The man in the foyer did not wait for anyone to invite him inside.
He entered carrying a black leather case and a stack of papers secured beneath one arm. He was in his early fifties, with silver at his temples and the careful, tired expression of someone who had spent years watching people lie in expensive rooms.
His eyes moved from Margaret to me, then to Robert.
“Ms. Cassidy?” he asked.
I stood. “Yes.”
“My name is Daniel Price. I am a partner at Whitaker, Bell, and Price.” He held out his hand, but his attention remained fixed on the papers in his other hand. “I have a temporary restraining order, a notice of civil action, and several preservation demands requiring Mr. Robert Cassidy to refrain from transferring, selling, concealing, or destroying any asset connected to the Cassidy Family Trust.”A glass tipped somewhere behind me.
It struck the table and rolled, spilling red wine across the white cloth.
No one reached for it.
Robert looked at Daniel as though he had just walked into the wrong house.
“You cannot serve me here,” he said.
Daniel glanced toward the open front door. “I already have.”
Robert turned to Margaret. “You brought a lawyer to your birthday party?”
“I brought a lawyer because you have spent twenty-six years treating my granddaughter’s inheritance as if it were your private checking account.”She had placed ownership in my name, preserved evidence, warned Margaret, and trusted that one day I would become strong enough to open the box. Robert had spent twenty-six years believing he had defeated her.
He had never understood that every dollar he took, every document he hid, and every business he built was becoming evidence against him.
The fortune he thought he had stolen was never the real inheritance.
The real inheritance was the truth.
And now it belonged to me.