Chapter 2

I did go to my mother's room.

I just didn't say a single word he wanted me to. I sat on the edge of her bed and told her to keep her lawyer and ask for double.

Then, when the house went dark, I dug a mason jar out of a box of her things. Empty. Lid still on.

I tore a strip off a notepad and wrote one line on it, folded it small, and dropped it in.

Every family keeps accounts. I'd just never been allowed to see mine.

So I started one of my own. One folded slip for every debt this family didn't know it was running up. I screwed the lid down tight and held it up to the streetlight, watching that single white scrap settle at the bottom.

Dad always swore I'd never see a cent of inheritance.

Fine. I'd collect it a different way.

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The new apartment had a smell. Old radiator, someone else's cooking, carpet that had outlived three tenants. My mother apologized for it twice before we got the boxes inside.

"It's temporary," Tegan said, scrubbing a counter that was already clean.

"It's fine, Mom." I'd built an empire from a worse kitchen than this once. She just didn't know that yet. Nobody did.

My phone buzzed. The family chat -- Vale Fam, renamed by Chloe without irony.

A photo of Chloe in a white convertible, peace sign, new chapter!! Then, because subtlety was never her gift:

Chloe: some of us chose right.

Aunt Lynne: poor Grace. she'll learn.

I set the phone face-down and kept unpacking. Cold isn't weak. Cold is just refusing to pay rent to people living in your head.

Jack called Thursday. Not about money, this time.

"Grace. I need your help -- and only you can pull this off." Flattery first; he always greased the tool before he used it. "Leah's family is coming to the engagement party. Old money. Everything has to be perfect, and you're the only one in this family who can make perfect." A pause. "I need you to plan it. The whole thing."

"You want me to throw a party for the woman who's replacing my mother."

"Don't make it ugly." A warm laugh. "It's just logistics. Family helps family." Then, lighter, like an afterthought that had been the whole point: "Oh -- and the cake. Have your mother do it. She's good at that little hobby of hers, and it saves us a caterer. Tell her it's a chance to be useful for once."

There it was. Use the discarded wife to feed the new one's party, and use me to ask her. Two birds, no cost. My father, ever the economist of other people's dignity.

"Sure," I said. "I'd been meaning to get a look at the guest list anyway."

A small silence. He didn't know what to do with yes. Resistance he could win against; agreement made him itch.

What he didn't know was that Chloe had already gotten there first. She called twenty minutes later, syrup-sweet, to "help."

"I told Leah's mom the party was basically my vision," she said. "So if she asks, just, you know, back me up. You're doing the boring part, I'm doing the creative direction." A giggle. "Oh -- and don't bother with a tasting menu, Leah hates fuss. Keep it simple. Trust me."

Leah did not hate fuss. Leah's family judged a host by exactly that fuss. Chloe knew it. She was building a trap with my name on the door -- let the help fail in front of old money, then step in as the tasteful one.

In my old life, I'd have walked straight into it.

This time I wrote creative direction on a slip, folded it, and dropped it in the jar. Number two: they made my mother bake a cake for the woman replacing her -- and called it a favor.

The jar was getting heavier. I liked the weight of it.

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