Chapter 6 - The Brother’s Reckoning
While my father and mother faced the immediate legal destruction of their lives, my younger brother, Ethan, tried to take a very different approach: escape.
Leveraging what little remained of his college connections and hiding out in a high-end apartment registered under a friend’s name, Ethan had managed to avoid the initial media frenzy. But as the financial investigation deepened, his direct involvement in forging corporate invoices became the central focus of the grand jury.
It was late on a rainy Tuesday evening when my phone rang. The caller ID showed an unknown, unlisted number.
I hesitated before answering. “Hello?”
“Emily?”
The voice was shaky, arrogant yet desperate. It was Ethan.
“Ethan,” I said, setting down my pen. I was sitting in the quiet library of Arthur Pendelton’s law firm, where I had been working as a temporary research assistant while preparing for my graduate school applications. “You shouldn't be calling me. The prosecutors have monitored all family lines.”
“I’m using a burner phone, you idiot!” Ethan snapped, his old, bully personality flaring up before instantly collapsing back into panic. “Look, Emily... you have to help me. The police came to my apartment today. They have a warrant for my arrest!”
I leaned back in my chair, listening to the rain lashed against the tall library windows. “I know, Ethan. I saw the indictment paperwork yesterday.”
“You have to tell them I didn't know anything!” Ethan pleaded, his voice rising to a high-pitched whine. “Tell them Dad forced me to sign those papers! Tell them I was just doing what he told me to do! You’re the hero now, Emily! Everyone believes you! If you tell the prosecutor that I was brainwashed, they’ll drop the charges!”
I took a deep breath, feeling a profound sadness—not for the situation, but for the boy my brother had become. My parents had spoiled him, shielded him from every consequence, and taught him that other people were merely tools to be used and discarded.
“Ethan,” I said softly. “You weren't brainwashed. You were twenty years old when you signed those fraudulent tax returns. You used the money from those accounts to buy a fifty-thousand-dollar sports car and take luxury trips to Europe while I was working night shifts at a diner to buy my textbooks.”
“That doesn't mean I belong in prison!” he screamed into the phone. “I’m your brother, Emily! Family is supposed to stick together!”
“Family?” I echoed, a cold edge entering my voice. “Where was family when Mom broke my violin and told the neighbors I did it? Where was family when Dad slapped me across the face in front of five hundred people on my graduation day? You stood right beside him, Ethan. You smiled. You told him you knew I’d ruin everything.”
Silence stretched across the line, heavy and toxic.
“You’re a monster,” Ethan spat out, his voice dripping with venom. “You ruined Dad, you ruined Mom, and now you’re doing this to me. You always hated us because we were better than you!”
“No, Ethan,” I replied calmly. “I never hated you. I spent years wishing you’d be the brother I needed. But you chose to become his mini-clone. You made your choices, and now you have to face the consequences. Turn yourself in. It’s the only decent thing you have left to do.”
“Go to hell!” he shouted, and the line went dead.
I slowly lowered the phone. Ten minutes later, I walked into Arthur Pendelton’s office and gave him the burner phone number and the approximate cell tower location of the call.
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Two hours later, news broke that Ethan Bennett had been arrested at a bus station on the state border while attempting to flee to Canada using a fake identification card.
The last pillar of Richard Bennett’s legacy had fallen. The family that had spent two decades trying to crush me had completely dismantled itself, destroyed by the very greed, arrogance, and deceit that had held them together for so long.
