I Escaped Her Locked Estate in a Storm — By Morning I Held the Evidence That Would End Her at the 10 O’Clock Board Meeting

I’m not doing anything to you.

I’m just balancing the books.”

Chapter 18 — What She Never Asked

There is one thing about my stepmother that I have kept turning over, in the months since, because it is the true key to the whole story, and it is a thing worth understanding about power in general.

Wendy taught me — not on purpose, but by example, over years — that power belonged to whoever controlled the room.

She was a genius at controlling rooms.