Camille,
If you’re reading this, then I’m gone.
I’m sorry I didn’t tell you everything.
But there’s something I need you to understand.
I didn’t marry you because I was afraid to die alone.
I married you because you reminded me of Eleanor.
Not because you look like her.
Because you have the same strange habit of giving people kindness when they haven’t earned it.
And because when you told me about your mother, I realized something.
You were grieving someone you couldn’t save.
I was grieving someone I couldn’t forgive myself for losing.
I thought perhaps we could sit together in that grievance.
But there’s another reason I needed you.
I needed someone to find my son.
I tried for twenty years.
I failed.
Maybe you won’t.
I stopped reading.
Tears blurred the page.
Then I reached the final paragraph.
I am leaving you the estate.
Not because you were my wife for seven days.
Because I trust you.
But if you find Desmond, don’t give him my money first.
Give him the letters.
Let him decide whether he wants a father back.
— Bennett
I looked at Gerald.
“How much?”
“How much what?”
“His estate.”
Gerald hesitated.
“Approximately $2.4 million.”
I nearly dropped the letter.
But Gerald wasn’t finished.
“There’s something else.”
He pulled another document from the backpack.
“One property.”
He placed it on the table.
It was a death.
A house.
The address meant nothing to me.
Until I read the name beneath it.
Eleanor Cole.
Gerald whispered:
“Bennett never sold his first home.”
“He kept it?”
“For twenty years.”
“Why?”
Gerald looked at me.
“Because that’s where Desmond grew up.”
