Nico hadn’t considered this perspective but it was obviously untrue to anyone who knew Roger. “Roger’s not that kind of man. He’s a good person.” Nico’s voice came out louder than he anticipated and the other two looked startled until Valerie nodded.
“That’s a vote of confidence, but doesn’t answer the question.”
“In my defense, I believe she tried nineteen years ago when my daughter was eleven, but my family intercepted her and told her some lie that caused her to stay away.”
“How do you know?”
“Because after I found that photo, I tore apart Dad’s files and found this.” Roger showed them an overexposed photo of a diary page. There was a note in Malcolm Badgerton’s heavy hand: “Repaid P. $500,000 for YT child (girl 11).”
“Is that in code?” asked Valerie, squinting at the screen.
“Not code.YT, that’s Yvette Tsui.” He pointed to the date in the corner. “Yvette left twelve years prior, so if we count her pregnancy, I might have a little girl who was eleven at the time the note was written.”
“What about theP?” asked Valerie.
Roger took the phone back to frown at it. “That’s tricky and why I think someone else in my family besides Dad knew. I have three siblings. My sister is Penny. Dad called my brother David ‘PeeWee’ because he looked like PeeWee Herman when he was young. My other brother, Peter, died five years ago.”
“Your mother?” asked Valerie.
“Harriet. She died twenty years ago. I don’t know who approached whom or why. I do know this P gave Yvette money, and Dad repaid P, resulting in the note I showed you. I was doing a research trip at the time for the Bread Company, so I wasn’t around.”
“Then your dad conveniently left that photo and this note for you to find after he died? Did he want you to know?”
“Probably not. Dad didn’t put anything in order before the end. He’d been sick for a couple years, but still refused to believe death would have the nerve to come for him.”
“P might not be a family member,” Valerie pointed out.
“Dad wouldn’t have shared this with anyone else,” Roger said with confidence. “Too shameful.”
“Oh.” Valerie looked pained.
“I wish I could say he was a product of his time, but he was just an asshole,” said Roger. “God, that feels good. Penny would kill me if she heard that. She idolized Dad.”
“How do you feel about this whole thing?” Valerie said abruptly. “It must be a shock.”
Roger blew out his breath. “I haven’t thought about feelings. I’m focused on a solution first. Feelings can come later.”
Good, at least Roger was concentrating on results, because the rest of this was a mess. Forbidden love, an illegitimate child, family drama. Roger had kept all those secrets from Nico. He shouldn’t be upset. This was a job, as Kimmy pointed out. It wasn’t healthy to have such an emotional attachment to one’s employer, although he’d always thought they were more than boss and assistant. He glanced over at Valerie. Why was she the one Roger chose to confide in? He couldn’t help but resent that Roger had been more willing to talk to Valerie than to him.
At least this whole thing would die on the vine. There was no way Valerie would agree to this. No normal person would. His mind churned with ways to figure this out for Roger after she declined.
Valerie pressed her lips together. “To be clear, you think me pretending to be your daughter this summer will help flush out the P who knew all this.”
“Yes.” Roger nodded his head almost ruefully. “When I saw you yesterday, it was like finding her all over again. You look so much like Yvette, I can’t believe it, and if it was a shock to me, I think it will be the same for whoever knew about my kid.”
Valerie gave Roger a narrow look. “Did you, I don’t know,askthem before coming up with this scheme?”
“Of course I did. I showed them the payments and the DNA test. They both denied it, but that doesn’t make sense because one of them has to be the P mentioned by my father. My gut says it wasn’t Peter, but Idon’t know. My daughter and Yvette are out there and I have to find them. If they don’t want me in their lives, I’ll respect that, but I need them to understand I wasn’t involved in what my father did. I never even knew.”
“You didn’t show your siblings the photo?” she asked.
He shook his head fiercely. “That’s mine.”
“What if I can’t figure it out?” Valerie leaned forward. “I probably won’t.”
“You don’t need to,” said Roger. “I hired an investigator, who hasn’t found anything yet, and he agreed that questioning my family directly would make them defensive and be counterproductive. The thing is, I can’t stand sitting here doing nothing while he searches.”
“So you want me to—” She paused. “What, exactly?”
