The guard had called a ten minute warning to us after my father told me that he was guilty. I was grateful when he interrupted us because it gave me a moment to silence my heart's beat. I thought my dad, and the guard, would hear its steady rhythm. It was pounding, just as my mind was. I didn't expect this.
I knew when I arrived that I'd have answers to many of my questions. I didn't know that my father proclaiming his guilt would answer almost all of them in one fell swoop.
"I loved your mother, Tess." He smiles gently. "I loved her so much but something changed."
His declaration may have been welcomed in the middle of their contentious divorce, but today I don't want to hear any of it. I want to know more about the man who broke the law and then lived his life as if nothing was amiss.
"They said you are involved in the case of a missing woman," I say the words recklessly, not tempering the edge of anger that's there, in my voice. "Who is she? What happened?"
The muted accusation pushes him back in his chair. His eyes drop to my mouth before they settle back on my eyes. "I had nothing to do with that. I have no idea where she is or what happened to her."
That's more than I know. I hadn't taken the time or put in the effort to learn more about the woman in question. I had done that with purpose. I didn't want to catch a glimpse of her or see her name in print. I wanted her to be faceless and nameless so I wouldn't torture myself with imagined scenarios about what had become of her.
"Who was she?" I repeat the question.
"I'm trying to get to that." He sighs. "She was one of the agents who worked in my division. She wrote up those policies I told you about. She started everything in motion."
"Why didn't you go to the police then?" I push my palms against the edge of the table. "You should have gone to the police, dad. They would have arrested her."
"I couldn't do that." His weathered hands reach towards me, desperately seeking mine. "I cared for her, Tess. I thought I loved her."
Chapter 11
––––––––
Since my parents divorced I've never heard either of them talk about loving someone else. I didn't expect my mother to seek out a new partner. She'd found her soul mate in the sorrow that she's immersed in since her marriage ended.
I always expected my father to date. He's an attractive man. He works out, he takes care of his appearance and his charm is undeniable.
I once asked him why he never pursued any of the women he'd met in the gym or why he wasn't interested in the beautiful brunette he always talked about from his book club.
The timing isn't right, he'd tell me. She's not really my type, he'd say.
It seems as though his type was an insurance broker writing fake policies who lured him right into her trap. She managed to do all that while he was married to my mother.
"Her name was Lydia. Lydia Keeley. She needed help. I helped her."
His voice is vulnerable in a way I've never heard before. I knew that the passion in my parent's marriage had waned. I assumed it was an inevitable part of life when two people settle into a routine with one another.
Now, the time my father bailed on our family vacation to North Carolina makes more sense. I don't have to question why he was always the one holding the camera when we stood in front of the fireplace for our annual family holiday photo. My brothers would run to get the tripod, but my father would wave them back to their places next to my sister, my mother and me.
He'd tell them that the lighting wasn't right with the tripod and he could always find our best angles. My mother's smile in those images wasn't as bright as it had been years before when he'd proudly stood next to her after asking the neighbor to step in to take the photograph for us.
They were small things that illustrated a major shift in the dynamic of their marriage. None of us noticed what was happening right in front of our eyes.
"What happened?" I push my hair back over my shoulders. "Where is she?"
He shakes his head, his shoulder slumping forward with the movement. "She left the office on a Monday afternoon to go meet a client. She never got there. They found her car in a parking lot a week later."
"When was that?"
"It was six or seven months after I ended things between us." His voice is low and quiet now. "The police questioned me about it then. They thought I had a hand in it. They were wrong. I may have stopped loving her, but I'd never hurt her."
***
"Just five more minutes," I plead with the guard. "I came all the way from New York. I had to take time off work and I won't be able to come back until next week."
The truth in that statement is so muddled with the half-truths that even I can't keep it straight.
I do have to focus on the event for Gabriel and if I leave now, I may not have the chance to tell my father about Landon and me. In a perfect world I wouldn't have to do it within a five minute time frame and with a guard breathing heavily nearby but this is what I've been given, so I have to make it work.
The guard points at the clock on the wall before he walks back to his post by the door.