Chapter 5

Scott's POV

Yolanda turned her anger on me again. "Scott, you went to all this trouble to get me there so I would feel guilty, didn't you? Keep dreaming. Even if you and Paul died right in front of me, I wouldn't even shed a tear!"

After she hung up, Dr. Whitmore sighed helplessly.

"Dr. Whitmore, just assume I don't have any parents," I said.

He didn't argue with me.

…

The next day, Dr. Whitmore scheduled my surgery.

Afterward, he told me, "Scott, once you recover, you'll walk normally again. But you can't do anything strenuous from now on."

I didn't feel sorry about it at all. Because for the first time, there was something in my body that didn't come from Yolanda.

Tomorrow would be the seventh day since Dad died, and I insisted on leaving the hospital despite Dr. Whitmore's objections.

Dad had already died with regrets. If I didn't lay him to rest properly, what kind of son would I be?

But when I came home in my wheelchair, I noticed that the front door wasn't fully closed.

A bad feeling hit me.

I rushed inside in my wheelchair and found the whole place in a mess. It looked like someone had broken in.

Worst of all, the urn I had left on the table was gone.

In a panic, I searched every corner of the house, but it was nowhere to be found.

If a thief had broken in, why would they leave the cash in the nightstand untouched and steal Dad's ashes instead? Wouldn't a thief want nothing to do with something like that?

Unless it was someone who hated Dad.

Dad had always been gentle and never made enemies. So, that left only one possibility.

Having failed to find the evidence they wanted, they had taken their anger out on Dad's ashes instead. After all, they hated the two of us.

I went downstairs and searched through the trash, hoping against hope that I would find it.

At the bottom of one of the dumpsters, I finally spotted a familiar box.

But it was empty.

Fine as dust, Dad's ashes were scattered across the ground and garbage bags, mixed in with scraps of food. No matter how carefully I gathered them, I knew I could never recover all of them.

I clenched my fists as rage filled me.

Yolanda could doubt me and investigate me, but how could she be so cruel to the only family I had left?

And even in his final moments, Dad still couldn't stop worrying about her.

If her family wouldn't let us live in peace, then I'd make their lives hell, too.

I took Dad's ashes to the biggest media outlet in town.

"I want to report Carson Group's chairwoman, Yolanda Quinn, for abusing her position," I said. "She used her influence to get Winston Zeller into the most advanced class at the city's top high school, despite his failing grades.

"She also cheated on her husband and abandoned her family. Then, she moved in with her lover, Karl Zeller!"

After going public with my accusations against Yolanda, I took Dad's ashes to the police headquarters.

"I want to report a crime," I said. "Carson Group's chairwoman, Yolanda Quinn, hired someone to take the SAT for Winston Zeller. He's a senior at the city's top high school.

"She also hired kidnappers to abduct me and beat me so badly that I was left with a permanent leg injury!"