Richard frowned.
“She said you insisted.”
Barbara unhooked the chain.
“Catherine. Richard. Please come inside.”
Harper stepped toward the door.
Barbara blocked her.
“I said Catherine and Richard.”
“This is ridiculous!”
“Possibly.”
“You cannot humiliate me in front of my parents.”
Barbara’s voice remained quiet.
“You should have considered that before lying to them.”
Catherine went pale.
“Harper?”
Daniel rubbed both hands over his face.
“Can everyone just calm down?”
Barbara turned.
“No.”
Daniel froze.
She had never answered him like that.
Barbara stepped aside for Catherine and Richard.
They entered.
Harper pushed through after them before Barbara could object.
Daniel followed.
Within seconds everyone stood in the living room.
The ocean continued rolling outside as though none of them mattered.
Catherine looked around.
Her smile had vanished.
“This is beautiful, Barbara.”
“Thank you.”
Richard picked up a framed photograph from a shelf.
It showed Robert sitting on the balcony, holding a ridiculous tropical drink decorated with three paper umbrellas.
Richard smiled faintly.
“This was Robert?”
Barbara nodded.
“My husband.”
“He loved this place?”
“Very much.”
Richard looked confused.
Then disturbed.
He turned toward Harper.
“You said Daniel inherited it from his father.”
Silence.
Barbara felt something cold move through her stomach.
She looked at her son.
Daniel stopped breathing.
Harper answered too quickly.
“That’s basically what happened.”
“No,” Barbara said.
Everyone looked at her.
“That is not remotely what happened.”
Catherine gripped the back of a chair.
“Then who owns this condo?”
Barbara stared at her.
“I do.”
Richard’s expression emptied.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No, I mean—”
He looked at Harper.
Then Daniel.
Then Barbara again.
“We were told Daniel owned it.”
Barbara could hear her own pulse.
Daniel whispered, “Dad intended—”
“Do not,” Barbara said.
Her voice cracked like a branch.
Daniel stopped.
“Do not use your father to finish that sentence.”
Richard sat down.
Catherine remained standing.
Something about her face frightened Barbara now.
Not anger.
Fear.
“What exactly were you told?” Barbara asked.
Catherine did not answer.
Richard did.
“We were told Daniel was selling it to us.”
The room became perfectly still.
Even Harper seemed stunned that he had said it aloud.
Barbara looked at Daniel.
Her son.
The little boy who had once brought injured birds into her kitchen.
The teenager who used to call from college every Sunday because he knew she worried.
The man whose first business she had helped finance.
The only child she had.
Barbara could not fit the man standing before her into the sentence she had just heard.
“What?”
Richard swallowed.
“We transferred the deposit last month.”
Barbara’s knees weakened.
Catherine finally sat.
“Three hundred and twenty thousand dollars.”
Barbara gripped the edge of the table.
The sea breeze lifted the curtains.
Somewhere in the distance, a gull screamed.
Harper spoke.
