Chapter 1 - Twenty Minutes Until the Showing
The sound that finally ended my patience was not my sister’s laughter.
It was the crack of my son’s sailboat breaking in half.
Eli stood barefoot near the sliding glass doors of my Malibu cottage, holding the snapped wooden mast in one hand while his cousins laughed beside him.
The boat had taken him nearly two months to build.
He had painted the hull blue himself. He had written his initials beneath the tiny white sail because he said someday, when he learned to sail for real, he wanted to remember where he started.
One of Jenna’s twins kicked the broken hull across the floor.
“Oops.”
The other knocked his orange soda sideways.
Sticky liquid poured across the refinished hardwood and disappeared beneath my white sofa.
Jenna barely looked.
“Daryl can hire someone.”
My father laughed.
My mother lifted her wineglass.
“To summer.”
Then Jenna raised hers.
“To real family.”
The glasses touched.
Eli looked at me.
Zoe tightened both arms around her purple backpack.
“Daddy, where are we sleeping?”
Jenna answered before I could.
“Not here.”
She smiled as though she were explaining something obvious.
“The twins get the guest room. Your children already live with you all year. This summer is for our family.”
Our family.
Inside a cottage I had paid $940,000 for after my divorce.
A cottage whose mortgage, property taxes, insurance, renovations and utilities had never cost Jenna one dollar.
I knelt beside Eli and collected the pieces of his boat.
“Can you fix it?” he whispered.
“Yes.”
I looked straight at Jenna.
“You’re right. Someone’s leaving.”
She laughed.
I checked my watch.
Nineteen minutes.
Then I sent one message.
Proceed as scheduled.
Jenna saw me typing.
“Calling a cleaner?”
“No.”
I picked up the spare house key beside her wineglass and put it in my pocket.
“Everyone out. The showing starts in twenty minutes.”
Mark finally lowered his phone.
Mom stopped smiling.
Dad frowned.
Jenna laughed again, but there was no confidence in it this time.
“Showing?”
“I’m selling.”
Her face hardened.
“You can’t sell our house.”
“My name is the only one on the deed.”
Then a black SUV turned into the driveway.
A woman in a navy suit stepped out carrying a thick folder.
Behind her came a photographer and three prospective buyers.
Jenna’s wineglass trembled.
The woman crossed the porch.
“Dr. Mercer.”
“Claire.”
She opened the folder.
“I have the deed, listing agreement and lock-change authorization.”
Jenna rushed forward.
“What lock change?”
Claire looked past her.
“To whichever locks Dr. Mercer wants replaced.”
I slipped one arm around Eli and one around Zoe.
“Start with every code my family knows.”
Mom stared at me as though I had struck her.
Then Claire quietly added:
“There’s one other issue before the buyers come inside.”
“What?”
She looked directly at Jenna.
May you like
“Someone filed a document yesterday claiming you already own twenty-five percent of this property.”
My sister’s face went completely white.
