“I have to buy food for this house tomorrow,” I said.

Grant clicked the wireless mouse once to save the new password and shut the monitor off with a soft click.

The four hundred twenty dollars from the estate appraiser lay on my laminate table next to my mother’s velvet jewelry box.

I pushed her gold filigree brooch and two thin bangles across the felt mat to the dealer, who stamped my invoice in blue ink.

A single-user license for the forensic accounting software cost three hundred ninety-five dollars, which left me twenty-five dollars for the court clerk’s document fees.