Chapter 1
I tore the envelope open while Madison shivered against my chest.
The first page meant almost nothing to me.
Transfer language. Family acreage. The old Holloway summer property.
Then I saw the signature.
Mine.
I looked at my mother.
“You punished my daughter for a signature you forged?”
Carol’s face changed.
Not enough for innocence.
Too much for surprise.
Dennis stood several feet away beside the patio table, one hand still holding a slice of pizza he had apparently forgotten existed.
Nobody spoke.
I shifted Madison higher against me. Her skin was burning beneath clothes soaked with filthy water.
“Who wrote this?”
Carol recovered first.
“You did.”
I stared.
“No.”
“You signed it last month.”
“No.”
Her jaw tightened.
Several relatives looked down.
Interesting.
I held the page up.
“My name is Grant Holloway.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I know your name.”
“Then you should know how I sign it.”
Silence.
I pointed to the final stroke.
“I never close the G.”
Dennis’s face changed.
Carol’s did too.
There.
I had my answer.
Not proof for strangers.
I did not care about strangers.
This family knew my hand.
Someone had copied it badly enough that only people who never expected me to inspect the document would think it worked.
I looked at Madison.
“Baby, who told you to clean the pool?”
Her teeth chattered.
“Grandma.”
“Why?”
Madison glanced at Carol.
Fear.
Immediate.
“Tell me.”
“Because Daddy won’t give it back.”
I looked at my mother.
“Give what back?”
Carol said nothing.
Madison pointed weakly toward the envelope.
“The house.”
My breathing slowed.
This was not discipline.
Carol had told a feverish three-year-old that her suffering was payment for something I had supposedly stolen.
I looked around at every relative who had watched.
“How long has she been in that pool?”
Nobody answered.
Then my youngest cousin whispered:
“Almost two hours.”
Something inside me went completely still.
May you like
My daughter had been sick, hungry, soaked, and scrubbing concrete while my family ate pizza ten yards away.
The forged signature suddenly became the smaller betrayal.
