You don’t know what you’re causing.
My mother is devastated.
You’re behaving worse than they are.
And finally one, at two fifty-one, that made my body run cold.
If you tell them about the trust fund, you’ll sink all of us.
I sat up in bed.
I read it again.
Trust fund.
We had never had that conversation.
I had never used that word with him.
I went barefoot down to the study where my father and Stephen were still reviewing papers. I showed them the text without saying a word.
My father read it once.
Then again.
The lawyer reached out his hand.
“Pass it here.”
He did.
And for the first time all night, I saw a genuine look of alarm on his face.
“What trust fund?” I asked.
My father went incredibly still.
I felt a hole open up under my feet.
“Dad.”
He exhaled slowly.
“There’s something I didn’t tell you before because I didn’t think it was necessary yet. And then because…” he stopped, annoyed with himself, “because I thought your marriage could be saved if I didn’t put more weight on you.”
I looked at him without understanding.
“What thing?”
It was Stephen who answered.
“Your grandfather left a testamentary trust for you. You wouldn’t gain full control until you turned thirty-five, or until there was proven financial risk due to economic abuse or marital coercion. You turned thirty-four two months ago.”
I felt a slow wave of dizziness.
“And Patrick knew?”
