Chapter 9 - Lucas’s Letter
Victoria,
If you are reading this because something happened to me, I am sorry the first thing I left you was paperwork.
I laughed and sobbed at the same time.
That was Lucas.
Even dead, apologizing for administration.
Then:
Do not let Charles convince you that grief makes you incapable of making decisions. It only means you should not have to make all of them at once.
I pressed the page to my mouth.
He had written this seven weeks before the crash.
Before he knew he would die.
Estate-planning exercise.
Not prophecy.
Then:
I need to tell you something about Baldwin-Gallagher that I should have told you sooner.
Your twenty percent is real.
Charles has spent years treating it as if it exists under his authority because you gave him proxies and never cared about meetings.
That is partly my fault. I enjoyed protecting you from company nonsense.
I laughed weakly.
Then:
Northstar is in trouble.
I believe Charles used false approvals to make Baldwin-Gallagher appear responsible for debt the board never authorized.
I am working with Samantha, Marjorie, and an independent accountant.
I have not concluded that Charles personally forged anything. Please remember that suspicion is not proof.
Even in a private letter, Lucas was careful.
Then:
I confronted him. He was furious, but he did not threaten me.
Important.
Then:
If Charles ever tells you that Northstar was my project or my debt, he is lying.
There it was.
The lie from my kitchen.
Then:
I am not asking you to fight him.
Use Samantha.
Use the trustee.
Use the board.
Do not stand in a room and let him make urgency feel like authority.
Tears ran down my face.
I had spent childhood doing exactly that.
Then:
About the house.
It is yours if I die first.
Not morally. Legally.
I added you to title because it is our home, not because I expected anything to happen.
Do not let anybody turn my death into a property negotiation while you are pregnant.
Too late.
Then:
About Samuel, if that is still his name by the time he arrives.
I laughed.
Lucas had wanted Samuel.
I had pretended to prefer Elliott for two months just to annoy him.
Then:
Tell him his father was terrified of becoming a father.
Tell him I watched three infant CPR videos and understood none of them.
Tell him I already loved him.
I had to stop.
For ten minutes, I could not see.
Then the final page.
There is one other thing.
Charles is not the only person who knows about Northstar.
Courtney has signed more than she understands.
I think Charles is using her.
That does not mean she is innocent.
It means if this falls apart, she may become the first person willing to tell the truth.
I stared.
Lucas had predicted not her kindness.
Her self-interest.
Then:
Do not trust her because she turns on Charles.
Trust documents.
Trust corroboration.
Samantha will appreciate that sentence.
I looked at Samantha across the room.
She cried too.
“Of course he wrote that.”
Then last lines:
If none of this matters because I am sitting beside you while you read this someday, I expect you to mock me mercilessly.
If I am not there, do something harder.
Live without making my death the most important thing that ever happened to you.
I love you.
Lucas.
I folded the letter.
For the first time since the accident, I felt angry at him.
How dare he tell me to live.
How dare he know I would need permission.
Then I opened Samuel’s envelope.
It was shorter.
Samuel,
I don't know you yet.
Your mother says you kick when she eats peaches.
That is suspicious but not disqualifying.
I laughed again.
He wrote about baseball.
Bad jokes.
My stubbornness.
Then:
If I am not there, do not spend your life trying to become me.
Be yourself.
Love your mother.
But do not make her your whole world either. She needs a life too.
I put the letter against Samuel’s blanket.
“You had a good dad,” I whispered.
Then my phone rang.
Detective Jennings.
State police had completed preliminary re-review of Lucas’s crash.
No evidence of vehicle tampering.
No evidence the private investigator followed him after 8:10 that morning.
Weather records and traffic-camera footage supported the original reconstruction.
The crash appeared unrelated to Northstar.
I closed my eyes.
Relief can hurt.
“Are they done?”
“They will document final findings, but there is currently no evidence your father or Courtney caused Lucas’s death.”
Good.
I needed Charles held responsible for what he actually did.
Not transformed into a murderer because grief wanted a bigger villain.
Then Jennings said:
“There is something else from the private investigator.”
“What?”
“He says Charles hired him to identify which bank Lucas visited.”
“Why?”
“Charles believed Lucas had placed original documents in a safe-deposit box.”
“Did he?”
“No.”
The originals were in my black fireproof box.
Charles had spent weeks chasing them.
Then Jennings added:
“The investigator says Courtney paid him, but Charles gave instructions.”
“Can he prove it?”
“He kept emails.”
Evidence.
Then:
“One email says, ‘Find out what Lucas gave Samantha before Friday.’”
Friday.
The emergency board meeting Lucas never lived to attend.
Charles did not kill him.
May you like
But he had been racing him.
Lucas died with the finish line three days away.
