Chapter 14: Cosigned

My father turned the legal pad around so that I could read it.

Down the page, in his square engineer's hand, was a single number.

Fifteen million.

"What is this?" I asked.

"Eleven years ago, Preston's father came to this kitchen."

"It was the week before he died. He sat where you're sitting."

"He said the bank on his hotel loan wanted a second name."

"He said it was a formality, and that families like ours help each other."

"You signed it."

"I cosigned it," my father said. "A personal guarantee for fifteen million, secured on Lockridge Point."

I felt the floor tilt under the chair.

"You put Mom's house up for a Delacourt loan?"

"I put the house up for a friend."

"He bet that hotel chain on credit, and it never opened."

"Then he died, and the loan went to the next lender, and the next, and every one of them kept my signature in the file."

"Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"Because he was dead, and Regina was a widow, and I thought the debt would be paid."

He folded his reading glasses and set them on the pad.

"I have called her four times in eleven years to ask where it stood. She always said it was handled."

"It was never handled," I said.

"No."

"That's why she offered twelve million for the Point."

"She wanted the one thing the guarantee is attached to, before anyone read the file."

My father nodded slowly.

"I should have told you the night of the gala," he said. "I should have told you the day the rumor started."

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