Page 4 of Silent Past
Sheila swallowed hard, her frustration simmering just beneath the surface. "What truth, Dad? What's in the envelope?"
Gabriel took another drag of his cigarette, exhaling slowly. "Not here. I'll show you when we're somewhere safe."
"Safe?" Sheila’s voice edged with impatience. "You said this meeting was safe. What aren’t you telling me?"
Gabriel glanced around the empty lot, his eyes scanning the shadows. "This place was safe enough for the drop. But what’s in this envelope, it’s not just about you or me anymore. It’s bigger than that."
Sheila wanted to argue, but instead she bit her tongue. Her father took another drag, his eyes scanning the shadows, and then together they returned to the truck.
As Gabriel started the engine and the truck rumbled to life, Sheila crossed her arms and stared out the window. The envelope burned in her mind like an itch she couldn’t scratch. They drove in silence for a few miles, the headlights cutting through the darkness of the back roads.
Finally, unable to stand it anymore, Sheila spoke. “If you’re going to make me wait much longer, I’ll just grab it and open it myself.”
Gabriel glanced at her, his lips twitching in what might have been a smirk. “Patience, kid. But fine.” He reached into his jacket, pulled out the envelope, and handed it to her. “Just don’t freak out when you see it.”
Sheila took the envelope, her fingers fumbling slightly as she tore it open. Inside were several pages of documents, some typewritten, others handwritten. There were photocopies of old reports, bank statements, and even a grainy photograph of a man she didn’t recognize.
“What is all this?” she asked, flipping through the papers. Her eyes caught snippets of text: ‘Illegal wire transfers,’ ‘offshore accounts,’ and ‘internal memo—Sheriff’s Dept.’ But the jumble of information made little sense.
“It’s a trail,” Gabriel said, his voice steady. “Connecting key players in the department to some very shady dealings. Bribes, cover-ups, even hits on people who got too close to the truth.”
Sheila’s grip tightened on the pages. “And this has something to do with Mom?”
Gabriel’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Everything to do with her. That”—he nodded toward the envelope—“is part of what she was working on when they killed her. She’d found out about the corruption, and she was gathering proof. Enough to bring the whole system down.”
"If that's the case, why would that guy give up information like this so easily? It’s not exactly the kind of thing you’d just hand over, not without getting something in return."
Her father gave her a long look. "Who says he didn't get anything in return?"
Sheila raised an eyebrow. “Did he owe you a favor or something?”
Gabriel exhaled heavily. “Back when I was working Internal Affairs, I covered for him. He made a mistake during an operation, and when it came across my desk, I made it go away. Let’s just say he’s been paying it forward ever since.”
This admission made Sheila uneasy. "What kind of mistake?"
"He didn't kill anybody, if that's what you're wondering. It was a chain-of-custody thing—the kind of mistake that could ruin a career, given how it threatened to destroy a case the department had been building for years."
Sheila frowned, the pieces slowly coming together in her mind. “So he’s helping you now because he feels guilty? Or because you could expose him?”
Gabriel’s jaw worked for a moment before he said, “Maybe a bit of both. Nobody really knew the details of what he did, nobody except me. It would do some damage to his reputation if I shared those details. But I have no motive to do so."
"So long as he keeps playing ball."
"That's the way it works."
They were both silent for several moments. Sheila stared down at the envelope again.
"Whatever proof of departmental corruption this is," she said, "that's not really what we need. We need names. I want to know who sent Eddie Mills to our house ten years ago. He may have been the only one who pulled the trigger, but that doesn't mean he's the only one who killed Mom."
Her father stared out the windshield in silence. Empty countryside rolled by.
"Is there a name in here?" Sheila asked.
"You tell me. You're the sheriff."
Sheila flipped through the pages again, her eyes narrowing as she searched for something that made sense. Finally, a particular document caught her attention—a photocopy of an old personnel file with scribbled notes in the margins. Her gaze landed on a name written in bold at the top: "Carlton Vance."
"Carlton Vance," she murmured. "Does that name ring a bell?"
