The silence shattered.
“What did you say?” Ryan demanded.
“I heard you in the kitchen,” Ethan said. “You said Mom would never sign. And Aunt Claire said one curve could fix what a judge would complicate.”
Claire swore under her breath.
“Shut up.”
“You said you’d tell everyone Mom was tired. That she lost control.” Ethan did not move toward the door. He did not lower his voice. “And then you’d take me away after.”
Ryan took a step toward him.
“Come here.”
“Don’t touch him,” Ms. Parker said.
The metal object in Claire’s hand shifted.
Emily heard it.
She felt it the way you feel a temperature change — a physical awareness of danger moving closer to her son.
And she moved.
Not one finger this time.
Her whole hand.
A full, deliberate movement — everything she had compressed into that one motion.
Ethan felt it. He turned to look at her. His eyes went full. But he held still.
Claire saw it too.
“Look at that,” she said, and there was something in her voice Emily had never heard there before — something old and ugly that had been living underneath the expensive perfume and the practiced smile for years. “The dead woman wants a say.”
