kind of woman I had always been, controlling, difficult, unable to let my daughter have anything that was her own.
Greg had sent one text that said simply: You will be hearing from our attorney.
I set the phone down.
I thought about what Richard would have said, and I knew he would have said something quietly dry about the attorney, and I allowed myself a brief moment of missing him with the specific sharpness that still arrives sometimes without warning, ten years on.
Then I called my own attorney.
Patricia Vance had handled my legal and estate matters for twelve years and she had the quality I most value in professionals, which is that she told me the truth without managing my feelings about it. I told her what had happened, in order, including the gift of the stone house the previous week. She asked several precise questions. Then she said she would need to review the gift documentation and would call me back within the hour.
