The stove burner clicked four times before catching a blue ring of flame under the steel pot.

I stirred the morning oatmeal with a wooden spoon and checked the round wall clock above the refrigerator.

It was a quarter past seven on a Tuesday morning in late February.

The kitchen of the old Craftsman house still held the winter chill.

My grandmother Eleanor Bennett had left me this house in Lakewood two years ago.

I kept her original copper pans hanging above the center island and her heavy ceramic bowls stacked neatly behind the glass cabinet doors.

The original property deed sat in a fireproof box under my office desk.

Daniel sat at the kitchen island with his thick black consulting binder pressed flat against the quartz countertop.

He turned a stiff paper page and ran his silver pen down a long column of printed figures.

A chime sounded from his phone, which was resting near his coffee mug.

The screen lit up with a notification showing the blue and white logo of Community First Bank.

Daniel set his pen down immediately.

He reached out and flipped the phone face down on the counter.

The plastic phone case made a sharp crack against the stone.

“Was that a bank alert?” I asked.

“Just a routine account sync,” Daniel said.

He didn’t flip the phone back over.

I turned the heat down on the stove and tapped my wooden spoon against the steel rim of the pot.