The unanswered calls they never made because they had not tried to reach me at all.
Thomas’s jaw tightened.
“So you’re keeping records now?”
“Yes.”
He turned toward Richard.
“Sir, with respect, this is a family matter.”
Richard’s expression did not change.
“Then speak to your family.”
Thomas flushed.
Paula suddenly reached into her handbag.
My body went still.
She placed my wallet on the table.
For several seconds, nobody breathed.
I stared at it.
The worn brown leather had a small scratch near the clasp.
I had carried it for eight years.
“Where did you get that?” I asked.
Paula swallowed.
“It was at Thomas’s place.”
“Where?”
“I found it after you left.”
“When?”
She hesitated.
Thomas snapped, “Paula.”
Richard did not move, but the room changed around that one word.
Paula looked at her brother.
Then at me.
“Yesterday morning.”
My throat tightened.
“Before Thomas drove me to the airport?”
She began to cry.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
Tears simply gathered in her eyes as the lie collapsed.
“I was angry,” she whispered.
Thomas stood.
“Don’t do this.”
I looked at him.
“Sit down.”
He stared at me as if he had never heard that tone from his mother.
Then, slowly, he sat.
Paula confessed first.
She had taken the wallet from my purse after our breakfast argument about nothing important.
She said she meant to scare me, to make me realize I could not simply expect them to solve every problem.
The cruelty of that explanation stunned me.
I had not expected them to solve my problems.
They had created one.
“And my phone?”
Paula looked at Thomas.
Thomas’s face changed.
I understood before he spoke.
“I took it,” he admitted.
“Why?”
He rubbed both hands over his face.
“Because you would have called us when you found out about the flight.”
The room became very quiet.
