Chapter 2 - The Forgotten DeedI didn’t answer. I pushed my chair back, walked up the creaking wooden stairs to my bedroom, and pulled a heavy, fireproof lockbox from beneath my bed. From it, I extracted a thick, beige folder. It was the same folder Eleanor had pressed into my hands when I was eighteen, her skin frail and paper-thin, whispering to me, “Never let anyone push you out of the first place where you were loved.”
I walked back down the stairs and dropped the heavy legal document squarely onto the center of the dining table, right next to the salt shaker.
“My grandparents left this property in a trust, which transferred directly to my name when I turned twenty-one,” I said, my voice echoing off the wainscoting. “Dad lives here because I never wanted to make my own father leave his childhood home. You live here because he brought you here. But the owner of this deed, Brenda, is me.”
Her perfectly manicured hands trembled as she snatched the document. Her eyes darted over the embossed seals and the legal jargon.
“This is fake,” she hissed, though her voice lacked conviction.
“Call the county clerk in the morning if you’d like.”
“Robert!” she shrieked, slamming the paper down. “Tell this arrogant little brat she’s crazy!”
My father finally lifted his eyes. The bags under them looked heavier than usual. He looked like a man who had been slowly drowning for years.
“It’s true, Brenda,” he muttered, rubbing his temples. “The house is in Harper’s name. It always has been.”
Brenda’s face drained of color. The absolute authority she had wielded over me for years shattered into a million irreparable pieces right there on the dining room rug. Tyler had stopped playing his game. Chloe’s mouth was hanging slightly open.
“And why the hell didn’t you ever tell me?” Brenda demanded, turning her fury on my father.
“Because I didn’t think it mattered,” Robert whispered.
Brenda stood up so fast her chair tipped backward and crashed to the floor. “It didn’t matter that I’ve been playing house in a property that isn’t even yours? That I’ve been living under the thumb of a twenty-three-year-old?”
I stood up, mirroring her posture. “Exactly. So starting tomorrow, the rules in my house are changing. And if you don’t like it, the door is wide open.”
I left my dinner untouched and walked back upstairs. My legs were trembling, but for the first time in five years, it wasn’t from fear. It was adrenaline.
I barely slept that night. At 6:12 the next morning, I crept out of my room to get a glass of water. As I reached the top of the stairs, I heard hushed, frantic whispering coming from the kitchen below.
“Robert, you have to convince her to move to campus for her final year,” Brenda was hissing, her voice a venomous serpent in the quiet dawn. “That girl already thinks she’s a dictator. If we don’t get her out of the picture now, she’s going to put my kids on the street.”
I froze, pressing my back against the wall, pulling my phone from my sweatpants pocket and hitting record.
“It’s her house, Brenda. I can’t force her out,” my father pleaded weakly.
“Then make her sign a Power of Attorney,” Brenda snapped. “Tell her it’s for some boring property tax liability issue. She’s young, she won’t read the fine print. Your buddy, Greg, the notary? He owes us a favor. He can help us fast-track the paperwork.”
A block of ice formed in my stomach. She didn’t just want me gone. She wanted to steal my legacy.
When Brenda hung up her phone, I forced my heart rate to slow, shoved my phone deep into my pocket, and walked down the stairs, yawning as if I hadn’t heard a single syllable.
Brenda turned from the counter, pasting on a terrifyingly fake, sugary smile.
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“Good morning, sweetie,” she purred. “Coffee?”
I watched her pour the dark liquid with steady, remorseless hands. I realized right then that she was far more dangerous than I had ever imagined. But she was about to find out exactly whose blood ran in my veins.
