Linda held my gaze for a second, then looked back down at the agreement. She took off her glasses, folded them carefully, and set them on the desk.
“Then that’s your clock.”
I nodded, but my mind had already moved ahead of us. Brent had never been subtle a day in his life. Even as a boy, according to Charles, he’d rather kick a locked door than try the handle. If he was trying to rush me now, it meant he was under pressure.
“What is he doing?” I asked.
Linda didn’t answer right away. She reached for a yellow legal pad and wrote down three things. Estate. Trust. Board.
“First,” she said, “I want a full review of every document tied to your trust holdings. Second, I want to know whether he’s made any representations to lenders or board members based on family control. Third, I want you not to sign a single thing. Not a text, not an email, nothing.”
“I can manage that.”
She gave me a look over the top of her desk.
“Can you?”
I almost smiled.
“Yes.”
She leaned back.
“Good. Because once we start pulling on this thread, things may get loud.”
That part I believed. By the time I left Linda’s office, the sun was fully up and Dallas was moving fast. Delivery trucks. Dog walkers. Men in sport coats carrying coffee like the day belonged to them. I got into my Honda, closed the door, and sat there for a second with both hands on the wheel. I wasn’t scared exactly, but I was tired. Not physically. Not the kind of tired a nap fixes. The kind that comes from being pulled into something ugly when all you wanted was a little peace. Charles had been gone just under four months. Four months of casseroles, sympathy cards, estate papers, thank-you notes, and rooms that still held his shape. Four months of people asking how I was doing in voices that told me they didn’t really want an honest answer. And now this.
I drove home by way of the pharmacy and the grocery store just to delay being alone with my thoughts. By noon, I was back in the kitchen, standing over a half-unpacked bag of oranges when my phone buzzed. Brent. I let it ring. Then a text.
Have you had time to think?
A second one came before I could even lock the screen.
I’m trying to do this respectfully.
I stared at that word. Respectfully. Then another.
Amber was only trying to help.
That one almost made me laugh. I set the phone face down on the counter and finished putting away the groceries. Ten minutes later, it buzzed again.
If you want to bring a lawyer into this, that’s your choice. But it will get expensive fast.
There it was. The soft threat. I picked up the phone and typed one sentence.
I received the documents.
Then I deleted it. Linda was right. No texts. No little openings. I put the phone away and carried the oranges to the fruit bowl. My hand brushed against the old voicemail button icon on the screen without meaning to, and suddenly I was staring at a saved message from Charles. Three years old. I hadn’t played it in months. I pressed it anyway.
“Diane, it’s me. I’m at the hardware store and I can’t remember if you said satin finish or eggshell for the guest room. Call me back. And don’t laugh. I know they’re not the same.”
I stood in the kitchen and listened to that ridiculous message twice. Nothing profound. Nothing cinematic. Just Charles forgetting paint. And somehow that was the hardest thing in the world. I set the phone down and leaned my hands against the counter until the feeling passed.
By late afternoon, Linda called back.
“I’ve started digging,” she said, “and I don’t like what I’m seeing.”
I pulled out a chair and sat down.
“Tell me.”
“There’s chatter around a merger proposal. Quiet so far, but real. Mercer Industrial and a logistics group out of Houston.”
My stomach tightened.
“What kind of merger?”
“The kind that sounds efficient in a board packet and ugly on a factory floor.”
I closed my eyes for a second. Mercer Industrial wasn’t some shiny tech company. It made real things—industrial components, machine parts, the kind of business built on people showing up for 30 years, not branding campaigns and keynote speeches.
“What does he gain?” I asked.
“Access,” she said. “Debt relief, maybe. Positioning. A seat he hasn’t earned.”
“And what does the company lose?”
Linda paused.
“Depends how far it goes. Jobs. Plant stability. Maybe pensions down the road if he gets reckless enough.”
I sat very still. That was the moment it stopped being about me. Up until then, I had imagined a dozen endings. Refuse to sign. Take a smaller house. Let Brent posture in boardrooms until reality caught up with him. Walk away and protect whatever piece I had left. That all changed when Linda said pensions. People my age and older hear that word differently. It isn’t abstract. It’s medicine, mortgage payments, a roof, groceries that don’t feel like a calculation.
“When will you know more?” I asked.
“Soon,” she said. “But I think there’s someone you should talk to before then.”
“Who?”
“Eddie Collins.”
That surprised me.
“Eddie’s still there?”
