Chương 8
“I made breakfast,” she said.
Hannah stared at her.
Judith’s shoulders sagged.
“That was stupid.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Try not cooking.”
Judith turned off the burner.
Lauren sat at the kitchen table wearing jeans and a gray sweatshirt. Her hair was tied back. Without the satin robe and makeup she looked younger, tired, frightened.
Mark had left a note on the counter.
I’m at a motel. I’ll come back for the rest after you tell me when it’s okay.
Hannah put it in her pocket.
Richard noticed.
“He’s being dramatic.”
Mercer said nothing.
Hannah looked at Richard.
“No. He’s leaving a house that isn’t his.”
Richard’s mouth tightened.
“You still don’t know that.”
“I’m meeting the attorney in an hour.”
Judith put the spatula down.
“Hannah.”
“What?”
“I want to say something.”
Hannah waited.
Judith looked at Mercer, then Lauren, then Richard.
“I shouldn’t have hit you.”
“No.”
“I was angry.”
“That isn’t an apology.”
Judith’s eyes flashed.
For half a second, the old woman returned.
“I said I shouldn’t have done it.”
“You explained why you did it.”
“Fine.” Judith breathed through her nose. “I’m sorry.”
Hannah looked at her bruise reflected faintly in the microwave door.
“Okay.”
Judith seemed confused.
“That’s it?”
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know.”
“Neither do I.”
Judith’s chin trembled.
“I thought you ruined him.”
Hannah looked at her.
There it was.
Not the apology.
The wound under the cruelty.
“You thought I ruined Daniel?”
“I thought he changed.”
“He did.”
“He stopped coming to Sunday dinner.”
“Because every Sunday dinner became an argument about me.”
“He sold his motorcycle.”
“We needed nursery money.”
“He stopped hunting with Mark.”
“Because Mark called me a gold digger.”
Mark was not there to defend himself.
Judith sat at the table.
“He used to call me every Wednesday.”
Hannah’s anger softened in the most inconvenient way.
“He called you every Wednesday from our kitchen.”
Judith looked up.
“What?”
“After we got married. Every Wednesday. Usually while I made dinner.”
Judith stared.
“He never told me you were there.”
“Why would he?”
“I don’t know.”
Hannah thought of Daniel leaning against the refrigerator, rolling his eyes while Judith complained about somebody from church.
“He didn’t stop being your son.”
Judith’s eyes filled.
“He just became my husband too.”
Richard pushed away from the counter.
“This is ridiculous.”
Lauren turned on him.
“Can you not?”
He stared at her.
Lauren surprised herself.
“So,” she said more quietly, “just don’t.”
Richard walked out of the kitchen.
A door closed down the hall.
Judith began crying.
Hannah did not comfort her.
That was not cruelty.
It was capacity.
She had none left.
The attorney’s office occupied the second floor above a dentist.
Hannah sat across from Camille Brooks while the woman read Daniel’s documents twice.
Brooks was in her fifties, with silver hair cut close to her jaw and a habit of tapping one fingernail against the paper when thinking.
Mercer waited outside.
Hannah had asked him not to come into the meeting.
She needed one room where nobody wore Daniel’s death like a uniform.
Brooks finally looked up.
“The house is yours.”
Hannah exhaled.
“The beneficiary deed was validly executed and recorded before his death. We’ll need certified death documentation to complete the county process, but Richard Carter does not inherit the property.”
“And the mortgage?”
“Still exists.”
“Of course.”
Brooks slid another sheet toward her.
“You also need to understand that ownership and affordability are different questions.”
Hannah looked at the payment amount.
Daniel’s military income had carried most of it.
Her job as a physical therapy assistant had been reduced to part-time during pregnancy because of complications earlier in the year.
Insurance money might eventually help.
Eventually was an expensive word.
“How long until the benefits are processed?”
“That’s outside my lane. Talk to casualty assistance. Some benefits can move relatively quickly, others take time.”
Hannah rubbed her forehead.
Brooks tapped the paper.
“There’s another issue.”
“Good.”
“Your father-in-law appears to have contacted a real estate broker.”
Hannah looked up.
“How do you know?”
“Because he emailed my office six days ago.”
The room became quiet.
“What?”
“He identified himself as Daniel Carter’s father and asked whether a parent could sell a deceased child’s property when there was no surviving spouse with a recorded ownership interest.”
Hannah stared.
Brooks turned her monitor.
“I did not represent him. He contacted us through our website. We told him we could not advise without more information.”
“Did he give my name?”
“No.”
“Did he say Daniel was dead?”
“Yes.”
Six days ago.
Richard had known.
Not merely known enough to suspect.
Known enough to ask how to sell the house.
Hannah leaned back.
Her daughter kicked high under her ribs.
Brooks watched her carefully.
“Do you need a minute?”
“No.”
“That answer is available.”
Hannah looked at the email.
“Can I have a copy?”
“Yes.”
“Is it legal for him to ask?”
“People can ask all kinds of ugly questions.”
“Can I make him leave today?”
“Not by throwing his belongings onto the lawn.”
Hannah sighed.
“Still irritating.”
“Still real.”
Brooks discussed written notices, occupancy, documenting property, changing access only after lawful move-out, and avoiding confrontations. She recommended a separate attorney if estate administration became contested. She advised Hannah to preserve the envelopes Richard had withheld and the police report, but not to decide immediately whether she wanted broader legal action.
“You have three different problems,” Brooks said. “Grief, family, and property. They overlap, but they are not the same problem.”
Hannah looked at Daniel’s handwritten letter inside its plastic sleeve.
“I keep trying to solve them all at once.”
“Most people do.”
“What would you do?”
Brooks smiled faintly.
“I charge people not to answer that question.”
Hannah laughed.
Then Brooks became serious.
“What do you want?”
“I want Daniel back.”
“I can’t help with that one.”
“I know.”
May you like
“Then pick the next true thing.”
Hannah looked through the window at the parking lot.
