Chapter 19
My fingers were steepled over my lips as I sat at the table inside the file room with the documents Gabe and I found sprawled across it. Standing beside Gabe was Kenneth Pierson.
Gabe called him and told him we needed him to meet us in the file room at what was once his office. It was clear my dad had been involved in a cover-up with the Carlisles, and both Gabe and I wanted and needed to know whether his dad knew and was a part of it.
I wasn’t paying much attention while Gabe showed Kenneth the documents we found along with the information regarding the trust I’d been sent by the bank while lobbing questions at him.
I was still trying to process what the hell was happening.
“I didn’t…” Kenneth blew out a breath. “I had no idea.”
I looked up from my seat at the table when I registered his words. The look of shock and sheer mortification written across his expression once he realized the gravity of what we had just uncovered told me he was telling the truth. He didn’t know, and he wasn’t a part of it.
I was relieved, but at the same time, some sick, twisted part of me wished he was, if only so we could get answers.
Because there wasn’t anyone that could give us any now.
Everyone involved—my dad, Lucas’s parents, and Callie’s mom—were gone.
We had nothing but those damn documents and speculation to go off of.
I blew out a breath, dropping my head and rubbing my eyes with my thumb and forefinger. “This is un-fucking-believable,” I muttered.
“But why?” Gabe asked. “I mean, why go through all that trouble…pay all that money?”
“Reputation,” Kenneth and I said in unison.
Lucas’s parents, more so his mom, were the type of people who looked at reputation as everything. To them, it was the one thing that could make or break you in this town.
“Eighteen years ago…” Kenneth mused as he looked over the accident report again. “John was running for his second term as county mayor back then. This happened just a few months before the election.”
I scoffed. “And there you have it.”
Kenneth sighed, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Listen, Wes—”
“Don’t,” I interrupted, knowing what he was going to say. “I know he was your friend—hell, he was my dad—but don’t you dare defend him and what he did.”
“I promise I’m not trying to defend him or his actions, son. I just…I know this is hard for you, but perhaps there’s more to the story that—”
“No!” I cut him off, slamming my fists onto the table as I shot up from my seat and looked at him.
“This wasn’t a cover-up to get out of a damn parking ticket!
He helped cover up someone’s death! He played a part in helping to pay someone off to keep them quiet!
And we all know he more than likely got a cut out of it for himself because he certainly didn’t do it out of the goodness of his fucking heart!
‘More to the story’?” I grabbed the documents and held them up.
“There is no excuse for this! An innocent man lost his life, and the person responsible got to go on living theirs like it never happened all because they were loaded with enough fucking money to keep people quiet, and my dad helped them do it! I don’t need to know anymore! ”
I knew Kenneth meant well and was only trying to offer up some explanation I could grasp hold of, but I didn’t want it.
I’d looked up to my dad my whole life. For as long as I could remember, I wanted to be just like him.
Sure, he could be a hardass at times, and he wasn’t perfect, but he was my role model.
He taught me the value of hard work, of standing firm in my morals and values, and everything I’d done was with one goal above all others in mind: to make him proud.
When he died last year, I promised myself that I would do everything I could to ensure I upheld his legacy, not only at the firm but in my family, for my mom and Haley.
I was damn proud to be Robert Callahan’s son.
Until today.
My dad willingly went along with this, and I knew that because no one told that man what to do.
He went against the very oath he swore to uphold.
And it made me wonder how many other instances there were because I didn’t believe for a second that this was the one and only time.
How many other bribes did he take? How many other people did he help to avoid responsibility and consequences for their actions?
How many other laws did he break to help himself?
How many other injustices was he responsible for?
I’d never have the answers to those questions. The only thing I knew for certain was that my dad wasn’t the man I thought he was. Not even close. And I wanted no part of that legacy I once cherished.
Whatever I was feeling didn’t matter, though. Because it was nothing in comparison to what the two other people this affected were going to feel.
I raked my fingers through my already disheveled hair and let out a shaky breath. “I have to talk to Luke. I have to tell him.”