Chapter 2 - The Door That No Longer Opened for Him
Finnley had been released from Oakwood Correctional Facility at seven-thirty on a cold Monday morning.
Everything he owned fit inside an old backpack.
Three years earlier, he had been convicted of stealing nearly four hundred thousand dollars from Dennis Agricultural Equipment, the company his father built from a two-bay repair garage.
The prosecution said Finnley created false vendor accounts and moved company money into private transfers.
The digital records carried his employee credentials.
Several approvals contained his electronic signature.
Reagan testified that Finnley had always resented his father’s new marriage.
Carter testified that Finnley repeatedly complained about not receiving enough from the business.
Camden never appeared at trial.
Reagan said cancer treatments made him too weak.
Finnley wrote to his father from prison every week.
No reply came.
Still, he imagined Camden waiting at home.
Instead, Reagan opened the new black front door wearing an emerald dress and pearl earrings.
“He died a year ago.”
Finnley forgot how to stand.
“No one told me?”
“You stole from him.”
“I didn’t.”
“Nobody believed you.”
She blocked his view into the hallway.
The family photographs were gone. So was his late mother’s portrait.
Carter appeared on the staircase wearing Camden’s gold ring.
“The ex-con came for his inheritance.”
Finnley asked to see his father’s room.
Reagan smiled.
“It doesn’t exist anymore.”
Then she warned that calling police would be easy.
A convicted felon trespassing at a wealthy widow’s home would not receive much sympathy.
The door closed.
Finnley walked away without making a scene.
He still carried one thing Reagan did not know about.
An old key Camden had slipped into his palm during their final prison visit.
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At the time, Finnley thought it opened a desk.
He was wrong.
