Chapter 2 - THE LAND MY FATHER REFUSED TO SELLThe police took the glass.
They took the small container from the kitchen.
They separated Natalie from the rest of us.
An ambulance took Mom to the hospital.
I went with her.
Maria followed in another car.
My brother Michael did not answer his phone.
That was not a coincidence.
At the hospital, doctors stabilized Mom and reviewed her medications.
Several things were wrong.
Her prescribed medicine had been given inconsistently.
Some doses were missing.
Others had apparently been substituted with harmless-looking supplements that did nothing for her actual condition.
The orange juice contained a substance investigators needed to analyze.
The doctor would not speculate.
Neither would I.
But one thing was obvious.
Natalie had no legitimate reason to hide anything inside Mom’s drink.
I sat beside Mom.
“What property were they talking about?”
She looked exhausted.
“The lake acreage.”
I knew it.
One hundred and eighty acres along Lake Hartwell.
My father bought it forty years ago.
He refused every developer.
“Too beautiful.”
That was his entire argument.
After he died, Mom inherited it.
I assumed she planned to keep it.
Michael apparently knew something I didn’t.
“What development deal?”
Mom looked away.
“I found out three months ago.”
A private resort company had offered forty-two million dollars for the land.
More if zoning approval went through.
My stomach tightened.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You never cared about the land.”
That was true.
“What did Michael want?”
“To sell.”
“And you said no.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because your father didn’t want it sold.”
I nodded.
That sounded like Mom.
But there was more.
“I was going to place it into conservation.”
That explained Michael’s panic.
If Mom transferred development rights into a conservation trust, the deal vanished permanently.
“When did Natalie find out?”
Mom’s face changed.
“I don’t know.”
Maria answered from the doorway.
“Mr. Michael told her.”
We both looked at her.
“How do you know?”
Maria had overheard arguments.
She described one from three weeks earlier.
Michael:
If Evelyn signs the conservation papers, the land is dead money forever.
Natalie:
Then stop her.
Michael:
Andrew will ask questions.
Natalie:
Andrew trusts me.
I closed my eyes.
There it was.
My trust.
Used as cover.
Then Mom said:
“There’s another reason.”
“What?”
She looked at me.
“The land isn’t really mine anymore.”
I frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“Your father created a transfer-on-death trust.”
“To who?”
Mom hesitated.
Then:
“Your daughter.”
I stared.
“I don’t have a daughter.”
Mom closed her eyes.
May you like
“Yes, you do.”
That was the second time that day my understanding of my family collapsed.
