffee and left the diner.
On the drive home, I kept the radio off and thought about the shoebox in the nursery closet.
I thought about the tiny shoes I had dropped on the floor when I walked in and saw Beckett kissing Ysolde.
I thought about the word DADDY on the ribbon I had thrown at his feet.
And I thought about what I was going to do next.
When I got home, Beckett’s car was in the driveway.
He was sitting on the porch steps, waiting for me.
He stood up when I got out of the car.
“Ariella,” he said.
“We need to talk.”
I looked at him and felt nothing but cold.
“Yes,” I said.
“We do.”
