As the Canary Contract Expired, I Left New York Carrying My Father’s Ashes Chapter 06
I ended the call and blocked every number Caleb had.
The flight was delayed for forty minutes.
When David arrived at the airport, his coat was completely soaked through.
He carried a document folder in his hand.
“Caleb went to the family hospital.”
He placed the folder beside me.
Inside were copies of my father’s death certificate and the termination agreement his lawyer had just delivered to the rental apartment.
David looked at me.
“He sent me to pick you up.”
I shook my head.
“The original agreement expires today. There’s no reason for him to pick me up.”
“Nancy, he didn’t know your father died.”
I let out a cold laugh.
“He was the one who ordered the hospital not to tell him.”
David opened his mouth but couldn’t immediately respond.
“He thought you would come begging him.”
I looked at him.
“So my father was supposed to wait until I knelt in front of Caleb and begged for mercy before he was allowed to keep living?”
David stopped defending him.
I handed him the signed termination agreement.
Attached behind it was a transfer receipt for thirty thousand dollars.
That was the money left after I sold my necklace and paid for my father’s funeral arrangements.
Over the past three years, every large sum Caleb had given me had gone toward dialysis and hospital bills.
Only this thirty thousand dollars couldn’t be traced back item by item.
I didn’t want to owe him anything anymore.
“Give this to him.”
David didn’t take it.
“You should give it to him yourself. Can you do that?”
I shook my head.
“There’s nothing left between us that requires a face-to-face exchange.”
He looked down at the documents.
“What about the rental apartment?”
“The lease has already been terminated. I took everything that belonged to me. The keys were handed to the agent.”
David finally accepted the folder.
Before leaving, he suddenly asked:
“Did you never think that, back then, he truly wanted to save your father?”
My fingers tightened around the fabric of my coat.
“I thought about it.”
I looked toward the boarding gate.
“If those three years had all been fake, it would have been easier for me to let go.”
“But him sincerely saving my father and him later using my father’s life to humiliate me are two completely different things.”
Ten minutes after David left, a commotion broke out outside the waiting area.
Caleb wasn’t there.
He had gone to the hospital first.
Later, David sent me surveillance footage from the hospital hallway.
I didn’t open the video.
I only listened to the voice message attached to it.
Caleb had stormed into the empty ICU room.
He tore away the sheets, opened the bathroom door, and even demanded that the hospital open the morgue storage.
The attending physician handed him the death notice.
He stared at the signature line where my name was written for a long time.
Then he repeated the same sentence over and over.
“Impossible.”
“Without my money, how dare she let her father die?”
“Hand him over. I’ll pay whatever you want.”
“Or maybe you don’t plan on seeing tomorrow morning?”
No one could give my father back to him.
Not even under his threats of death.
After that, he went to the rental apartment.
The place had already been restored to the condition it was in before I moved in.
The only things left on the table were the termination agreement and the transfer receipt.
He sat alone in that empty apartment for two hours without saying a word.
Carol followed after him and tried to hold him.
David didn’t tell me everything that happened.
He only said Caleb demanded that she hand over the three-million-dollar card.
He also terminated every business partnership with the Foster family.
And he had even considered using the family’s private punishment methods.
I turned off the voice message.
The airport announcement had already begun calling passengers to board.
I stood up.
But before I could move, hurried footsteps came from behind me.
Several bodyguards wearing black tactical gear entered the boarding area.
The man at the front stepped in front of the gate agent and presented a temporary authorization document.
A moment later, David called again.
“Nancy, don’t board yet.”
“Caleb sent for a helicopter.”
“He’s already at the airport.”