Then Mom said the number.
It was almost the entire remaining estate.
Not just their imagined share.
Emma’s.
Mine.
And the money specifically intended for Lily.
I closed my eyes.
When I opened them, Lily was staring at me with complete trust, one hand wrapped around my finger.
“Did Emma know?”
“Know what?” Mom asked.
“That you were planning to take all of it.”
“We weren’t taking it.”
“Did Emma know?”
Mom hesitated.
Dad answered for her.
“We told her we would help her get established in London.”
There it was.
Emma hadn’t just been following Jake.
She had been following a promise.
Jake had supposedly gotten his big break.
My parents had supposedly found their new life in Barcelona.
And somewhere in the middle of those fantasies sat Nana’s money, silently assigned the job of making every reckless decision safe.
I thought of Emma at five that morning, saying, Everybody is leaving.
I can’t be the only one left here with nothing.
Someone had told her she wouldn’t have nothing.
Someone had promised there would be money waiting.
“I have to go,” I said.
“You absolutely do not hang up on your mother,” Dad snapped.
I disconnected.
The phone rang again before I could put it down.
This time it was Mr.
Feldman.
I answered immediately.
“I assume they discovered the transfer,” he said.
“They’re in Barcelona.”
A pause.
“That was faster than I expected.”
Despite everything, I smiled.
I told him about the hotel, Mom’s text, the attempted card use, and Emma’s messages about her share.
Mr.
Feldman did not sound surprised.
That bothered me almost as much as anything else.
“The important thing,” he said, “is that you did not authorize a transaction.
I have already sent the bank written notice confirming the estate distributions and the protective transfer.
Your parents cannot reverse those movements through the old account.”
“What about the fifty-eight dollars?”
“Leave it exactly where it is.”
That tiny balance had seemed petty when I left it.
Now I understood why he had approved the idea.
It meant the old account remained visible.
Any attempt to use it would leave a record.
And apparently, my parents had just created one.
“Can they accuse me of stealing it?” I asked.
“They can accuse you of anything they like,” he said.
“That is different from proving it.
The records show where the money came from, who the beneficiaries are, and where it went.
