Chapter 5 - THE FAMILY ROBERT CHOSE TO FUND
Caroline came to Thomas’s house the next morning with a folder.
Leah took the kids to the library so Thomas and his sister could talk privately.
Caroline placed bank printouts on the kitchen table.
“I went through everything Mark and I have.”
Thomas looked at her.
“You told him?”
“I had to.”
For five years, Robert and Helen had contributed toward Tyler’s private-school tuition.
They had paid for Madison’s competitive dance fees.
They had also covered part of a summer leadership program, orthodontics, and a used Honda for Tyler’s sixteenth birthday.
The total Caroline could document was just over $41,000.
“I thought it was from Dad’s retirement,” she said.
Thomas compared dates.
The pattern was ugly.
Three days after Helen requested $8,900 for a nonexistent furnace emergency, $6,000 went toward Tyler’s tuition.
A week after Thomas transferred $4,200 for an alleged roof repair, Madison’s annual dance fees were paid.
The previous December, Helen asked Thomas for $3,500 because Robert supposedly needed extensive dental work.
Two days later, Caroline received $2,800 toward Tyler’s school trip to Washington, D.C.
Caroline stared at the dates.
“Oh my God.”
Thomas did not enjoy watching her realize it.
That surprised him.
For years, he had resented how easily their parents celebrated Caroline.
Her wedding had been larger.
Her children’s birthdays were photographed and framed.
Robert attended Tyler’s football games while missing Samuel’s school play because he was “too tired to drive.”
Thomas had blamed Caroline for enjoying the favoritism.
Now she looked physically ill.
“I didn’t ask them to take it from you.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Thomas hesitated.
“Not until today.”
Caroline wiped her eyes.
“Dad always said you didn’t help because Leah controlled your money.”
Thomas gave a short, humorless laugh.
“He told me you and Mark were always asking him for money.”
“We haven’t asked them for anything since Madison was born.”
They sat with that.
Robert had created two versions of the same family.
To Thomas, Caroline was the demanding golden child draining their elderly parents.
To Caroline, Thomas was the selfish son who married a woman Robert disliked and abandoned his responsibilities.
Both stories protected Robert from one dangerous possibility.
That his children might compare notes.
Caroline reached for another paper.
“There’s something else.”
Robert had given Tyler $12,000 toward a future college account the previous spring.
“He told us it was from selling some old business equipment.”
Thomas remembered that month.
Helen had requested $11,500 for what she described as a sewer-line replacement.
Thomas had sent $10,000 after telling her he could not manage the full amount.
Mara later confirmed no sewer permit had been issued for the property.
No major plumbing contractor had worked there.
Caroline covered her face.
“I feel sick.”
Thomas understood.
Because he was beginning to see that the insult at the party was not a random act of cruelty.
Robert and Helen had spent years deciding which grandchildren were worthy of investment and which could be put into aprons.
Still, one part did not fit.
Even if his parents had redirected tens of thousands of Thomas’s money to Caroline’s children, it did not explain how they had survived financially before he began supporting them.
Or why Robert had been so terrified when Thomas held up the catering paperwork.
Thomas looked at his sister.
“When they sold me the house, Dad said the closing paid almost everything they had left.”
Caroline lowered her hands.
“That’s what he told you?”
“Yes.”
May you like
She frowned.
“Then what’s the investment account he keeps talking about?”
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