PART 2 — The Secret My Father Took to His Grave
I read the first line again.
“Son, if you’re reading this, Vonetta has already started lying to you.”
My hands went cold.
For three years, I had carried the shame of being called a thief. I had lost my freedom, my reputation, and the only family I thought I had left.
Now my father’s final letter was telling me that the woman who had just thrown me out of his house had been lying.
I kept reading.
“Josiah, I know what they told you. I know what the court believed. But you did not steal from my company.”
I stopped breathing.
My eyes moved quickly across the page.
“The evidence against you was planted.”
I nearly dropped the letter.
Three years.
Three years in prison for something I hadn’t done.
Someone had destroyed my life—and my father had known.
But why hadn’t he told anyone?
Why hadn’t he come to see me?
Why had he allowed me to sit behind bars believing he had abandoned me?
Then I reached the next line.
