“The lawyer. We thought you were sick.”
Across from me, Richard looked down.
“We’ve been packing things we don’t use,” she said. “We weren’t going to make this difficult.”
I could see their little girl on the front steps, always insisting on showing me whatever flower had opened since my last visit.
“You don’t have to leave,” I said.
“But your family—”
“I own the house. I haven’t asked you to leave, and I’m not asking now.”
Megan started crying quietly.
I told her my attorney would contact them with written reassurance. Then I apologized without explaining it away.
When I ended the call, Vanessa was holding her purse.
“So now strangers matter more than your family.”
“They were afraid of losing their home because they trusted my name.”
“Mom needs somewhere to live.”
“Your mother has somewhere to live.”
Carol stared at Vanessa.
It was the first time I had heard Richard speak sharply to his stepdaughter.
Vanessa turned on him.
“Then why did you tell us we needed this?”
The question stayed between them.
Richard set the portfolio down.
Carol’s mouth opened.
“Richard?”
He adjusted the handle although it was already straight.
“We’ve had some financial pressure.”
“How much?”
“This isn’t the place.”
Carol rose.
“You let me complain about rent. You let me stand here asking her for a house.”
Vanessa looked away.
“You knew?” Carol asked her.
“I knew they needed help.”
“What did you know?”
Richard answered at last.
He had been borrowing to cover obligations, then borrowing again. Their savings were smaller than Carol believed. A free house would relieve their expenses. Access to my money, he admitted in careful fragments, had become something he thought they could arrange.
“You were going to call it managing my affairs,” I said.
He said nothing.
Vanessa put her purse back on the table.
“We would have paid it back.”
Ethan stared at her.
I felt something settle inside me, heavy and cold.
