Chapter 5 - The Handshake
Rachel stared at the photograph.
“Where did you get this?”
“Who cares?”
“I care.”
“Did Dad know Mr. Keller?”
“I told you he did.”
“You said they weren’t friends.”
“They weren’t.”
“Then why are they shaking hands?”
Rachel sat.
“That was after a sentencing hearing.”
“Why?”
“Frank approached him.”
“And?”
“He asked Daniel to tell investigators everything he knew.”
Liam frowned.
“Dad already pleaded guilty.”
“That didn’t mean he had told them everything.”
Liam felt cold.
“What didn’t he tell?”
Rachel rubbed her forehead.
“Your father’s former supervisor, Charles Vance, had authorized some of the falsified payments.”
“I know that name.”
“It was in the news.”
“What does this have to do with Keller?”
“Frank believed Vance had hidden assets that could be used to reimburse employees.”
“Was he right?”
“We don’t know.”
“Did Dad help him?”
Rachel hesitated.
“No.”
The answer landed hard.
“Why not?”
“Because Daniel had a cooperation agreement with prosecutors and lawyers advising him not to speak independently.”
“That sounds like an excuse.”
“It was partly legal advice.”
“Partly?”
“Partly fear.”
Liam’s jaw tightened.
“So Mr. Keller asked Dad to help get people’s money back and Dad refused.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you were already waking up at night thinking every problem in this family was your fault.”
“I never thought that.”
Rachel looked at him with exhausted sadness.
“You stopped inviting friends over because you thought their parents were judging me. You quit baseball because one father whispered about Daniel at practice.”
Liam looked down.
“You were twelve,” she said. “I was trying to keep you from becoming responsible for adult damage.”
“But hiding it didn’t make it disappear.”
“No.”
Rachel sat beside him.
“And I’m sorry.”
The apology mattered more because it came without a defense.
Liam showed her the unknown messages.
Rachel’s concern sharpened immediately.
“Do not respond.”
“Who sent them?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could it be Mrs. Keller?”
“Maybe. Maybe somebody else.”
“Frank?”
“I don’t know.”
Rachel forwarded screenshots to Mercer and the district investigator.
Then she contacted Daniel’s attorney.
By evening, Liam’s written statement was finished.
He read it three times.
The last paragraph was the hardest.
My father committed a crime. I did not. I don’t think I should have to pretend he is innocent in order to be treated normally at school.
He almost removed it.
Instead he left it.
The next day, Principal Mercer asked Liam whether he would allow investigators to interview him.
“Yes.”
Rachel looked surprised.
Liam looked at Mercer.
“But I want something first.”
“What?”
“A list.”
“Of what?”
“Not names. Numbers.”
Mercer frowned.
“How many complaints were made about Mrs. Keller before mine?”
“I may not legally be able to provide that.”
“Then ask what you can provide.”
Mercer studied him.
“Why?”
“Because if people complained and adults kept calling it ‘communication style,’ that’s part of what happened too.”
Mercer did not answer.
Emma was waiting outside.
“How’d it go?”
“I said yes.”
“To the interview?”
Liam nodded.
She smiled.
Not proudly.
Relieved.
Then he showed her the photograph and anonymous messages.
Emma’s smile vanished.
“This is creepy.”
“Helpful creepy.”
“No. Regular creepy.”
Liam almost laughed.
It was the first time he had wanted to laugh since Room 214.
Emma looked again at the picture.
“Where was this posted originally?”
“What?”
“This looks cropped.”
Liam zoomed out.
She was right.
The photograph showed half of another person’s shoulder.
Emma searched local news archives on her phone.
Thirty seconds later she found the original image from an old article.
Daniel and Frank were visible.
So was a third man walking behind them.
Charles Vance.
Liam recognized him from the news.
Emma enlarged the image.
Vance was looking directly at Daniel and Keller.
“That doesn’t prove anything,” Liam said.
“No.”
Emma scrolled through the article.
Then stopped.
“What?”
She handed him the phone.
The article concerned allegations that financial records connected to Vance’s company had been destroyed shortly after Daniel’s sentencing.
No charges had resulted.
At the bottom was one sentence Liam read twice.
Former municipal employee Frank Keller told reporters that a source had warned him additional records existed days before the destruction occurred.
Liam looked at Emma.
“Who was the source?”
She did not answer.
Neither of them needed to.
There was a possibility Liam had never considered.
His father’s silence might have hurt Frank Keller.
May you like
But before that silence, Daniel Carter may have tried to tell him something.
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