Chapter 3 - The Envelope Under My Bed
“What was she talking about?”
Dad asked the question the second we heard Veronica’s bedroom door slam upstairs.
“I don’t know.”
“Claire.”
“I don’t.”
He studied me, as if eight years of distance had suddenly become visible between us.
I wiped my face.
“You want to know what I’ve been hiding? Fine. I’ve been hiding how bad this house has been whenever you travel.”
Dad’s eyes narrowed.
“What does that mean?”
“Your college account is not frozen.”
I stared at him.
“Yes, it is.”
“No. I funded it last month.”
The room seemed to tilt.
“Then why did Veronica tell me you stopped paying because I changed majors?”
Dad looked genuinely confused.
“I never said that.”
My stomach dropped.
I walked to my bedroom.
Dad followed.
It had my name on it.
Inside was a letter from my mother’s estate attorney.
I had not opened it.
Not because I wasn’t curious.
Because the envelope had already been opened.
Dad read the return address and went pale.
“Where did you get this?”
“It was hidden.”
“By who?”
“I don’t know.”
He tore the envelope open the rest of the way.
The letter was dated six months earlier.
I watched his eyes move faster.
Then stop.
“What?”
He read one paragraph again.
“Dad.”
He lowered the page.
“Your mother left you a trust.”
“I know. You told me. It’s for when I’m twenty-five.”
“No.”
He handed me the letter.
The words blurred at first.
Then sharpened.
The trust had a release clause.
At nineteen, I was entitled to use part of it for education, housing, or starting a business.
I had turned nineteen four months earlier.
There was more.
Three certified notices had been mailed to the house.
I had never seen them.
“Someone signed for these,” Dad said.
My hands went cold.
He checked the bottom of the page.
There was a name beside the delivery confirmation.
V. Bennett.
Veronica.
Dad looked toward the hallway.
Upstairs, a drawer slammed.
Then another.
He folded the letter carefully.
“Stay here.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to ask my wife why she intercepted legal mail addressed to my daughter.”
He reached the door.
I grabbed his arm.
“Dad.”
He turned.
I showed him the final line on the letter.
Dad read it.
His face lost all color.
May you like
Because the household trustee wasn’t him.
It was Veronica.
