I had only allowed them to speak.
Richard pushed back from the table.
“You’re enjoying this.”
I considered lying.
Instead I said, “I’m enjoying not having to pretend you know more about my life than you do.”
He stood.
The movement made several people tense.
“This house belongs to the Harrington family.”
I remained seated.
“Maple Ridge belonged to Ruth.
Ruth chose what happened to it.”
“And now you think having your name behind some company makes you better than us?”
“No.”
I closed the blue folder halfway.
“That’s the difference between us.”
He stared at me.
I continued.
“I didn’t think I was better than you when I lived above a laundromat.
I didn’t think I was better than you when I drove through your gate in an old Toyota.
And I don’t think I’m better than you because I own this house.”
I let my hand rest on the folder.
“But you thought you were better than me because you believed I didn’t.”
Richard had no immediate answer.
Margaret did.
“What happens now?”
Her voice was quiet.
That was the real question.
Not who had won Thanksgiving.
Not whether Richard had been humiliated.
What happened to the people living inside a mansion they had spent three years pretending was theirs?
I looked at the lease.
“Now you read what you signed.”
Richard’s eyes narrowed.
“Is that a threat?”
“No.
It’s advice.
Practical advice.”
Tyler inhaled sharply.
Bree looked down, hiding what might have been the beginning of a smile.
Richard did not miss the reference.
His face went pale again.
I could have threatened to throw them out.
I could have turned ownership into the kind of weapon Richard understood best.
But that was never why Ruth had trusted me.
She had wanted Maple Ridge protected from someone who treated possession as entitlement.
So I told them the truth.
Their lease remained their lease.
Their obligations remained their obligations.
Future questions about the property would continue through Bluebird Holdings, only now they knew who was on the other side of the correspondence.
Richard seemed almost disappointed that I wasn’t giving him a dramatic threat he could fight.
“So you’re just going to hold this over us forever?”
“No.
I don’t need to.”
I gathered the documents.
“You’ll remember it without my help.”
Margaret looked around the dining room.
