Chapter 4 - My Father’s Locked Room
My father’s study had remained locked for eighteen years.
After his death, my mother entered it once, removed several personal items, and closed the door. She told me she could not bear to see the room changed.
I respected her grief.
Or perhaps I feared my own.
Now Detective Bennett stood beside me as I inserted the old brass key into the lock.
The door opened with a groan.
Dust covered the mahogany desk. Books lined the walls from floor to ceiling. My father’s leather chair remained positioned toward the window, as though he had only stepped away for a moment.
The room smelled faintly of tobacco and cedar.
“What are we looking for?” I asked.
“Anything connecting Richard Hale, Thomas Reed, and Elena Cole.”
We searched for three hours.
Most of the files concerned Hale Meridian, the pharmaceutical company my father and Thomas Reed had founded. The company was sold after their deaths, creating the fortune I later inherited.
In the bottom drawer of a filing cabinet, I found a folder marked Project Sable.
It was empty.
Behind it was a bank statement from an offshore account containing over twelve million dollars.
The final transaction occurred the day before my father died.
The recipient was Elena Cole.
“Your father transferred her twelve million dollars?” Detective Bennett asked.
“It appears so.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know.”
We found another clue inside an old dictionary.
A key.
Small, silver, and numbered 317.
Detective Bennett photographed it.
“Safe-deposit box?”
“Possibly.”
A knock sounded from the door.
An officer entered.
“We located the estate manager’s vehicle.”
“Where?” Bennett asked.
“Near the railway station.”
“Mercer?”
“No sign of him.”
“Any evidence inside?”
“Blood on the steering wheel.”
The detective’s expression hardened.
Before leaving, she asked me to remain in the house with police protection.
I ignored her instruction thirty minutes later.
The key marked 317 belonged to Westbridge National Bank. My father had maintained accounts there for decades.
With the bank manager and a legal representative present, I opened the safe-deposit box.
Inside were three objects.
A cassette tape.
A sealed letter addressed to my mother.
And a birth certificate.
I read the certificate twice.
The child’s name was Daniel Thomas Reed.
My date of birth was printed beneath it.
My mother was listed as Margaret Elaine Reed.
My father was listed as Thomas Jonathan Reed.
The room became silent.
The bank manager looked away.
Detective Bennett arrived before I opened the letter.
“You should not have come here alone,” she said.
“I’m not Richard Hale’s son.”
She read the certificate.
“We need to confirm whether it’s genuine.”
“My middle name is Thomas.”
“That could be coincidence.”
“My father’s business partner was Thomas Reed.”
“Yes.”
“My mother was married to Richard Hale.”
“According to public records.”
I tore open the letter.
Margaret,
If you are reading this, Richard is dead or the truth has finally reached our son.
I am sorry for leaving you to carry what happened. I am sorrier that I trusted Richard for as long as I did.
Daniel must never know until it is safe. Thomas intended to expose Project Sable. Richard discovered the plan. Elena believes both men betrayed her, but she does not understand the complete truth.
The evidence is divided.
You have one part.
I hid the second.
The third remains with the child.
Do not trust anyone who asks about the white room.
R.
I read the final initial again.
“R,” I said. “Richard wrote this.”
Detective Bennett nodded.
“Apparently.”
“He knew I was Thomas Reed’s son.”
“It seems so.”
“Then why did he raise me?”
“That is one of many questions.”
I picked up the cassette.
The bank had an old tape player in a records room.
When we pressed play, static filled the speaker.
Then my father’s voice emerged.
Richard Hale had been dead for eighteen years, but I recognized him instantly.
“If Daniel hears this,” he said, “then Margaret failed to keep the past buried.”
There was a pause.
A woman began crying in the background.
My father continued.
“Thomas Reed is dead because of me.”
I stopped breathing.
“But I did not kill him.”
Another voice shouted from somewhere near the recorder.
A woman’s voice.
“You’re lying, Richard!”
My father answered, “Elena, put down the gun.”
May you like
A loud bang followed.
The tape ended.
