by Amie Denman
When he turned toward the doorway of the construction office, he saw Bruce holding the door open. The old man had tears in his eyes, and Matt knew he was about to hear something that would change his life forever. He wanted to get in his pickup truck and just drive, but he didn’t. He had no choice but to face the ugly truth about his family. Again.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“I WASN’T THERE that night,” Bruce said. “But I know what happened.”
Matt was too nervous to sit across from his stepfather. He paced the office, steeling himself for the worst. He briefly thought of the meeting he was going to miss with the electrical contracting company at the job site, but it didn’t matter. The entire company might be circling the drain if his worst fears were true. Rescheduling a meeting was a drop in the bucket.
“I always wondered. I’ll admit that,” Bruce continued. “But I lacked the courage to ask.”
Matt stopped pacing and faced the wood-paneled wall instead of his stepfather. Pictures of previous construction jobs were framed and hung there. Certificates of merit. Newspaper articles. Bayside Construction’s certificate of operations. The company’s wall of fame.
“You should just tell me,” he said. His heart was so heavy it couldn’t take any more burdens, but he had to. There was no stopping now. He’d seen Caroline’s face, and it was clear she had told his stepfather something catastrophic. What would she do with her information?
“JC Construction should never have taken on the massive job of building the Loose Cannon. Back in 1984, my brother had big dreams. He bid the job, but he didn’t know what he was doing. He had the winning bid because it was the lowest dollar amount, but it was too low. It forced him to cut corners and save money here and there or he’d lose his shirt on the whole deal.”
“Did you know about this at the time?” Matt asked.
Bruce shook his head. “My brother was a proud man. He didn’t want to admit it to anyone, even his own flesh and blood. And I wasn’t in the construction business then. I wanted to follow my father into banking at that time. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t have understood.”
Matt thought about his own father’s crimes and how he’d never even told his wife. Stubbornness and secrecy were damaging and especially cruel to those closest to a person.
“I heard the whole story for the first time last winter, just a week before John died,” Bruce said. He slumped in his chair, his elbows on his desk, hands supporting his head.
Even in the silence of the office, it was hard for Matt to hear his stepfather’s words. Perhaps saying them out loud was painful enough. Volume would increase the pain to an unbearable level.
Did his mother know what Bruce now knew about the crime—yes, that was clearly the word—thirty years ago? How would she take the news that she would be facing public ignominy again, and again through no fault of her own?
Matt crossed the room and put a hand on Bruce’s back. “I’m sorry,” he said. He expected to feel his stepfather’s back shaking with sobs, but he only felt the rattling in his chest as he took a deep breath. This was cruel, forcing a story from an ill man, but he had to know the truth.
His relationship with Caroline was beyond saving now. The pain of that realization cut deep, but Matt put it aside. He couldn’t think about it. Not yet.
“My brother wasn’t a terrible person. I want you to know that. People do things when their back is against the wall. He wanted to save his company at all costs, but the cost was much higher than he’d ever imagined.”
Matt sat in the chair across from Bruce’s desk and leaned in so he could hear. Their secretary was at her desk out in the hallway, but the door was closed. Nelma wouldn’t hear them unless they raised their voices. Matt felt as if he was in a clandestine meeting, and perhaps he was.
“They cut corners, like I said. Used cheaper material. Less concrete. It was probably a blessing the ride failed right away and they took it down. It would have continued failing if they’d left it in place. Who knows how many people might have been endangered.”
“Do you know what caused the accident?” Matt asked.
“Bolts twisted off on part of the structure. They mostly used the right grade of bolts, but there was just the one section where they went cheap. I don’t know if they ran out of the grade eights or what happened, but they used fives. You know enough about construction to know what’ll happen to lower-grade bolts under stress.”
Matt nodded, even though Bruce’s eyes were closed and he didn’t see his assent.
“Made the track dip and threw the car just enough to toss out a lightweight girl,” Bruce continued. “It didn’t come off the track, and it was dark, so it wasn’t obvious unless you looked closely.”
Bruce coughed and rubbed his chest with both hands. Matt went to the mini refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of cold water for his stepfather.
“He knew it would come to light the next day,” Bruce continued. “As soon as the sun came up and someone climbed up to take a close look at that part of the ride.”
Matt took a deep breath. “So Uncle John went in that night,” he said.
Bruce nodded. “With a couple of his trusted guys. They paid off the lone security guard and sneaked in. It couldn’t have been easy, but they replaced the bolts on that section of the ride. With no physical evidence, the crew that came in from the state didn’t see any specific reason for the accident. They couldn’t blame John’s company, and no one was the wiser.”
Matt thought of the girl who was killed on the ride and whose parents never got answers. Caroline’s neighbors who’d lived with the heavy sorrow for thirty years. Had it ever gotten easier for them? Would it help now if they knew what caused the accident?
He was afraid to ask the next question, but he had to. He had to know what happened to the maintenance man whose death was labeled an accident.
“No one from Starlight Point was at the accident scene overnight?” Matt asked.
Bruce steepled his hands and rested his forehead on them. “I didn’t want to tell you this, son, but I won’t keep the truth from you.”
“The maintenance man who was electrocuted,” Matt prompted.
“Not an accident.” Bruce said, tears running down his cheeks. “It’s a hard thing to face, knowing your own brother is a murderer.”
He let the terrible word hang in the air for a moment while he dug a handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose.
“My own brother,” he said. “The only thing I can say for him is he didn’t plan it. Heat of the moment, I guess. Desperation. He said the guy was going to blow the whistle. John knew he’d be blamed for the girl’s death. The problems with the ride would come to light. He’d lose everything.”
“No excuse,” Matt said.
“I know. I swear to you I never knew this until last winter. I knew John was a changed man after that summer thirty years ago. He lost all the swagger from his step. I tried to talk to him over the years, but he clammed up. I thought it was just the general feeling of failure and having to tear down something he’d just built...you know how it is, son. You build things. Imagine what that’d take out of you.”
Matt nodded. It would be terrible, but it was still no excuse to kill.
“So he confessed this to you on his deathbed?”
“Just before.” Bruce swiped a hand over his eyes. “Gotta tell you, I wish he’d taken it to his grave instead of burdening me. Maybe I’m a coward for saying that, but I’ve struggled with it every day since, what to do with this terrible knowledge.”
Matt sat in the familiar chair where he and Bruce had talked about the business a hundred times. But everything was different now.
“What are you going to do?” Matt asked.
“It’s not up to me anymore,” Bruce said quietly. He raised his head and looked Matt in the eye. “Th
e company is yours. I’m handing it all over to you. It’s something I’ve wanted to do since spring, but my brother’s secret has been holding me back. I didn’t know how I could give you the company without telling you the truth. Now the truth’s out, you may not want Bayside Construction, but I’m telling you, it’s yours. And you’re free to do whatever you have to do.”
Matt felt as if the floor had opened up beneath his chair. His dream of taking over the family legacy had come true, but it came with a nightmare attached.
* * *
CALLING A MEETING with the police chief at Starlight Point and asking Evie Hamilton to be there was one of the bravest things Caroline had ever done. She was sticking her neck out and risking everything. Her relationship with her sister-in-law. Her job at Starlight Point. Her police chief’s respect and potential recommendation for the police academy.
Worst of all, the relationship she and Matt Dunbar had been slowly building all summer. The physical pain squeezing her heart when she thought of what Matt would suffer confirmed what she already knew but had been afraid to admit to herself.
She loved him. Every action, every word, every moment she’d shared with him all summer had led to the most exquisite and agonizing thing she’d ever felt. She just wished she could have told him before it was too late.
But she had no choice now. She’d already taken the first step in destroying any feelings he might have for her. There was no going back now, no matter how much it hurt. No matter who it would hurt.
“I don’t have any new evidence,” Caroline told Evie and the chief after she’d shared her entire theory. “But I know who to ask. Bruce must know the truth, but he’s been silent all these years. Probably because he’s guilty.”
“This doesn’t make sense,” Evie protested. “I’m not doubting your powers of investigation and perception, but I can’t understand why no one figured this out years ago. If this is true.”
They were all in the police chief’s office. Evie sat in front of the chief’s desk and Caroline leaned on the closed door of his office. As the person in charge of safety at Starlight Point, Evie needed to be in on the conversation. If an old investigation involving the park’s police department was going to be reopened, she would be in the middle of it. Smack dab in the middle of a nightmare.
The chief did a slow spiral in his chair. In the two summers Caroline had worked for him, she had seen that stalling technique over and over. It was his way of thinking before speaking.
Evie was apparently aware of his habit as well because she crossed one long leg over the other and waited. Caroline wondered if her brother had shared any of their conversations with his wife. Had he already told Evie about Caroline’s summer project investigating the old Loose Cannon incident? Evie couldn’t be happy about exposing Starlight Point to an ugly public scandal. Could Starlight Point still be held accountable for the accident and the two deaths after all these years?
Caroline knew the answer to that question. There was no statute of limitations on murder. But the murder, if her theory proved correct, was not on the shoulders of Starlight Point. It was squarely on the construction company. Matt’s family.
Her heart tightened in her chest at the thought of the conversation that might be going on at that moment in the downtown office of Bayside Construction, which she’d left only thirty minutes ago.
Were they plotting how to avoid scandal and prosecution? Was Bruce going through files right now and destroying any evidence that might linger after three decades? Caroline wondered if there were construction reports or receipts that would provide evidence of the faulty construction. If so, she was sure that a man who’d gotten away with murder had probably destroyed them.
Was Matt finding out about his family’s crimes for the first time, or had he known all along? The question made her nauseous. She pushed off the door and paced around the office. The chief stopped his slow circuit in his chair and put both hands on the edge of his desk.
“If the bolt issue and the murder never came to light years ago, there was probably a reason. Either the theory has no merit, or somebody wanted to keep it quiet.”
Caroline snorted. “Of course somebody wanted to keep it quiet. John Corbin would’ve lost everything if people knew he cut corners on that ride and caused a death. His brother wasn’t going to raise red flags either because he benefited by buying the company. Starlight Point probably wanted the whole thing to go away as fast as possible because of the negative publicity. A no-fault determination from the state investigation and an accidental death label on the maintenance man’s death made the whole thing go away.”
She’d raised her voice more than she intended and her words were harsh and bitter. It sounded as if she were a judge condemning everyone involved.
Evie let out a long, loud breath. Caroline didn’t know how far she was going in destroying her relationship with her sister-in-law, but she couldn’t stop now.
“I read the old newspapers at the library,” Caroline said in a lower voice. “After two weeks, they didn’t even mention the story again. With social media nowadays, people might’ve talked it up and demanded answers, but at the time it just went away.”
Chief Walker gave Caroline a hard look. “You’ve never told me why this accident is so important to you. There’s got to be a reason beyond just your nose for crime.”
Caroline crossed her arms over her chest. “I know the family of the girl who was killed. She was only twelve.” To her horror, her eyes filled with tears and her voice shook. She did not want to show weakness and emotion in front of her boss, but the girl who was killed and her sister, Catherine, had become linked in her mind throughout the summer.
The police chief’s mouth was open and his eyes large. Caroline wondered if he was more shocked that she knew the girl’s family or that she had tears flooding her eyes.
Evie didn’t look surprised at all. She got up and hugged Caroline.
“I understand,” she said quietly as she rubbed Caroline’s back.
“You’re doing better than I am,” the chief said. “What’s going on?”
Caroline shook her head, unable to explain without more tears. Evie turned to the chief. “Caroline and Scott had an older sister who died in an accident when she was twelve. A fire at a hotel. The hotel was at fault, but no one was ever held accountable. It’s a terrible burden for people to carry...knowing someone they loved is gone and feeling as if there was no justice.”
The chief stood. “I’m sorry, Caroline.”
She nodded and managed to murmur “thank you” without her voice quivering. She was glad Evie was there to explain. It was Evie who’d helped Scott overcome his guilt about their sister’s death.
“So,” Evie said. She put her hands on her hips and stared at the ceiling. “What are we going to do?”
“I think we need to ask some questions. Hard questions,” Walker said. “And we have to be prepared to either get stonewalling and denials or worse.”
“Worse?” Evie asked.
“We could also get the truth,” the chief said.
“How can the truth be worse?” Caroline asked.
“Because if and when we find out what really happened thirty years ago, we have to decide what we’re going to do with that information,” he said. “I know it might seem obvious to you that we’d turn it all over to the local police, recuse ourselves from the investigation and let the full light of the truth do all the damage it can do.”
Caroline and Evie stood silently, waiting. The clock ticked loudly on the wall. The outer door of the police station slammed.
“The truth can be ugly. And we have to decide who it would serve to bring it all to the surface,” the chief continued. “If we find out that Corbin is a murderer—”
His words were arrested by the office door whipping open. Matt Dunbar filled the door frame.
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Caroline’s heart expanded and betrayed her at the same time. She wanted to run to him and hold him in her arms until the look of agony on his face disappeared. But she couldn’t. The truth was more important than the way she felt.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MATT GLANCED AROUND the room. Evie Hamilton was white-faced and the police chief was flushed. Matt knew his own skin was heated with passion but he felt cold and empty at the same time. He looked past Evie and the police chief to Caroline.
Her shoulders slumped and her arms hung loosely at her sides. She looked as if she didn’t know what to do and felt powerless. He had never seen her look that way before. And there was something else. Her skin was mottled and her eyes glimmered. Had she been crying?
Matt wanted to go to her and hold her in his arms, but he couldn’t. A horrible secret stood between them. He knew it was already out in the open, had heard the words “Corbin” and “murderer” when he’d burst through the door.
The chief was the first to react. He approached Matt, pulled the door shut behind him and pointed to an extra chair next to his desk. “Sit down, Dunbar,” he said.
His voice was gruff and Matt wished he could turn and run. But there was no running from the truth, from his family’s past. The injustice of everything made his throat tight. He wanted to scream in frustration. How could he be so unlucky that he had a father in prison and a stepfamily he’d just learned was guilty of something worse than embezzlement?
He sank into the chair, not sure his legs could hold him up anymore.
“I’m guessing you came here to tell us something,” the chief said.
Matt swallowed. He dug deep for the courage to say the words he had to say. He looked at Caroline. Her eyebrows drew together in an expression of pain. Did she feel his pain? Did she already know what he was going to say?
She nodded slightly and it was enough for him to find the words.
