51. What we sow
WHAT WE SOW
T hey had a few hours before the concert. Enough time to do damage. Enough time to tell the truth.
After a short trip, they pulled up to the house.
Spring didn’t knock. She opened the door and walked in like she owned the room – she was done being polite.
Preston stayed close but quiet, present without interrupting.
Rae wasn’t there physically, but she might as well have been; Spring’s phone was warm in her hand, recording their end of the open line.
Her father was at the kitchen counter, drink in hand. He looked up, surprised – but not confused. “Spring,” he said carefully. “This isn’t the time?—”
“Then make the time, Dad.” Her voice shook with anger. Preston stood next to her in silence.
“No more games,” she cut in. Her voice was steady, lethal in its calm. “If you ever want to see me again, if you ever want to see your grandchildren in this lifetime, you’re going to start talking.”
That landed. Preston watched him swallow hard.
Her father turned away, pouring more amber liquid into the glass than he needed. “What should I be talking about?”
“The truth, for once in your miserable life, Dad. Start with the truth. Or else.”
“You don’t get to threaten me.”
“I’m not threatening you,” Spring shot back. “I’m telling you the stakes.”
Silence filled the air.
He took a sip, then another. Finally, he sighed – the long, exhausted kind. “You know,” he said, almost wistful, “I was always proud of you. You became exactly what I hoped you’d be. A real journalist. Fearless. Principled.”
His words didn’t soften her. “Don’t do that,” she threatened.
He turned, defensive now. “Do what?”
“Compliment me so you don’t have to answer the question.”
Preston felt the temperature drop.
“You’ve been snooping around the contracts, I know it.” He heaved a sigh. “This got out of hand,” her father said quickly. “You don’t understand how complicated the habeus corpus ratification?—”
She stepped closer. “You know I always know when you’re lying, Dad.”
He frowned. “I’m not ly?—”
“Don’t insult my intelligence neither, none of us have time today. You’re speaking in legalese,” she pointed out. “That’s how I know you’re lying.”
He stiffened.
“You did it the night Mom died,” she continued, voice cracking just enough to be human, but not enough to lose control.
“I asked you what happened, and instead of telling me, you explained liability. Timelines. Procedures.” She swallowed.
“That was the moment I knew she was really gone – and that you were hiding something.”
Her father’s hands shook now. He set the glass down too hard. “I was protecting us,” he snapped. “You have no idea what it costs to keep a family safe.”
Spring laughed once, sharp. “You don’t get to say that when your protection keeps killing people.”
Preston shifted forward, but she lifted a hand as if to say, I’ve got this .
“I know about Mack,” she said. “I know about the coroner. I know you signed off on the coroner’s revision. I know you were the bridge that made it all possible.”
Her father’s face tightened. “You think you know everything.”
“I know enough,” she replied. “And I know this is your last chance. If you ever want to see me again, you’ll start talking.”
He looked her in the eyes. “You always were too good at this,” he said quietly.
She didn’t blink. “Tell the truth.”
A long pause, then something broke inside him. “Mack… never meant for Cameron to die,” he confessed. The words came out heavy, like they’d been waiting to escape. “Mack came to me panicked. Said there’d been a fight, that it was an accident.”
Spring’s breath caught. Preston’s expression hardened.
“He begged me to help him make it go away,” her father continued. “Said the company would collapse. Said Preston’s career would be over, and they were already in the hole pretty bad.”
“And you believed him?” Spring asked in disbelief.
“I believed I could control it,” he said bitterly. “I believed I could contain the damage.”
She stepped back, hurt flashing across her face. “You chose a company over family? Over truth?”
“I chose survival,” he snapped back, then deflated. “And I’ve been lying ever since. I’m tired, Spring. I’m tired of pretending this didn’t cost me everything.”
Tears stung her eyes, but she didn’t let them fall. “This is it,” she said. “Right now, you decide who you are to me. To my children. You either help us bring this into the light, or you lose us.”
Her father closed his eyes. When he opened them, the fight in them was gone. “I’ll testify,” he agreed quietly. “I’ll turn over everything. Emails. Payments. Conversations.”
Spring didn’t let him stop at I’ll testify . She set her phone on the table, screen dark but present. “No,” she said calmly. “Start at the beginning.”
Ralph exhaled, rubbing his hands together the way he used to before trial. Preston recognized it now for what it is: a stalling tactic.
“You’re still doing it,” Spring says. “Legalese. Structure. Distance.”
He looked up at her. And finally, he nodded. “The contracts weren’t in their names,” he admitted. “Not technically.”
Preston’s brow furrowed. “What does that mean?”
“There was an underscore,” her father explained. “A character shift. A subsidiary variation so minor, no one ever clocked it. Mack held them through shell entities. On paper, they looked like routine holding companies.”
Spring’s chest tightened. “So the money?—”
“Never went where they thought it did,” he admitted. “It all funneled back to Mack. Paid out as ‘emoluments’. Executive compensation. Mack structured it so it looked like overheads.”
Preston felt sick. “For how long?”
“Since the beginning.”
Spring’s voice sharpened. “And nobody knew?”
“Just me and Mack,” her father said shamefully. “He made sure no one else could.”
The room went quiet.
“And Cameron?” Spring asked.
Her father sighed hard. “He was always too smart for his own good… he figured it out,” he said. “Saw a discrepancy. Followed it. He came to Mack with questions.”
Preston’s hand curled into fists. “And then he was gone.”
Her father noded once.
Spring stepped closer, eyes burning. “What were you getting out of this?”
He flinched.
“You didn’t do this out of loyalty,” she pressed. “Or fear. You did it because you were paid.”
Silence stretched, then he broke. “After you exposed my affair,” he said quietly, “my business dried up. Clients didn’t trust me. The calls stopped. I was bleeding.”
Spring closed her eyes for a moment, but she didn’t stop him.
“Mack came to me with an offer,” he continued. “Ten percent of Preston’s first contract.”
“You were his lawyer, isn’t that standard? Where’s the con?”
“Mack wanted to make shell companies of the artist’s name. We’d take our cut from the initial check, run it through the shell company, and then take another cut.”
“So your ten percent was really twenty percent?”
“Exactly.”
Preston’s head snapped up. “You did what?” He walked toward Ralph when Spring stood in between them to stop him.
“I told myself it was temporary,” her father said quickly. “Just until I got back on my feet. You were just a kid. I thought, what’s a small percentage? You’d never miss it.”
Spring’s voice cracked. “You needed money for my school.”
He nodded. “Yes. And then the money kept coming. Bigger numbers. New deals. Renewals. It stopped feeling like borrowing.”
“It felt like entitlement,” Spring said.
He didn’t deny it. “I got caught up.”
Preston stood abruptly, pacing now. “You stole from me.”
Her father looked at him, shame finally showing on his face. “Yes.”
“You stole from Cameron,” Preston continued. “And when he noticed?—”
“I didn’t think he’d die,” her father said, voice breaking. “I swear to God, I didn’t.”
Spring stepped between them, steady despite the storm inside her. “But you helped cover it up,” she said. “You signed the report. You let them rewrite the truth.”
Her father nodded, tears finally spilling. “I did.”
Spring stared at the man who had raised her – the man who taught her to ask questions, to value truth – and saw him clearly for the first time. “This is why I always suspected something,” she said softly. “Because every time you lie, you sound like this.”
He bowed his head.
“I’m done protecting you,” she said. “But I’m giving you one last chance to protect what’s right .”
He looked up, eyes red. “I’ll cooperate fully. I’ll give them everything.”
Spring nodded. “You will.”
Preston stopped pacing. His voice is low, controlled. “And after tonight?”
Her father hesitated. “After tonight… I accept whatever comes.”
Spring turned toward the door. “Good,” she called out. “Because the truth is done waiting.”
Ralph didn’t try to soften his words anymore. “Spring, I’m sorry,” he said again, quieter this time. “I know that doesn’t fix anything. I know you’re both outraged – you should be. But when I found out I was going to be a grandfather, I… I want my grandchildren to be proud of me.”
Spring didn’t respond to the apology. She pressed forward instead, voice steady, incisive, the way she got when she finished feeling and started working . “How much?” she asked.
Her father looked confused. “How much what?”
“Don’t play dumb, Dad,” she chided. “If you were taking twenty percent, how much was Mack really taking?”
He exhaled through his nose, like the number tasted bitter. “Forty percent,” he admitted. “From day one.”
Preston stopped pacing.
“Forty?” His voice cracked. “So the debt? The pressure? The corners we were cutting?”
Ralph nodded. “That was Mack. He bled the company dry, then blamed the numbers.”
Spring nodded slowly. “So Cameron wasn’t a problem. He was a threat.”
“Yes.”
Preston dragged a hand down his face. “I can’t believe this.”
Spring didn’t look at him yet. She kept her eyes on her father. “And the current contract?” she asked. “Is it still structured the same way?”
Her father hesitated. That told her enough.
Spring closed her eyes for a second, then opened them. “So that’s why he’s been moving so fast,” she said. “That’s why everyone keeps acting like time is running out.”
Preston let out a hollow laugh. “They’re still stealing from me.”
“Yes,” her father said. “Right now.”
Spring stepped closer, her voice dropping – not loud, not angry, but controlled. “You might not have killed Cameron,” she said. “But you helped bury him.”
That landed harder than a shout ever could.
Ralph’s shoulders sagged. “If there’s any way to make this right?—”
“There is,” Spring cut in. “You will change the current contract immediately. No shell companies. No underscores. No emoluments. Clean. Transparent. Today.”
He nodded quickly. “I can do that.”
“And you will testify,” she continued. “Fully. Against Mack, when it comes to that. Against yourself, if that’s what it takes.”
“Yes,” he acquiesced. “Anything.”
Ralph’s voice broke, desperate now. “Spring… please. I know I failed you. I know I hurt you. But I’m still your father.”
That was when she finally looked at him, not with rage, but with clarity.
“Dad… We’re done,” she said simply. “You taught me to tell the truth. I’m just living the lesson.”
Silence followed, thick and final.
Preston stepped beside her, slipping his hand into hers. He squeezed once – grounding, grateful, still reeling. “Thank you,” he said to Ralph, not kindly, but not cruelly. “For finally stopping.”
Her father nodded, tears running freely now.
Spring turned toward the door.
Outside, the world was still preparing to celebrate a concert, a comeback, a triumph.
Inside, something far more important had already happened.
The truth was no longer negotiable. And this time, it wasn’t going away.