No answer.
“Mom.”
“A car accident.”
Something in her voice was wrong.
“Was Dad involved?”
“No.”
Too fast.
I stood.
“Was he?”
“No!”
Nathaniel intervened.
“Sylvie.”
But Mom was unraveling.
“Your father didn’t kill her.”
“I didn’t say kill.”
Mom froze.
There are moments when truth enters a room before anyone speaks it.
That was one.
I whispered:
“What happened?”
Mom stared at the table.
Then told me.
Elaine had taken the settlement.
Then demanded more.
She threatened to expose everything.
She arranged to meet my father.
Mom followed him.
Elaine and Dad argued in a parking garage.
Elaine slapped him.
Dad pushed her away.
She stumbled.
Fell backward over a low concrete barrier.
One story below.
She survived the fall initially.
Dad panicked.
Mom called emergency services anonymously.
Then they left.
Elaine died two days later.
“Why didn’t you stay?”
Mom sobbed.
“Because your father had already been investigated by Wexford.
He said we’d lose everything.”
I felt sick.
“You left an injured woman alone?”
“An ambulance came.”
“You didn’t tell the police?”
“No.”
“And Grandma found out?”
Mom looked at me.
“Eventually.”
Now I understood the recordings.
Grandma’s fear.
The medication concerns.
Her distrust.
But one question remained.
“Did Dad hurt Grandma?”
Mom’s face changed.
And that expression terrified me more than any answer.
“What do you know?”
“Sylvie—”
“What do you know?”
She whispered:
“Nothing.”
“That’s not true.”
“He was angry with her.”
“When?”
“Near the end.”
“Why?”
“Because she told him she had rewritten the trust.”
My hands went cold.
“Was he with her when she got sick?”
Mom cried harder.
“I don’t know.”
“Was he?”
“I don’t know.”
“Mom!”
“YES!”
The word exploded.
“He was there that night.”
Silence.
“He told me she was sleeping.
The next morning the nurse couldn’t wake her properly.
Two days later she was hospitalized.”
I gripped the chair.
“What medication was she taking?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did Dad have access?”
“Probably.”
My stomach turned.
“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
She looked at me with twenty-three years of fear in her face.
