Chapter 5
I asked Dennis whether Emily ever confronted him about the orchard.
He closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Carol looked at him sharply.
Too late.
“When?”
“Ten months before she died.”
“What happened?”
“She told me to stop using the north road.”
“Did you?”
“For a while.”
“For a while.”
He nodded.
“Raymond argued we needed it.”
I looked at Raymond.
He said nothing.
Dennis continued.
“Emily put up a gate.”
I remembered that gate.
She told me it was for privacy.
I never asked why privacy had suddenly become urgent.
“What happened to it?”
My father swallowed.
“Someone cut the chain.”
I looked at Carol.
She folded her arms.
“I knew nothing about that.”
Maybe.
I did not believe or disbelieve yet.
“What happened next?”
Dennis stared at the floor.
“Emily threatened to tell you everything.”
“What everything?”
Silence.
My patience ended.
“Dad.”
He looked at me.
“The orchard wasn’t only a shortcut.”
There it was.
“What was it?”
“Storage.”
My jaw tightened.
“What kind?”
“Temporary transfers. Cash. Supplies. Old family things.”
Mafia things.
On my wife’s property.
Without my consent.
Without hers.
Emily had discovered my own family quietly using her inheritance as a hidden logistical site.
No wonder she was furious.
“Did you stop?”
“Yes.”
Raymond laughed bitterly.
“For three weeks.”
I turned.
“You restarted it.”
He stared back.
“The organization needed it.”
“And Emily?”
“She kept interfering.”
My hands became still.
Interfering.
A word men use when a woman protects something they feel entitled to.
Then Carol finally spoke.
“She was making Grant choose between wife and family.”
I looked at my mother.
“No.”
“She absolutely was.”
“No.”
My voice dropped.
“She asked me to stop my family from using what belonged to her.”
Carol scoffed.
“Same result.”
There.
Her worldview.
Any boundary against the Holloways became betrayal.
I looked at Dennis.
“Was Emily still fighting over the orchard when she died?”
He nodded.
May you like
Raymond looked away.
And for the first time, I understood why Carol wanted the property transferred before Madison grew old enough to ask what her mother had been protecting.
