Chapter 6 - The Father June Never Met
For eighteen years, Evie had believed the story of her father's death because everyone told it in the same careful order. There had been a warehouse fire. Thomas Whitaker had been working late. The building had collapsed before the firefighters could reach him. A wedding ring had been found among the wreckage, and the family had buried what the county returned in a closed casket.
In the kitchen, Mae told the story differently.
“Three nights after the fire, someone called your grandmother,” she said. “A man. I answered because Rose had finally fallen asleep. He said, 'Tell her Thomas got out.' I thought it was a vicious joke. I hung up.”
“You never told me?” Evie asked.
“I told Rose. She went white as the tablecloth and told me not to speak of it again. I thought grief had frightened her out of her senses.”
“What about Mom?”
Mae rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I don't know what Margaret believed. I should have asked her. Instead I did what this family always does. I made a pot of coffee and hoped tomorrow would be easier.”
Evie wanted to rage at her, but the woman before her seemed smaller than she'd ever seen her. Mae had helped pay Evie's college tuition by hemming wedding gowns. She'd slept in a hospital chair when Margaret had pneumonia. Love and cowardice, Evie was learning, could live in the same person.
“I'm not promising to keep another secret,” Evie said.
“Then don't.”
At seven the next morning, Daniel came into Sunday Table wearing a charcoal suit and an expression of wounded patience. Nora was arranging muffins beneath the glass case. Eli was carrying a new handrail through the back door. Evie stood at the register counting the till.
“Can we talk privately?” Daniel asked.
“No.”
He noticed the other two adults. “You're making this uglier than it has to be.”
“You filed a deed with a dead man's notary stamp.”
Nora stopped moving the muffins.
Daniel lowered his voice. “You need to be very careful about repeating accusations.”
“Then tell Laurel why the paperwork bears my signature when I wasn't there.”
“Your lawyer is turning a misunderstanding into a war.” His gaze dropped to the cash drawer. “You have a loan payment coming due. Without the renovation funds, this place won't last another month.”
Evie had been awake half the night studying the statements. She knew the bakery's revenue, its suppliers, the outstanding loan, and the money he'd diverted. He was right about the squeeze, which made his smile harder to bear.
“Get out of my bakery.”
Daniel leaned closer. “You think Claire is the only one in this family with a past?”
Eli set the handrail down. “She asked you to leave.”
Daniel looked at him, then at Nora, and walked out. Through the window, Evie saw him stop beside a black sedan. Graham Vale sat behind the wheel. Daniel bent to speak through the open window before getting into his own car.
An hour later, Claire arrived without makeup, carrying her keys so tightly that the metal had marked her palm. Evie took her into the empty storeroom. Flour bags were stacked to the ceiling, and a calendar from the local church hung above the mop sink.
“Is Daniel June's father?” Evie asked.
Claire nodded.
“Did he know you were pregnant?”
“Yes. He said he wasn't ready to be a father. He sent me money twice, then disappeared.”
“Then he came back and started dating me?”
Claire's eyes filled. “He came back before that. He told me he could make things right. He said the Whitaker property would solve all our problems if you agreed to the renovation loan.”
“Was meeting me planned?”
Claire stared at the floor. “I told him you always helped at the school fundraiser. He showed up there on purpose.”
Evie had expected the answer. It still hit like a falling shelf.
“And the deed?”
“He told me you already agreed to a transfer and that the bank was being difficult. I helped file paperwork. I knew I should have checked.”
“Claire. You watched me take Mae to the doctor on Wednesday. You knew I couldn't have signed anything at a notary's office.”
Claire wiped her cheeks. “Yes.”
They stood in silence until the refrigerator compressor clicked on.
“Why did you get into bed with him on my wedding day?” Evie asked.
Claire swallowed. “He said once you were married, he'd move us away. Me and June. He said I'd never have to ask you for another dollar. I wanted to believe I mattered more to him than you did.”
“June matters,” Evie said. “You should have started there.”
Claire reached for her. Evie moved aside.
“If you want to make this right, tell Laurel everything. Not just the parts that make you look frightened.”
Claire nodded, though her face showed she understood what it could cost her.
When she left, Evie found June at the kitchen table with Margaret. June was coloring a house with yellow windows and an enormous red chimney.
“Is that us?” Evie asked.
June shook her head. “It's a house where nobody makes you promise not to tell.”
Evie sat beside her, unable to find the right words.
Then June added, “Mr. Daniel told Mom he could take me away if she didn't listen. Can he do that?”
Evie took June's hand. “Grown-ups have to follow rules about children. Your mother and I are going to get proper help sorting this out. Right now, you're staying here, and you're safe.”
May you like
That evening, Laurel arranged a family-law consultation for Claire. Evie didn't attend. She went to the basement with Rose's ledger instead. Under the final entry, beneath the words about Graham and the fire, a line of faint pencil emerged when she tilted the page beneath a lamp.
ASK VICTOR MERCER WHERE THE SECOND KEY WENT.
