Chapter 5 - What Brooke Never Asked For
The red car remained in the driveway for two days.
Nobody drove it.
By Wednesday morning, pollen had begun settling across the windshield.
The giant bow was still attached.
Brooke hated looking at it.
Every time she passed the front window, she remembered everyone cheering when Vanessa had led her outside with her hands over her eyes.
Her mother had been so happy.
“Open them.”
Brooke had opened her eyes.
The car had looked impossible.
Brand-new.
Bright red.
The kind of gift people filmed for social media.
Brooke had screamed.
She had hugged Vanessa.
Then Marcus.
Then Maya.
Now every memory from that afternoon felt contaminated.
Maya returned from Zoe’s before lunch.
She entered quietly.
Brooke found her in the kitchen.
“Hey.”
Maya looked up.
“Hey.”
Neither knew what to say.
Brooke opened the refrigerator unnecessarily.
“I’m sorry.”
Maya leaned against the counter.
“For what?”
“For the money.”
“You didn’t transfer it.”
“I benefited from it.”
“You didn’t know.”
Brooke shut the refrigerator.
“I should’ve known something was weird.”
“Why?”
“Because nobody buys an eighteen-year-old a forty-thousand-dollar car when they’ve been complaining about money for six months.”
Maya gave a weak smile.
“Forty thousand?”
“Thirty-eight plus taxes.”
“That somehow makes it worse.”
For the first time in days, Brooke laughed.
Then the laugh disappeared.
“My mom made you feel like you couldn’t tell Dad you got into Michigan.”
Maya looked down.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Maya considered that.
“Because you were excited about your birthday.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Yes, it is.”
Brooke understood.
Maya had learned to make herself smaller to keep everyone else comfortable.
Brooke thought about all the moments she had mistaken that quietness for distance.
“I didn’t ask her for your money.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t even know there was that much.”
“I know.”
Brooke’s eyes filled.
“What if Dad thinks I did?”
“He doesn’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because he told me.”
Brooke nodded.
There was a long silence.
Then Maya asked, “Did she really show you my email?”
Brooke’s stomach tightened.
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
Brooke did not want to answer.
Maya noticed.
“Tell me.”
“She said you were going somewhere expensive.”
Maya waited.
Brooke whispered, “And that Dad would empty everything for you if she didn’t act first.”
Maya stared at her.
Brooke quickly added, “I told her that didn’t sound like him.”
“What did she say?”
“She said I didn’t understand because I wasn’t his biological daughter.”
Maya’s face changed.
Brooke immediately regretted telling her.
But Maya stepped closer.
“Brooke.”
“What?”
“He doesn’t think of you that way.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
“How?”
“Because when you got appendicitis freshman year, he slept on that terrible hospital chair for two nights.”
Brooke blinked.
“He missed my regional soccer semifinal.”
Maya smiled sadly.
“He chose you.”
Brooke started crying.
Maya hugged her.
It was awkward at first.
Then Brooke held on.
Neither heard Marcus come through the back door.
He stopped when he saw them.
Something in his expression broke.
The girls separated.
Marcus held a folder.
“I need to ask you something, Brooke.”
“What?”
“Do you know a company called VBC Administrative Services?”
She frowned.
“No.”
“Have you ever worked for it?”
“No.”
Marcus handed her a paper.
Brooke read it.
At the top was a payroll summary.
Employee: Brooke Carter
Gross wages over eighteen months:
$24,600
Brooke stared.
“I never got this money.”
“I know.”
“It says I worked twenty hours a week.”
“I know.”
“I was in school.”
“I know.”
Her voice rose.
“Dad, I didn’t—”
Marcus put both hands up.
“I believe you.”
Brooke looked again.
Her Social Security number appeared partially masked on the page.
“Mom used my information?”
“That’s what it looks like.”
Brooke sank into a chair.
Maya sat beside her.
Marcus explained carefully.
The company existed.
It had received money from Reed Outdoor Design.
Some of that money had supposedly been paid to Brooke as wages.
But the direct-deposit account receiving the wages was not hers.
“Whose is it?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Brooke covered her mouth.
The car outside suddenly felt like the smallest betrayal.
“She said she did all this for me.”
Marcus pulled out another page.
“There’s something else.”
A vehicle registration.
The red car was not registered to Brooke.
It was not registered to Vanessa.
The owner was:
GREENSTONE CONSULTING LLC
Brooke read the name twice.
“Uncle Calvin owns my birthday present?”
“On paper.”
“Why?”
Marcus did not answer.
He did not know.
Brooke stood and walked outside.
Marcus and Maya followed.
She approached the car.
The giant red bow fluttered in the breeze.
Brooke untied it.
The bow slid from the hood and collapsed onto the driveway.
Then Brooke placed the keys on top of it.
“I want it gone.”
Marcus nodded.
“We’ll figure out what legally happens to it.”
“No.”
Brooke turned toward him.
“I mean all of it.”
She pointed toward the house.
“The accounts. The company. Everything Mom put my name on.”
Marcus saw fear in her face.
“I want to know what she used me for.”
His phone vibrated.
Alicia had sent him a photograph.
A bank signature card.
The direct-deposit account that had received Brooke’s supposed wages had been opened eighteen months earlier.
Account owner:
Vanessa Reed
Secondary owner:
Brooke Carter
But the signature beside Brooke’s name did not look anything like Brooke’s handwriting.
Marcus looked at his stepdaughter.
May you like
Someone had not merely stolen in her name.
Someone had forged it.
