Then my hand began to shake.
Richard crossed the room and gently took the phone before it slipped from my fingers.
“You did well,” he said.
The praise almost undid me.
“I don’t feel well.”
“That’s not always the same thing.”
Evelyn gave a watery laugh. “That is very true.”
I let my head sink back against the pillow. The pain medicine had made everything feel distant earlier, but now every nerve in my body seemed awake. My mother’s warning circled through my mind.
You have no idea what you might destroy.
“What did she mean?” I whispered.
Richard looked down at the photograph.
“I don’t know yet.”
“But you suspect something.”
His silence was too careful.
Aunt Evelyn came to sit beside me. “Claire, there are things from that time that were never clear to us. Your grandparents’ estate. Your mother’s choices. The way your father suddenly had influence over papers he shouldn’t have controlled.”
