Chapter 9
The next six months flew by.
Carter Global was thriving.
My startup’s fraud detection software was saving us millions a year, and we’d started selling it to other big companies too—Fortune 500 clients all over the world.
We’d hired 50 new employees in the tech division alone.
We’d opened a new office in Austin.
The stock was up 40% since the trial.
Forbes put Dad and me on the cover, under the headline “Father And Son: How They Saved A Billion-Dollar Empire From Betrayal.”
I was busy.
Busier than I’d ever been in my life.
Meetings. Client calls. Product launches.
But I made time for the important things.
Every Sunday, we had family dinner at the estate.
Maria cooked her famous tacos.
Hale and Lila came every week—Lila had become like a little sister to me, always begging me to play video games with her, to teach her to code, to take her for ice cream.
Arthur, the co-founder of the company, came too, bringing his wife, telling stories about the old days when he and Dad had started the company out of a tiny garage with $5,000 and a dream.
Linda, the board member, came with her two grandkids, who ran around the house, chasing the dog, making a mess.
It was a real family.
Not the fake, toxic one Robert and Sarah had built.
A real one.
Full of love. Full of laughter. Full of people who had each other’s backs.
I even started dating someone.
Emma.
She was a software engineer on my startup team.
Smart. Funny. Tough.
She’d been with me since the beginning, when we were working out of my tiny apartment, eating ramen for dinner, staying up until 3 a.m. fixing bugs.
She’d believed in me when everyone else was calling me crazy.
She’d brought me coffee at the hospital when Dad was in the ER.
She’d held my hand through the trial, squeezing it tight when the video was played, when the verdict was read.
I loved her.
A lot.
And I was pretty sure she loved me too.
Life was good.
Almost too good.
I kept waiting for something bad to happen.
For Robert to escape.
For another lie to come out.
For another betrayal.
But nothing did.
Every day was just… good.
Calm.
Happy.
One night in late February, six months to the day after the funeral, Dad called me into his study after work.
He had a small, velvet box on his desk.
I sat down, confused.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Open it,” he said, smiling.
I opened the box.
Inside was a key.
A small, brass key, on a keychain engraved with the Carter Global logo.
And a note.
I picked up the note, reading it out loud.
“To Daniel. The future of Carter Global. And the best son a man could ever ask for. The eagle flies at midnight.”
I looked up at him, confused.
“What’s the key for?”
Dad stood up, gesturing for me to follow him.
We walked down the hallway to the big safe in the wall—the one Dad had always kept locked, the one he’d never let me see inside, not even when I was a kid.
He took the key from me, inserting it into the lock, turning it.
The heavy steel door swung open.
Inside, there was no cash.
No gold.
No stock certificates.
Just a stack of envelopes.
And a small, framed photo of Mom, Dad, and me at my high school graduation, all of us smiling, the sun behind us.
“These are for you,” Dad said, pulling the envelopes out, handing them to me. “I wrote one every year, on your birthday, starting the day you were born. In case something ever happened to me. In case I wasn’t here to tell you how proud I am of you. How much I love you. I almost didn’t get to give them to you. If Robert had gotten his way, you would have found them after I was gone. But I’m here. And I get to watch you read them. And I get to make more. For your wedding. For the day you have kids. For every big moment in your life.”
I sat down on the floor, my hands shaking, and started reading.
The first one, from the day I was born.
Telling me how small I was, how he’d cried when he first held me, how he’d promised he’d protect me forever.
The one from my seventh birthday, the year of the tornado, talking about the pancakes, about the code phrase, about how he knew I was going to be a brave man.
The one from my 18th birthday, telling me he was scared I’d grow up too fast, that he’d miss his little boy, but that he couldn’t wait to see the man I’d become.
The one from last year, the one he’d written a week before Robert drugged him, talking about how he’d been hard on me, how he was sorry he hadn’t believed me about the startup, how he knew I was going to change the world.
I cried as I read them.
Happy tears.
Sad tears.
All the tears I’d held in for the last six months, finally coming out.
Dad sat down next to me on the floor, putting his arm around my shoulders, letting me cry.
“I love you, Dad,” I said, when I could finally talk again.
“I love you too, kiddo,” he said, kissing the top of my head. “More than anything in the world.”
That night, I took the envelopes home.
I put them in the safe in my apartment, right next to the photo of Mom, Dad, and me.
I read one every night before bed.
They reminded me of what mattered.
Not the money.
Not the company.
Not the Forbes cover.
Family.
Love.
Being there for each other, no matter what.
A week later, I took Emma to the lake house.
It was a warm night, the stars bright over the water.
We walked down to the dock, holding hands.
I got down on one knee.
I pulled out the small ring I’d bought—my mom’s engagement ring, the one Dad had given me a few days prior, saying it was time.
Emma gasped, her hands flying to her mouth.
“Emma,” I said, my voice shaking a little. “I love you. You’ve been with me through the worst time of my life. You believed in me when no one else did. I can’t imagine my life without you. Will you marry me?”
She cried, nodding so hard her hair fell in her face.
“Yes,” she said, laughing through the tears. “A thousand times yes.”
I slipped the ring on her finger, standing up, pulling her into a hug, kissing her under the stars.
I looked up at the house, and I saw Dad standing in the kitchen window, holding up a pancake in a toast, grinning from ear to ear.
I laughed, waving at him.
Everything was perfect.
May you like
Everything I’d ever wanted.
And it was only the beginning.
