Chapter 6 - Daniel’s Letter
Grace refused to open the letter.
She placed it on the kitchen table upstairs and stared at it for an hour.
Noah eventually sat across from her.
“Dad wrote it.”
“I know.”
“Then open it.”
Grace rubbed her forehead.
“What if it changes everything?”
Noah thought about that.
“Everything already changed.”
Grace looked at him.
For the first time in weeks, she laughed softly.
“You sound exactly like him.”
She opened the envelope.
Inside were three pages.
Daniel had written them fourteen years earlier.
Grace read silently.
Then tears appeared in her eyes.
Noah waited.
Finally, she handed him the first page.
Daniel had believed Samuel stole money from the bakery.
A large deposit had disappeared.
Daniel had been responsible for taking it to the bank.
Samuel accused him of losing it.
Daniel accused Samuel of setting him up.
The argument destroyed their friendship.
But the letter contained something else.
Daniel had discovered that neither of them had taken the money.
Someone else had access to the office that night.
Someone Daniel had trusted.
The final paragraph ended abruptly.
I KNOW WHO DID IT.
I’M GOING BACK TOMORROW.
I WILL FIX THIS.
Daniel never returned.
Grace pressed both hands over her mouth.
“He told me he was leaving town.”
Samuel stared at the page.
“He never came back here.”
Noah’s stomach tightened.
“What happened the next day?”
Grace looked at Samuel.
Samuel looked away.
“There was an accident.”
Noah knew that story.
Daniel had crashed his motorcycle on a wet highway.
He survived.
But afterward, he refused to talk about Hale’s Bakery.
Years later, he married Grace.
Years after that, Noah was born.
Daniel carried the anger until the day he died from a construction accident.
Noah looked again at the letter.
“Who stole the money?”
Samuel shook his head.
“I never knew.”
Erica appeared in the doorway carrying an invoice folder.
She stopped when she saw the letter.
“What’s going on?”
Samuel folded the pages.
“Family business.”
Erica’s expression tightened.
“I’ve worked here six years.”
Samuel looked at her.
“That still doesn’t make this your business.”
She left without another word.
That night, Noah could not sleep.
Around midnight, he heard footsteps downstairs.
He crept into the hallway.
A narrow line of light glowed beneath the bakery office door.
Noah moved closer.
Someone was inside.
He heard a drawer open.
Then paper tearing.
Noah reached for the handle.
The door suddenly swung outward.
May you like
Erica stood on the other side.
And in her hand was Daniel’s old photograph.
