Chapter 4 Matt
MATT
The storm had dwindled to a stubborn drizzle, the kind that clung to the windows and tapped like restless fingers against the glass.
In the silence that followed, the living room felt both smaller and heavier, its air thick with secrets.
Carrie sat taut beside Matt, her back straight, eyes sharp, waiting for Ian to give her more than half-truths.
Matt studied Ian. The man’s face was washed out in the lamplight, every line etched deeper by guilt. He looked more like someone weathered by loss than the man Matt remembered from summers on the water. The cuffs on his wrists rattled when he shifted, the sound hollow and grating.
“Let’s go back to Katy,” Andy said, his voice low but firm. “You’ve told us pieces, but not the whole of it.”
Ian’s eyes flickered to him, then away, as though bracing himself for a blow.
“When Dick came back from Europe, he took over the Winters’ sale.
Trevor and I… we let him. What choice did we have?
He was always the one who claimed to understand the fine print.
But we didn’t stop digging. We started gathering evidence quietly, careful not to let Dick suspect. ”
He paused, jaw tightening, and when he spoke again his voice softened, as if he was reaching back to the moment everything shifted.
“It was just a few days before Trevor died when Katy came home from work. She told us she was getting that job full-time. The woman she’d been filling in for had resigned and wasn’t coming back. Said she was staying in Europe.”
Beside Matt, Carrie’s brows drew together. Her gaze met his, and he saw the same suspicion flicker there that had already taken root in his gut. Too neat. Too convenient.
Matt’s eyes narrowed. He thought back to the day Dick had returned from his holiday, swagger in his step, ready to take control as though nothing had been done in his absence.
Matt had never liked him from the start, too slick and arrogant.
The kind of man who smiled too wide and kept his hands in his pockets while others worked.
But after Trevor’s death, Matt had been forced to keep dealing with him.
The memory rose sharp, and Matt found himself speaking before he could stop. “Ian… Katy was the one that Dick told me to go to get all my permits passed.”
The words hung in the room.
Ian flinched as though struck. His eyes fell shut, his face contorting with something between grief and shame. For a moment, it looked as though he might be sick. When he opened them again, they were glassy, hollowed out. He looked like a man crushed beneath the weight of too many ghosts.
“Yes,” he murmured, voice rough. “I know.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed hard.
“It wasn’t long after she got that job that she began to pull away from us.
Erika and I… we became strangers in our own home.
She treated us like we were prying into every corner of her life.
One day Erika caught her going through my desk.
Another time, she insisted on visiting Lori with her mother, but instead she wandered off into Trevor’s study.
Claimed she was using the landline, but Erika saw the books on his shelves had been moved.
” His eyes went distant. “She was looking for something. I know she was.”
“Do you think she was searching for the evidence you and Trevor had gathered?” Oscar leaned forward, his voice alive with curiosity, almost hungry for the drama.
“Probably,” Ian admitted, the word tasting bitter on his tongue. “I don’t know how Dick found out about our investigation, but he did.”
Oscar frowned, his leg stretched out awkwardly across the sofa, his bandaged knee propped on a cushion. “So what did Katy have to do with it?” His tone was wide-eyed, too na?ve to recognize the knife edge of the question.
Andy leaned forward, his voice quieter but just as pointed. “Yes, Ian. What did Katy have to do with it?”
The cuffs clinked again as Ian rubbed his palms together, a nervous tic he could not disguise.
His breath left him in a ragged exhale. “Not long after Katy secured the new job on a permanent basis, she started seeing someone.” His gaze flicked toward the floor, shame crawling up his neck.
“According to Arno, she told him, not us. He came to us because he was worried for his sister. He told us that Katy was dating a man much older than her. Someone she knew we would never approve of. The new man in her life had told her not to mention it until they were sure where the relationship was heading.”
Oscar’s mouth dropped open. “Do you think he was the one who… who…” He stumbled, unable to finish the sentence.
Ian’s eyes burned with sudden fury. “Yes.” His voice cut through the room like a blade. “I don’t think it. I know it. Dick hid behind voice distortions on those calls, but a father knows. He drew her in with charm, made her his pawn, and used her against us.”
The room went still. Even the storm seemed to hold its breath.
“You think she was seeing your old business partner, Dick?” Andy was the first to break the silence. “Do you have proof?” His voice was steady, almost clinical.
“If I could find Katy’s diary,” Ian said, his tone cracking under the weight of longing, “yes. She wrote everything down. Every detail. But it’s gone.”
Carrie’s voice was soft, careful. “Where would she have kept it?”
“In her room,” Ian whispered. “She had a hiding place. Erika and I checked before we left, but it wasn’t there.”
Andy leaned back, folding his arms across his chest. His eyes sharpened. “Tell us why you came back, Ian. Why on the very day your daughter was found dead?”
The words landed heavy. Carrie’s breath hitched beside Matt.
Ian’s jaw trembled. He lifted his face toward them, anguish carved deep. “Like I told Carrie earlier… I got a call. A distorted voice told me to come home and to find Trevor’s disk and the documents we’d hidden. If I didn’t, we’d never see Katy again.”
Carrie’s eyes narrowed. “Was that the first time you were threatened?”
Ian shook his head, eyes dim. “No. Three months ago, when Erika and I were chasing a lead on Cheryl Winters, the phone rang. It was a woman. She told us to stop looking for Cheryl Winters. She said that Cheryl didn’t want to be found.
” He swallowed and drew a breath. “It was Erika who answered the call. Erika told the woman that they were looking for Cheryl because Delia Winters, Cheryl’s mother, had passed away, and the attorneys needed Cheryl to sign off on the estate that was now hers.
That woman…” Ian frowned, his features tightening.
“She said Cheryl didn’t care that her mother was gone, that she had no interest in property or money. ”
Matt’s pulse quickened. His voice came out rougher than he expected. “Do you think it was Cheryl herself who called?”
Ian’s head moved slowly, side to side. “No. We’d hired a PI by then. He was tracking both Cheryl and Katy. That woman was not Cheryl. She was someone else.”
Oscar’s face twisted, his mouth pulling down in disbelief. “You were spying on your daughter? Geez, man. That’s more than messed up.”
Carrie turned on him sharply, her voice firm but even. “Oscar. One day, when you have kids of your own, you’ll understand. Erika and Ian were trying to protect her. Look at the risks your mother took for you.”
Oscar’s cheeks flushed. His eyes dropped, shame tugging at his expression. “You’re right,” he said quietly.
Andy’s eyes stayed fixed on Ian. “What did the PI find?”
“And did he track down who called you?” Carrie added.
Ian licked his lips. His voice was hoarse.
“Yes. The caller was a woman who once took Cheryl in when she was twenty and broke, living in Chicago. They had been friends since then. She was pressured into making that call and didn’t know who was pressuring her.
But she told the PI to tell us to stop looking.
For Cheryl. She said that Cheryl was not interested in anything Delia had left behind.
Not the money or the property. That she didn’t care who was living there now or why. ”
Carrie’s brow furrowed, confusion shadowing her face. “But how would she know to say that?” She gestured with her hand. “About the property?”
“I don’t know,” Ian admitted, shoulders slumping.
“Erika thought Katy had been spying on us. She knew we were looking for Cheryl. And then…” His voice cracked.
“We found out that Katy was the one who stole the copies of the real deeds. The ones that showed the Cove properties were not owned at all, only leased for ninety-nine years. The ones Trevor and I made copies of.”
Carrie’s eyes sharpened, her voice slicing through the haze. “So your investigation into Cheryl alerted Dick that you and Trevor knew the truth. And he used Katy to turn the screws.”
“Yes.” Ian’s head dropped, nodding with defeat. “That’s what we believe.”
Matt spoke before he realized he was doing it. “And yet you kept digging?”
“I never thought Dick would hurt Katy.” Ian’s voice cracked. He looked down at his bound hands, then back at them, hollow and destroyed. “Dick was a lot of things. Crooked. Greedy. But a murderer? I never thought…” His voice trailed into a whisper.
“People will go to any length to cover their crimes,” Andy said flatly. “We need evidence that it was Dick Katy was seeing. That Katy was spying on you for Dick.” He glanced at Matt. “And that she was covering for Dick when she got the permits for the renovations on your property approved.”
“I have the original documents,” Matt told Andy. “I keep all my paperwork.”
“Good,” Carrie stated. “We’re going to need all that.”
Ian’s body sagged. “I should have left it alone. What have I done?”
Andy’s voice softened, his tone gentler than before. “You were trying to do the right thing. But you did it the wrong way. You should have gone to the police.”
Ian’s head snapped up, anger flaring. “We would have lost everything. Me. Erika. Lori. Matt.”