It had been a joke to them, my career, the thing that made me the bad daughter — Elena and her paperwork, Elena and her self-importance.

Nine years I had led a financial exploitation unit.

Nine years I had prosecuted guardians and caretakers and sons and daughters who did to vulnerable people precisely what my brother had done to our father, and I had gotten very, very good at it, and my brother had eaten breakfast across from that fact every holiday for a decade and never once seen it.

There is an irony in it so sharp that I still cannot hold it for long.