Messages.
Everything.”
“How long have you known him?”
Her silence answered before her voice did.
“Before David died.”
I felt the old instinct to protect my younger sister rise inside me.
I pushed it down.
“Did you help him get close to me?”
She nodded.
“He knew where you went after the funeral meetings.
What coffee you ordered.
When you were alone.
I told him things.”
My stomach turned.
Every thoughtful coincidence in my marriage suddenly had an explanation.
“Did you know what would happen to David?”
“No.”
She answered too quickly, then covered her face.
“I knew Garrett wanted him scared.
David had found the transfers.
Garrett wanted him to stop.
I gave Garrett information I should never have given him.
David’s schedule.
When he usually drove.
Things about the house.
I swear I didn’t know Garrett meant for him to die.”
I heard movement outside the room.
Sienna heard it too.
She went rigid.
Garrett appeared in the doorway.
“Everything okay?”
His eyes moved from her face to mine.
“Fine,” I said.
Sienna stood.
Garrett smiled at her.
“Leaving already?”
“I have somewhere to be.”
He held her gaze a little too long.
It wasn’t affection.
It was warning.
That night Sienna called Harrison.
Then she gave a formal statement to investigators.
She turned over messages Garrett had believed she deleted, financial records he’d sent her, and voice notes in which he repeatedly reminded her that he could expose her debts and destroy whatever chance she had of receiving help from our mother.
The evidence did not rest on Sienna alone.
David’s recordings supported her account.
Margaret’s study recording supported both of them.
The financial transfers established a pattern.
My recording showed Garrett discussing access to my inheritance and saying I would cease to be a problem afterward.
Harrison instructed me not to be alone with Garrett again.
So the next time Garrett pushed the papers toward me, we were in my mother’s dining room, and people with authority to intervene were close enough that I was not depending on courage to keep myself safe.
Garrett didn’t know that.
He sat across from me in a charcoal jacket, looking polished and patient.
“Just the highlighted sections,” he said.
I picked up the pen.
His gaze dropped to my hand.
“Once this is signed,” I asked, “you can manage the accounts?”
