PART 4 – I Chose Not to Reveal the Storage Lot Sale Until I Understood Why My Stepson Had Frightened My Wife

I had a decision to make.

I could reveal the sale.

Or I could continue asking about the gambling story.

I chose the second.

Not because I wanted to punish Pam.

And not because I had already decided Jordan was lying.

I simply didn't know enough.

That was the part I had to keep reminding myself.

Suspicion could tell me where to look.

It couldn't tell me what had happened.

Pam had given me her explanation.

She believed she was acting out of concern.

Jordan had given me almost nothing.

He said he had heard about my supposed gambling.

Then he couldn't recall who had told him.

I kept thinking about the difference between those answers.

Pam could explain why she was worried.

Jordan couldn't explain where her worry had come from.

That mattered.

I wasn't asking him to remember an unimportant conversation.

I was asking about the origin of a serious accusation.

A claim involving secret debts.

A claim involving the possible loss of everything I owned.

If somebody had really warned him, I wanted to know who.

If he had misunderstood something, I wanted to know what.

I wasn't willing to fill in those gaps for him.

Too much was at stake.

The storage-lot sale made that unmistakable.

But even without the sale, I would have deserved a clear answer.

I was their husband and stepfather.

I was also the person being accused.

I hadn't surrendered the right to ask questions merely because somebody claimed to be worried about me.

I looked at Pam again.

Her distress was painful to see.

I wanted to believe she had simply trusted her son and made a mistake.

That possibility still existed.

But believing that didn't mean I should ignore the rest.

Her fear had come from somewhere.

And Jordan was the person who had brought the gambling allegation to her.

I thought again about what she had said.

That she had been trying to protect me.

I didn't doubt that she felt worried.

What I couldn't understand was how she had become so convinced without speaking to me first.

That question stayed with me.

So did Jordan's inability to name his source.

I was left with an accusation I hadn't been able to verify.

A wife who believed it.

And a stepson who had offered no clear explanation.

Then there was the sale.

Nineteen million eight hundred thousand dollars.

A number I hadn't yet shared.

I understood how dramatically that information could change the conversation.

Once it was known, the discussion might no longer be about the original gambling claim.

It might become a discussion about the money itself.

I didn't want to lose sight of the first question.

Not yet.

At sixty-nine, I had learned that a person could make a costly mistake by moving too quickly.

I had also learned that money didn't make difficult conversations easier.

Sometimes it gave people one more reason to avoid the truth.

I wasn't claiming to know what Pam or Jordan intended.

I didn't.

That uncertainty was precisely why I couldn't reveal everything.

Before taking another step, I needed an explanation I could examine.

A real name.

A real source.

Something more substantial than a story somebody supposedly remembered hearing.

Until then, I would keep the sale to myself.

The money could remain undisclosed.

The accusation could not remain unquestioned.

Click here to continue reading: PART 5: THE CAR ON THE FLATBED