I straightened.
“I’m not taking her anywhere without your permission.”
Then I looked at Daniel.
“But I hope somebody remembers this trip was supposedly for her.”
I followed Marcus toward the elevator.
Just before the doors closed, I saw Madison turn on Daniel.
And although I couldn’t hear her first words, I saw enough.
She wasn’t embarrassed.
She was furious.
The Caldwell residence occupied most of the eighth floor.
Thomas had insisted on building it during the lodge’s first expansion.
“For visiting investors,” he told our accountant.
It was never for investors.
It was ours.
Two bedrooms.
A study.
A great room with a stone fireplace and windows facing the mountains.
For years, Daniel spent school holidays there.
He had learned to build snow forts on the terrace.
He once broke a lamp playing indoor baseball and blamed a raccoon.
In Aspen.
On the eighth floor.
Thomas pretended to believe him for three days.
I hadn’t entered the residence since my husband’s funeral.
Marcus opened the door.
The scent of cedar hit me first.
Then memory.
Thomas standing at the windows with coffee.
Thomas asleep in the armchair.
Thomas carrying a six-year-old Daniel down the hall after a day skiing.
I stopped.
Marcus said nothing.
After a moment, I whispered, “I thought they’d changed more.”
“Your instructions were to preserve it.”
“I’d forgotten.”
“No. You avoided remembering.”
I looked at him.
“That’s why I kept you around. Your charm.”
He smiled faintly.
Then his expression grew serious.
“Elaine, what happened downstairs?”
I told him.
Everything.
The invitation.
The cancellation.
Daniel knowing.
Madison waiting for a reaction.
When I finished, Marcus walked toward the windows.
“This may be worse than family cruelty.”
My stomach tightened.
“What does that mean?”
He hesitated.
“Three weeks ago, our corporate office received an inquiry.”
“About?”
“Your holdings.”
“From whom?”
“A law firm in Denver.”
My skin went cold.
“What kind of inquiry?”
“Asset verification.”
I said nothing.
Marcus continued.
“They wanted confirmation of properties held directly or indirectly through the Caldwell Family Trust.”
I turned fully toward him.
“Who authorized it?”
“That’s the problem.”
He looked at me.
“They claimed Daniel had.”
Daniel came upstairs thirty minutes later.
Alone.
I was standing beside the fireplace when he entered.
For a few seconds, neither of us spoke.
He looked around.
Recognition spread across his face.
“Oh my God.”
“You remember.”
“The telescope was there.”
He pointed toward the windows.
“Dad bought me one.”
“He bought himself one and pretended it was yours.”
Daniel almost smiled.
Then the memory vanished.
“You kept this?”
“I kept the lodge.”
“How?”
“I never sold it.”
“But after Dad died—”
“I sold three properties. Not Silver Pines. Not the management company. And not the land holdings.”
