I didn’t move.

The priest cleared his throat, uneasy. The lawyer, Mr. Bell, looked pale but stayed silent. He had already read the will beneath a dripping cemetery tent: Grandma left her “savings book and all rights attached to it” to me, her granddaughter, Elise.

My father received nothing.

That was why his mouth had twisted.

Grandma raised me after my mother died. She taught me to sew a button, balance a budget, and face wolves without showing fear. In her final week, when her hands were nothing but bones beneath hospital sheets, she whispered, “When they laugh, let them. Then go to the bank.”

I stepped forward.

My father’s hand shot out. “Leave it.”

I met his eyes. “No.”

His gaze hardened. “Don’t embarrass yourself, Elise.”

“You already did that for me.”

The cemetery froze again.

I climbed down carefully, my heels sinking into wet mud, and lifted the small blue savings book from Grandma’s coffin lid. Dirt stained its cover. My fingers trembled, but my voice stayed steady.

“It was hers,” I said. “Now it’s mine.”

Father leaned close enough that I smelled whiskey on his breath. “You think she saved you? That old woman couldn’t save herself.”

Something inside me went still.

I slipped the book into my coat.

Celeste smiled sweetly. “Poor girl. Always so dramatic.”

Mark stepped in my way as I turned to leave. “Where are you going?”

I looked past him toward the iron cemetery gate.