Chapter 2 - The Number Robert Wouldn’t Explain
Daniel read the amount again.
Two hundred eighty-six thousand four hundred dollars.
He looked at his father.
“Dad?”
Robert had gone pale.
Linda wiped soup from her cheek with the back of one hand.
“What is it?”
Daniel turned the page.
The document came from a private commercial lender in Oak Brook. It referenced a defaulted business loan issued eighteen months earlier to a company called Ellison House Interiors LLC.
Rachel’s company.
Daniel knew Ellison House.
He just didn’t know it was in trouble.
Rachel had spent years presenting the interior-design firm as proof that she had built something entirely on her own. She mentioned its affluent clients casually at dinners and complained about contractors, difficult homeowners, and unreliable vendors.
Whenever Daniel asked about finances, she said the business was fine.
More than fine.
“Why is Dad’s name on your business loan?” Daniel asked.
Rachel’s eyes moved toward Robert.
“Because he interferes in everything.”
Robert flinched.
Daniel saw it.
“You knew?”
Robert adjusted his glasses.
“Some of it.”
Linda turned sharply.
“Robert?”
Rachel laughed once, but there was no humor in it now.
“Go ahead. Tell him.”
Daniel felt something colder than anger.
“Tell me what?”
Robert looked at Linda first.
That bothered Daniel most.
His parents had always been painfully honest about money. Robert had spent thirty-four years supervising municipal maintenance crews. Linda had worked part-time as a school secretary until retirement. They budgeted carefully, drove older cars, and still clipped grocery coupons despite having enough saved to live comfortably.
Rachel mocked them for it constantly.
Cheap.
Provincial.
Small-minded.
Robert cleared his throat.
“Rachel asked me for help two years ago.”
Daniel turned to his wife.
“You went to my father for money?”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“How much?”
Robert said, “Fifty thousand.”
Linda sat down.
Daniel stared at him.
“You gave Rachel fifty thousand dollars?”
“I lent it.”
“Without telling me?”
“She asked me not to.”
Rachel folded her arms.
“You were already stressed about the house.”
Daniel looked at her.
“What house?”
Rachel said nothing.
That was when Daniel remembered something he had dismissed months earlier.
A mortgage statement had disappeared from the kitchen counter before he could open it.
Rachel had told him it was junk mail.
Now he looked back at the lender’s letter.
The fifty thousand dollars wasn’t mentioned anywhere.
But Robert’s name appeared repeatedly.
Not as lender.
May you like
Not as investor.
As guarantor.
