Chapter 2 - The Card in the Kitchen
I stood on the porch with the cold December wind nipping at my neck, staring at the faded handwriting on the index card.
Walt’s Classic Pecan Pie: 3 eggs, 1 cup granulated sugar, 1 cup light corn syrup, 2 tablespoons melted butter, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 1 ½ cups pecans.
At the very bottom, written in tiny, faded script that I had overlooked for twenty years, was a string of six numbers: 44-09-12.
"Mom?" Ethan asked, his voice shaking. "Who is he? What does he mean by 'built Dad's construction empire'? Dad built Walt’s Contracting from a single pickup truck and a toolbox!"
"Go inside, Ethan," I said, my voice dropping an octave into the tone I used when a middle-school lunchroom was about to break out into a food fight. "Get in out of the cold."
He walked inside, brushing past me into the warm air of the hallway. He looked around my small house as if he had never seen it before.
"Did Dad... did Dad have a partner we didn't know about?" Ethan asked, following me into the kitchen.
"Your father was an honest man," I said sharply, though a cold weight was settling in the pit of my stomach. "He worked sixteen-hour days framing houses in the North Carolina heat. He broke his back so you could go to Duke Law School."
"Then why did this guy have Dad’s handwriting?" Ethan demanded. "The guy is in his late fifties. Navy blazer, grey hair, looks like money. He walked right into the middle of Brooke’s party, didn't say a word to her parents, didn't look at the decor, just stared at the empty buffet table, pulled that card out of his wallet, and gave it to me."
"What’s his name?" I asked, setting the card down on the counter next to the pot roast.
"He wouldn't give it to me," Ethan said. "He just said, 'Tell Evelyn that Richard’s son is sitting at the head of the table.'"
Richard.
The name hit me like a splash of ice water. The air left my lungs so fast my knees buckled slightly. I grabbed the edge of the kitchen island to steady myself.
"Mom!" Ethan stepped forward, catching my arm. "You know him!"
"Richard Vance," I whispered, the name tasting like ash in my mouth. "Richard Vance was your father’s business partner in the late 1980s. Before you were born."
"Dad never mentioned a partner named Vance," Ethan said, frowning. "He always told me he started the business alone after he left the army."
"Because Richard Vance vanished in 1991," I said, looking Ethan dead in the eye. "He disappeared with eighty thousand dollars of the company’s payroll cash. The bank nearly foreclosed on our house. Your father had to take out a second mortgage and work three jobs just to keep from going to prison for unpaid subcontractor taxes. We never heard from Richard again."
Ethan stared at me, processing the words. "If Richard disappeared thirty-three years ago... who is the man in the navy blazer sitting in my house right now?"
"Richard’s son," I said softly.
Just then, my phone rang again. The ringtone sounded loud and abrasive in the quiet kitchen.
I answered it and put it on speaker.
"Ethan!" Brooke’s voice shrieked through the speaker, high-pitched and on the verge of total hysteria. "Where are you?! The caterers aren't coming! I called the regional manager and they swore our reservation was booked for December twenty-sixth! People are opening the third bottle of wine on an empty stomach! My father is asking why we don't have food served yet, and that weird man in the navy blazer is sitting on our living room sofa drinking our scotch like he owns the place!"
Ethan looked at me pleadingly. "Brooke... I’m at Mom’s."
Silence on the line for three full seconds.
"Is... is the food still there?" Brooke’s voice dropped, suddenly stripped of all her cold, pristine upper-class polish. "Ethan, please. My parents spent sixty thousand dollars on our wedding. My father’s boss is here. If this party fails, if people leave hungry, I will be the laughingstock of the Country Club community for the next ten years. Tell your mother... tell her I’ll pay her. I’ll pay her five hundred dollars for the roast!"
I picked up the phone.
"Brooke," I said calmly.
"Evelyn!" she gasped out. "Evelyn, I am so, so sorry about earlier. I was just stressed! The white theme was supposed to be featured in Raleigh Homes & Living magazine next month... I panicked! Please, bring the food back. I’ll clear the main table. I’ll put out silver platters."
"My food isn't for sale, Brooke," I said. "And I don't care about your magazine feature."
"Please," she sobbed out—a real, genuine sob. "Please, Evelyn."
May you like
I looked at the three heavy dishes on my counter. Then I looked at the grease-stained recipe card with the code written at the bottom.
"I’m coming back," I said. "Not for your party. And not for your five hundred dollars. I’m coming back because there is a man in your living room who needs to answer for what happened thirty-three years ago."
