I had tried. God knows I had tried. When Sophie wanted to go to an out-of-state university, I took double shifts at the auto-parts factory, working until my knuckles bled and my back felt like it was snapping in half. When she needed a deposit for her first apartment, I sold my father’s vintage watch. I lived on canned soup and instant coffee for months just so she would never feel the sting of poverty.
And tonight, she had looked at me covered in filth, and she had laughed. She had validated the cruelty of a man she had known for barely two years over the father who had bled for her for twenty-six.
By the time I reached my small apartment in the valley, my phone was vibrating incessantly in the cup holder.
The screen lit up with Jasper’s name. Then Sophie’s. Then Jasper’s again.
I didn’t answer. I walked into my apartment, stripped off the disgusting clothes, threw them straight into a trash bag, and spent a full hour under a scalding hot shower, scrubbing my skin until it was raw. But no matter how much soap I used, I could still smell the rot. Not from the garbage—but from the realization of what my daughter had become.
After dressing in clean sweats, I walked over to the small study desk in the corner of my living room. I unlocked the bottom drawer and pulled out a thick, legal-sized manila envelope. Inside was a document stamped by one of the most prestigious estate-planning law firms in New York City.
