Page 89 of Hidden Tide
“You should have stayed quiet, old man.”
Thomas straightens. “I stayed quiet too long.”
Cross smiles as the officers lead him away.
His eyes shift to me.
“Ask what your father carried the night he died.”
Ben steps into Cross’s path.
The smile disappears from the man’s face.
“If you look at her again,” Ben says quietly, “the floor will be the least painful thing you hit tonight.”
“Ben,” Keating warns.
Ben doesn’t move until the officers take Cross through the door.
The moment he’s gone, Storm turns on Thomas.
“You knew our father was murdered?”
“I suspected it.”
“For how long?”
Thomas looks at each of us.
“Since the night he died.”
Mom staggers back.
Nathan catches her before she falls.
“You told me it was an accident,” she whispers.
“That was what the police determined.”
“But you didn’t believe them.”
“I didn’t have proof.”
“You had enough doubt to hide a key for three years.”
“That came later.”
Mom pulls away from Nathan.
Her grief fills the room until it becomes difficult to breathe.
“I buried my husband. I raised five grieving daughters. I watched James blame himself until the day he died, and all that time you suspected someone killed him?”
Thomas lowers his head. “Yes.”
Mom slaps him.
The crack of her hand against his face silences everyone.
