Ten minutes earlier, I had been the unsuccessful daughter with a struggling bookstore.
Now I was the daughter with an oceanfront estate.
Nothing about my character had changed.
Only the number they imagined beside my name.
Mom softened her expression.
“Abby, honey, why didn’t you tell us?”
There was the syrup.
Apparently Tiffany had inherited it honestly.
“Because Grandma asked me to keep it private until I was ready.”
“We’re your family.”
“You remembered that quickly.”
Her smile vanished.
Jason pushed the documents back toward me.
“This still doesn’t change the reservation.
We paid for the week in good faith.”
“You did.”
“So we have a contractual right to be here.”
Clare stepped in before the argument could become another courtroom performance.
“The management company can handle the booking terms,” she said.
“Ms.
Mitchell has already instructed us that if the reservation ends early, the unused portion will be refunded and alternative accommodations can be arranged.”
Jason looked at me.
“You planned to throw us out.”
“No.”
That answer surprised everyone.
Even Clare glanced at me.
I had made the decision only minutes earlier, while listening to Mom toast the “successful branches.”
“I planned to see what you would do when you thought I had no power here.”
Nobody spoke.
“You showed me.”
I turned to Tiffany.
“You told me I made everything sad because I talked about Grandma.”
Her face tightened.
“That’s not exactly what I said.”
“It was almost exactly what you said.”
I looked at Jason.
“You wrote ‘Peace at last’ when you found out I wasn’t coming.”
His head snapped toward me.
“How did you see that?”
I ignored the question.
Then I looked at Mom.
“And you sat on my deck, in the house Grandma chose to leave to me, and toasted the successful branches of the family.”
Mom folded her arms.
“You are taking that completely out of context.”
“What context makes it kind?”
That stopped her.
Dad stepped between us verbally, the way he always did when Mom’s cruelty became too visible.
“Everyone has said things they regret.”
“Do you regret it?” I asked.
He looked annoyed by the question.
“That’s not the point.”
“It is to me.”
His expression hardened.
“Abigail, you have always been overly sensitive.”
There it was.
The old door.
