“Don’t sign anything he sends you.

Not a single page.”

“He thinks that because I was overseas, he can wipe out eleven years of my life here.”

Edward didn’t respond to that.

He picked up the top envelope and held it out to me.

“First National.

Sarah Miller has your grandmother’s statements pulled and ready.

Go and see her this week.”

I tucked the probate notice under the sugar bowl, weighted down, where I could see it from the doorway.

Robert had already stirred his coffee to the color of river clay by the time I sat down at the Birch Street diner.

Two sugars, then a third, and he had asked the girl at the counter for more before I even got my coat off.

“There she is,” he said.

“The soldier herself.”

“You’re the one who asked to see me.”