Chapter 2 - The Midnight Silence
I didn't go back to the guest house. I went to the airport. I had a ticket for a red-eye flight that would land before the lawyers even woke up. I sat in the departure lounge, watching my phone.
By 11:30 PM, the first notification hit. Then the second. Then the tenth.
They weren't just calls; they were frantic, digital screams. He had opened the box. He had seen the legal filing that declared his ownership of the estate void due to backdated signatures and the unauthorized transfer of my mother’s assets. He had realized that the "worthless garbage" was the foreclosure notice on his entire life.
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I turned the phone off. I didn't want to hear his voice. I didn't want to hear Celeste’s shrieking pleas. I had spent years watching them build their kingdom on the ruins of my mother’s memory, and tonight, I had reclaimed the foundation.
As the plane climbed above the clouds, I looked down at the city lights. I felt a profound, quiet victory. I wasn't just a daughter who had been slapped; I was the heir who had decided to collect her dues.
