“There’ll be no court hearing and no legal fees tacked onto your balance.”

“You’re blackmailing your own mother,” she said.

“I’m giving you a way out,” I said.

“If we walk into that courtroom on Monday, every bank statement from the past two years goes into the public record.”

“I don’t have twelve thousand dollars,” she said.

“I know you don’t,” I said.

“And you never had any legal claim to my income.”

My mother looked at the white paper lying on the glass table.