CHAPTER TWELVE

His grandmother kept everything. Which meant it took him nearly an hour to find the box of photos from when he was sixteen. If his hunch was right, his mom had met Luke that year. He grabbed a shoebox from the top shelf in the garage, cluttered with tools, old toys, and clothes headed for donation.

“Found it?”

“I think so,” he said, tucking the box under his arm as he climbed down the ladder to join Victoria Paige, the woman who’d raised him and his brothers and sister after his mother went to prison.

“Let’s go inside and paw through it,” she said, gesturing to the door into the house. Michael had come straight there after lunch with Annalise.

They parked themselves on stools at the kitchen counter, and Michael took the top off the shoebox.

“What exactly do you think you’ll find?” his grandmother asked as she grabbed a thick handful of curled-up photos from nearly two decades ago.

He shook his head. “Honestly not sure, Nana. But I want to look to see if anything gives me a clue about that guy. Any photo at all. I know he had to have been involved somehow. It can’t be a coincidence that she was trying to run away with that man.”

She nodded resolutely. If anyone understood the drive to leave no stone unturned, it was Victoria. Michael had lost a father; she had lost her son. That loss tethered them more tightly than a grandmother and a grandson should be. Now they were driven by the same need—the one for justice.

What if it was in their grasp? What if there was a clue in the family photos? Annalise had said photos sometimes held surprises, that when she looked at them again, she’d find things she hadn’t noticed the first time. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but hell, if there was a speck of evidence under his nose, Michael wanted to find it. He wanted to know if there were any photos that would tell him about his mother’s relationship with Luke Carlton, and how it had played a part in his father’s death.

He flipped through picture after picture from that fateful year, from posed school photos, to shots of Ryan playing hockey, to pictures of Shannon dancing.

“Let me have that one,” Victoria said, grabbing at a photo of his sister on stage, leaping high. “I need to frame that and give it to her.”

Michael smiled and draped an arm around his grandmother, squeezing her shoulder. “She’ll love it.”

His sister didn’t dance after she tore her ACL in college. She’d become a world-class choreographer instead.

Michael and his grandmother thumbed through more pictures. Shots of dance recitals, pictures of sunsets, images of family barbecues, including one of his dad flipping burgers with his grandfather, then one with Michael standing at his father’s side, laughing together.

A lump rose in his throat, and his fingers lingered on that shot.

“I remember that day,” he whispered.

His grandmother’s eyes shined with wistfulness. “You do? Tell me more,” she said, resting her chin in her hand.

He shook his head, surprised at the clarity of the memory. “It was just an average Sunday in the fall. October, I think. Dad grilling with Grandpa. Nothing special. They were placing bets on whose barbecue sauce was better, and at some point the stakes were so crazy, we all cracked up. We were all there. Hanging out at your house. I think Ryan and Colin were watching college football, and Shannon was playing with the dog you had then.”

Victoria smiled widely, her eyes misty. “Rusty. He was a good dog. Your dad liked him. I can see it all now,” she said, then tapped the photo. “Why don’t I have this one framed, too?”

Michael scoffed and tipped his head to the walls of her home. They were thick with framed family photos. “Can’t frame everything.”

“But I can try.” She snagged that photo, sighing as she regarded the shot of the men grilling. “The barbecue was the day after Thomas went to that party. I remember it now.” She traced a shaking finger across the bags under his father’s eyes. “He was so tired as they’d been up real late. He and your mother went to a work function.”

Michael sat up straighter. That’s what Annalise had mentioned. “The party,” Michael hissed. “That’s what I want to see. Do you think anyone took pictures of the party?”

“Not me. I wasn’t there.”

“But what if my dad had them? If someone had taken pictures from the work party…” He let his voice trail off, desperate hope coloring his tone.

She gestured to the pile. “Let’s hunt.”

He wanted to find those photos. He grabbed the next chunk of pictures and methodically studied each one. There was no reason to believe there would be pictures of a party here in his grandma’s home, but she saved everything, so there was always a chance. If someone had taken pictures at the event, his dad might have held onto them…

His heart stopped, then started again. He’d found it. A shot of his mother and father in front of a work banner at a company party for West Limos. Flipping to the back, he checked the date. Yep. The year it all went down. He gripped the edge of the photo as dark anger coiled through him. His mother took from him the person he loved most. His insides churned viciously as he studied the two of them. But it was only them posing for the camera, like some kind of company photographer had shot a picture.

He flicked to the next one. A foursome. Sanders and Becky stood next to his parents. Sanders clutched his wife’s shoulder tightly, and she smiled for the camera. Michael’s eyes roamed to his mother. He saw her looking to the right, just outside the frame.

Determined to follow her gaze somehow, he tore through the other pictures from the party. All in front of the banner, each one a little farther over, like the photographer was moving sideways. There were only a few more. As he lined them up, he could tell where his mother’s eyes had drifted just beyond the edge of the banner.

To a man playing a piano.

Luke Carlton.

Was Annalise right? Had his mother met her lover at his father’s work party? Why would Luke be at a work party?

“I need to talk to Sanders again. See if he remembers anything from that night. Anything about Luke talking to my dad, maybe. Anything that could make it clear what role he played.”

But when he called Sanders a little later from the car, his dad’s old friend didn’t answer.