Chapter 10: The First Crack in Their Perfect Family

After the phone call with Grant, I spent the rest of the afternoon preparing for my first interview.

I refused to let him ruin another day of my life.

For the first time in twelve years, I was making decisions based entirely on what I wanted.

The interview went better than I expected.

By the time I walked out of the building, the hiring manager had already asked when I could start.

I stood on the sidewalk in downtown Chicago, holding a coffee I had barely touched, when my phone buzzed.

It was an email from my lawyer.

The subject line read: Urgent—Savannah Property.

I opened it immediately.

The thirty-day notice had been delivered that morning.

Grant had signed for it himself.

But beneath that information was another message.

Grant's attorney had contacted my lawyer.

They were claiming that Grant had contributed significantly to the property and therefore believed he had an equitable interest in the house.

I almost laughed.

For years, Grant had told everyone that the house was our home.

But whenever the mortgage payment was due, the insurance bill arrived, or the roof needed repairs, he had conveniently forgotten the word “our.”

My lawyer had already sent copies of the bank records showing exactly where the money had come from.

Every major payment had come from me.

Then another attachment caught my attention.

It was a copy of a message Grant had apparently sent to his attorney.

I read it twice.

He was asking whether there was any way to prevent me from selling the property once they were forced to leave.

So that was what this was really about.

They weren't worried about losing a home.

They were worried about losing an asset they thought they could eventually control.

I forwarded the email back to my lawyer.

“Proceed with everything,” I wrote.

A few minutes later, my phone rang.

This time it was Sadie.

I almost ignored it.

Then I remembered how often I had once answered her calls in the middle of the night.

I picked up.

“June?”

Her voice sounded different.

Not angry.

Nervous.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Dad says you're really making us leave.”

“Your father received the notice.”

“But where are we supposed to go?”

I looked across the street at people rushing through the city, each one carrying their own problems.

“That's something you should ask your father.”

She was silent.

Then she said, “You can't do this to us.”

I closed my eyes.

“Sadie, I didn't marry someone else in my own backyard. I didn't remove you from your bedroom. I didn't send you a quitclaim deed asking you to give away your house.”

“Dad said you were going to come back eventually.”

“He was wrong.”

Her voice cracked.

“What about my tuition?”

There it was.

Not whether I was okay.

Not an apology.

Not even a question about the wedding.

Money.

“Your tuition is your responsibility now.”

“But you promised!”

“I promised to help the girl who needed me,” I said quietly. “I didn't promise to finance the woman who watched her father marry another woman while her mother figure was deliberately pushed out of her own home.”

Sadie stopped breathing for a second.

“June…”

“I'm not angry anymore.”

I meant it.

“I'm just finished.”

I ended the call.

That evening, another email arrived.

This one was from the hiring manager.

They were offering me the position.

The salary was higher than what I had earned before I moved to Savannah twelve years ago.

I accepted.

Then I sat alone in my new apartment and opened the photo of my mother in her wedding dress.

For years, I had thought leaving Chicago had been the greatest sacrifice I had ever made.

Now I realized it had also been the greatest lesson.

I had spent twelve years building a family that never considered me family.

I wasn't going to spend another twelve trying to convince them otherwise.

My phone buzzed one final time before I went to sleep.

It was a message from an unknown number.

I almost deleted it without reading.

Then I saw the attachment.

A photograph of Grant and Piper standing in my kitchen.

Piper was smiling.

Grant looked furious.

And between them was a document spread across the counter.

Someone had written three words across the photograph.

You don't know everything.

I stared at the message for a long time.

Then I saved the photograph.

Whatever secret they were hiding, I was finally ready to find it.