Chương 5
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Because?”
“Because I loved him.”
Claire shut off the water.
“That’s not enough.”
“I know.”
She dried the spoon.
There was nowhere sensible to put the anger.
Not with Grant.
Not with a dead man.
Not even with Hale, though he was conveniently alive.
She placed the spoon in the drawer harder than necessary.
Hale said, “Grant knew.”
Claire turned.
“Knew what?”
“That the cancer had spread.”
The kitchen seemed to contract.
“How?”
“Your father told him.”
Claire stared.
“When?”
“About a month before he told me.”
She sat down.
Hale remained standing.
“Grant drove him to oncology appointments,” he said. “Your father couldn’t hide everything from him.”
Claire looked at the table.
A crescent-shaped water stain darkened the wood near her wrist.
“So Grant knew Dad was dying. I didn’t.”
“Yes.”
“And Dad still changed the will?”
Hale sat across from her.
“He didn’t change the will in the final months.”
Claire looked up.
“The will I witnessed was signed two years ago.”
“Then what did Grant file?”
“A document dated eleven weeks before your father died.”
Claire’s stomach tightened.
She had seen the date.
Somehow hearing Hale say it changed the shape of it.
“The new will says Grant gets the cabin,” she said.
“And control of the investment account.”
“And I get half the remaining personal property.”
“Yes.”
“Which is almost nothing.”
“Your father gave most of that away before he died.”
Claire folded her hands.
“What did the real will say?”
Hale looked at her.
“The cabin to you. The investment account split between you and Grant. Personal property according to a separate memorandum.”
“Why the cabin?”
“He didn’t tell me.”
“He told you everything else.”
“No. He told me what he needed me to know.”
Claire gave him a tired look.
“You two were exhausting.”
“Yes.”
For ten seconds neither spoke.
Then Hale said, “Grant believes he earned the cabin.”
Claire looked at him.
“That’s not the same as owning it.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“He forged Dad’s will.”
“We don’t know that yet.”
Claire’s face heated.
“We heard Dad.”
“We heard one sentence.”
“He knew enough to label the drive.”
“Yes.”
“You saw Grant’s face.”
“Yes.”
“That’s evidence to me.”
“It can be evidence to you and still not be enough for court.”
Claire hated that he was right.
More than that, she hated that he sounded like her.
She stood.
“I’m going to bed.”
“You won’t sleep.”
“No.”
“Want whiskey?”
“I’m an Army colonel with an assault report, a probate dispute, a dead father who lied to me about cancer, and a brother who may have committed a felony.”
Hale considered.
“So yes?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She turned toward the hallway.
“Claire.”
She stopped.
“He loved you.”
She did not turn around.
“Don’t make him easier because he’s dead.”
Hale was quiet.
“I won’t.”
Claire slept for ninety minutes.
At 2:17 a.m. she woke because someone had left the dock light on.
She went outside barefoot.
The deck boards had cooled.
A stain remained where potato salad had spilled during the afternoon. Someone had stacked the outdoor cushions against the wall in case of rain. Her father’s empty chair sat near the railing, slightly crooked.
Claire fixed it.
Then, annoyed at herself, she crooked it again.
Thomas never left chairs straight.
He would sit facing the water, one ankle over the opposite knee, cup balanced on his stomach, reading three pages of a newspaper before getting distracted by a bird or a boat or a person he recognized.
Claire sat in his chair.
Her cheek still hurt.
She pressed her tongue against the inside of it.
For years Grant had accused her of being their father’s favorite.
For years Claire had denied it because the alternative was admitting she sometimes suspected it too.
Thomas had been harder on her in obvious ways. He had corrected her posture at dinner. He had mailed newspaper clippings about officers disciplined for bad judgment while she was still at West Point. When she made colonel, he said, “Don’t become impressed with yourself.”
Grant had received different attention.
Money.
Rescue.
Second chances.
Thomas complained about him constantly and answered every call.
Claire wondered whether being the trusted child was just another way of being left alone.
Her phone vibrated.
A text from Grant.
We need to talk without Hale.
She stared at it.
Another appeared.
Without uniforms. Without witnesses. Just us.
Claire typed, You hit me.
She deleted it.
She typed, Tomorrow.
Deleted that too.
Finally she wrote:
Call my attorney.
Three dots appeared.
Vanished.
Appeared again.
Then nothing.
At nine the next morning, Claire met Eleanor Price in a law office above a hardware store in town.
Eleanor was sixty, silver-haired, impatient, and had represented Thomas in property matters for fourteen years. She wore green reading glasses on a chain and seemed personally offended by disorganized paper.
Claire liked her immediately.
She disliked the first thing Eleanor said.
“Do not talk to your brother.”
“He already texted.”
“Do not answer.”
“I answered once.”
“What did you say?”
“Call my attorney.”
Eleanor considered.
“That’s acceptable.”
“Thank you for the medal.”
“Don’t get used to praise.”
Hale sat beside Claire.
He had changed into khakis and a blue oxford shirt, which somehow made him look more intimidating.
Eleanor examined the original will.
She compared the pages to the copy filed with probate.
Then she opened the county recorder’s online property database.
“The deed is real,” she said.
Claire leaned forward.
“You can tell from that?”
“I can tell a deed matching this recording information was filed three years ago.”
Grant’s probate filing suddenly felt less powerful.
Eleanor saw Claire’s expression.
“Don’t celebrate.”
“I wasn’t.”
“You were thinking about it.”
“Maybe.”
“The recorded deed is helpful. Very helpful. But the estate can still generate litigation if Grant claims incapacity, fraud, revocation, undue influence, or defects in delivery.”
“Hale witnessed the will.”
“Hale is a strong witness.”
May you like
“I’m sitting right here,” Hale said.
Eleanor looked over her glasses.
