Chapter Sixteen
"First of all, to save you all the embarrassment of me saying it, would anyone like to confess anything?" I announce. Mum mouths to me "What are you doing?", but I need to do this. They need to know.
"No, nobody", I say, raising my eyebrows. "Okay then, embarrassing road it is". I look around and everyone gets very shifty. I knew my signature death stare would work on them.
"Well, as you probably know, my family is being evicted. Evicted from a place they love. And, Dad I'm sorry, but it is not just your rival, Aled J. F. R. Owens driving you from your home, it is one of the people in this very room", I declare and gasps echo around the dining room. I feel like Poirot. This is fun.
"And I know who this person is, I know how they did it and who their accomplices are, I just don't know why. I was hoping they could tell us themselves".
"Well, who is it sweetie?" Mum asks with distress in her eyes.
"It is...", I start. You have to always have a dramatic pause for impact in these situations. "You, Alfred W. Jones! Or should I say Aled J. F. R. Owens".
"What?!" Dad yells. "No, no, there's something wrong here". He continues to shake his head until he sees Alfred sitting in the corner, eyes narrowed and angry.
"How the Hell did you find out?!" Alfred shouts furiously.
"Ahh, the other side of Alfred Jones. The side that he kept hidden for years. So, you ask me how I knew. Remember we had an old anagram book that you used to read to me. I can smell an anagram from a mile away. Why would a businessman supposedly born in Queens have such a Welsh sounding name? Aled J. F. R. Owens, it rearranges to be Alfred W. Jones", I say and Alfred gets more and more red with every word.
"Fine, it was me", he admits and everyone in the room looks dumbstruck.
"Why Alfred?" Dads cries. "What did I ever do to you?"
"Oh Pietro, don't you remember? The time you took my light away", he says.
"Dad what does he mean? Because if he took your lamp away, I'm sure we can buy you a new one", I ask.
"It's a metaphor, princess. He never told you, did he? You still think your father is as pure as freshly driven show. Trust me he's not who yo think he is. Your father is a MONSTER!" he yells and has to held back by Tom and Amelia (though mostly Amelia. Dad starts shaking his head again at Alfred and he smiles. What are they hiding?
"You obviously know that my first wife May passed away from a disease. I was broke, completely and utterly bankrupt, so as my darling May lay there, unconscious and in need of expensive surgery, I turned to your father. And he said NO. I had worked for him for twenty six years and he said NO!" he screams at me. I look at Dad and he is staring down at his feet, so I know this is all true.
"There's something else too though isn't there. Not about Dad, not about any of this. You've been blackmailing Gruffydd, so you tell him what you know about his heritage, or I tell him, and you'll have a lot of Welsh anger to deal with", I say.
"You aren't my son, Gruffydd", he mumbles.
"What?" cries Gruffydd who is now standing up from one of the dining chairs.
"You are May's and another man called Dewi Edwards's son. Me and May broke up for a while before Clorrise's mother was born, and she had an affair with Dewi, which resulted in you", he confesses.
"So, who am I? Is my name even Gruffydd? Who's Clorrise?" Gruffydd asks. He must be so overwhelmed right now. I had to sit down after Dad said his company was going down, Gruffydd's now being told his whole life is a lie.
"Your real name is Rhys Edwards and Clorrise is this little sweetheart by here. Your step- niece, I think", Alfred chuckles. He may be laughing but Gruffydd, I mean Rhys certainly isn't. He's just as dumbstruck as the rest of us.
"So, enough of that, back to you trying to destroy my father. If you don't mind, I now want to graphically describe your pathway of destruction", I say quite confidently. "Firstly, on December 21st 2002, you assumed the pseudonym of Aled Owens and created Owens and Associates. You then used the hiring of your granddaughter, Clorrise to steal my father's potential ideas in his office. You then copied and sold these, so a lot of money came into your account and you could live how you wanted. But you weren't finished there, were you? You then used the hospitalisation of my Mum and my haywire flight to Wales to really hit my Dad where it hurt. You then contacted your step-son, Gruffy- Rhys to make sure I stayed in Wales and to isolate my father. You then drained my father's account using a mixture of stealing money from him using his account numbers on bills in my Dad's office and using your pseudonym of Aled Owens. Anything I missed?" I announce.
"Yes, a lot actually", says Alfred. "I bribed the people who stole from the stockbroker's office. I said I would give Peter revenge on you breaking up with him, in return for making sure you stayed in Glyntafon. Oh, and I paid a taxi driver to try and run you over. I didn't know he would run your mother over instead".
"Why did you want to run me over?" I ask, feeling very betrayed by him. He was my very best friend when I was little and now I know all I am to him is a pawn in his revenge against Dad.
"To try and recreate what he did to me. That's what all this was about; to make him feel what I felt when he said no. I earned his trust, I made myself his friend, I made my bank account total known. I stuck it on the internet and everything", he says. "I wanted you, his light of his life, to be run over and for him to be in the same situation as me. And I wanted to take mighty pleasure in saying no to him".
"You're a monster", I whisper and, in the heat of the moment I furiously tap 9-1-1 and put my phone to my ear. "Hello, I'd like to report a crime. Yes. Yes. New York Garden Estate. Thank you", I say angrily through the phone. Alfred just stares innocently at me and when I grit my teeth in frustration, he nods and sits down.
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