“Mom, don’t put this on me.”

“Of course I have to put it on you,” she said, and her composure finally cracked all the way through.

“You need the capital.

Your Manhattan venture is about to go under.” Fergus went pale.

“How do you know that?” And my mother bit her lip a half-second too late, having said the thing she had not meant to say.

Bettina slid another summary across the wood.