For the next two hours, they treated my silence like defeat.

Marjorie ordered bags for our belongings. Grant followed me from room to room, making comments as I packed.

“Don’t take the silver frames,” he said. “They belong to the family.”

I picked up a photo of Daniel holding Eli on his shoulders, both laughing in the rain, and placed it carefully in my bag.

Grant blocked the doorway. “Did you hear me?”

“I heard you.”

He studied me. “You’ve always been too calm. Daniel thought it meant class. I knew better.”

Eli shifted nervously behind me.

That was when something in me changed.

I knelt and zipped his backpack.

“Go sit by the window, sweetheart. Count the cars.”

“But Mom—”

“Trust me.”

He nodded and walked away.

Grant watched him go, then said casually, “Funny how Daniel never questioned certain things.”

The room went still.

I stood slowly.

“You should be careful,” I said.

“Or what?” he replied. “You going to make a scene?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t waste energy.”

Downstairs, Marjorie spoke loudly on the phone, making sure I could hear. “Yes, tragic. But Daniel was under pressure. That woman isolated him. Thank goodness Grant found the corrected documents before she took everything.”

Corrected documents.

I walked into Daniel’s study. Drawers had been opened, papers scattered—but the safe behind his diploma remained untouched.

I remembered what Daniel had told me months earlier.

“If anything happens, don’t argue. Just watch.”

I entered the code.

Inside was a small drive, a sealed envelope, and Daniel’s watch.

I took all three.

Grant appeared behind me.

“What is that?”

“Something you missed.”

He moved closer, tense.

“Give it to me.”

“No.”

He reached for my arm, but I stepped back.

From the front of the house, Eli’s voice called out.

“Mom!”

Headlights appeared outside.

Then more.

Cars pulling into the driveway.

The front door opened.

A woman stepped inside, calm and composed.

Marjorie whispered, “Clara?”

Clara Rhodes—Daniel’s lawyer—looked straight at me.

“Lena,” she said. “Do you have it?”

I nodded.

Grant’s confidence vanished.

Part 3

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