He Killed My Mother,Now I Control His Fortune

Geoffrey Whitney pulled two cartons of cigarettes from his bag and slid them under the table.

“Sir, just a little something. Please don't take offense.”

I glanced down.

Premium brand.

Thirty years ago, he'd used the same cigarettes to pay off the building electrician.

The day after the fire, my father took me to Building Management to raise hell.

The electrician was squatting by the entrance, smoking. The same brand dangling from his lips.

He blew a lazy smoke ring and said：

“Wiring burns out all the time. Old building, you know? Happens to somebody every year.”

I pulled my gaze back. Kept my voice flat.

“Take them back.”

The smile on Geoffrey's face stiffened.

Ronald couldn't hold it in any longer.

“Sir, why was our compensation frozen? Everyone else gets to sign, but not us? What's that supposed to mean?”

“Our card parlor's been running for over thirty years! Ask anyone in the neighborhood. We've got a business license, we've paid our taxes. What right do you have to flag us?”

I opened the file.

“You filed as a legally registered commercial property, correct?”

“Requesting compensation at the commercial rate. Four hundred eighty-six thousand dollars?”

Ronald sneered.

“Wasn't that your office's own calculation? What, trying to back out now?”

Geoffrey quickly grabbed his arm.

“Ronald, that's no way to talk to the man in charge.”

Then he turned back to me with a smile.

“Sir, you know how young people are. Hot-tempered. Don't hold it against him. Our place really is a commercial property. Over thirty years of uninterrupted business. Everyone around here knows Old Whitney's card parlor.”

I looked at him.

“Do you remember the fire from thirty years ago?”

The conference room went silent.

The smile on Geoffrey's face faded, slowly.

He stared at me for a few seconds, as if trying to place something.

But he still didn't recognize me.

“What fire?”

“Maplewood Gardens, Building 3, Unit 1. Thirty years ago, middle of winter. Electrical short circuit in the middle of the night. Kitchen on the fourth floor caught fire.”

I said it word by word.

“You don't remember?”

Something flickered behind Geoffrey's eyes.

“Sir, that was ages ago. Old building, old wiring. Whose place didn't have some kind of incident? Besides, the police, the fire department, the District Office all came out and looked. None of them said it was our fault.”

I looked at Geoffrey Whitney's face.

Thirty years, and he was still running the same script.

My mother, burned so badly that every inch of her was wrapped in gauze, lying in a hospital bed unable to make a sound even when she cried.

He'd said the same thing to my father then.

He'd said：

“Leslie, your wife got unlucky. You can't pin that on me.”

“If you ask me, your wife was just born to die young. Nothing anybody can do about it.”

My father rushed him that day.

Five or six men came pouring out of Geoffrey's card parlor and pinned my father to the ground, beating him.

My father, who had never bent his back for anyone in his life, had it broken for him on that pavement.

Blood covered his head and face, but he still tried to shield it with his hands so the boy standing in the doorway wouldn't see.

I stood in the doorway, crying.

Geoffrey crouched down and patted my cheek.

“Kid, go home and tell that broke father of yours to quit stirring up trouble. Your mom's already done for. If something happens to your dad too, there'll be nobody left to look after you.”

Now he sat across from me, face full of innocence.

I felt something rise in my chest, slow and heavy, pressing upward.

But I didn't lose my temper.

I just said：

“That's why we're reopening the investigation.”

Ronald slammed his palm on the table.

“You're doing this on purpose!”

“One word from you about reopening an investigation and our family's money just disappears? We need that money for a house! My wife's about to give birth. We already picked the place. And now you're telling me it's just frozen, like that?”