Chapter 5: Thirty Days
She stayed that night in a hotel two blocks from Gerald's office.
It was a plain room — a bed, a desk, a window overlooking a car park — but she slept better than she had in three years.
She didn't dream.
She woke up before her alarm and lay still in the quiet for a long moment, listening to nothing.
Her phone had twelve missed calls by morning.
Seven from her father.
Four from Diane.
One from her stepsister, Keira, which surprised her.
She called Gerald first.
"The notice goes out today," he said.
"Certified mail, hand delivery to the property.
Your father will have it by this afternoon."
"How do you think he'll react?"
"In my experience," Gerald said, "people react to this kind of news in one of two ways.
They go very quiet, or they go very loud."
"He'll go loud," Nora said.
"Diane will make sure of that."
She was right.
Her father called at 2:14 in the afternoon.
She answered on the third ring.
"What have you done?" His voice was tight in a way she recognized — the voice he used when he was frightened but needed to sound angry instead.
"I haven't done anything, Dad.
I signed documents that were already prepared.
By Mum.
Eleven years ago."
"That's not — that's not possible.
Your mother didn't have — "
"She did.
She had everything.
She just didn't tell you." Nora sat down on the edge of the hotel bed.
"Gerald Hartwell has been holding the trust since before you married Diane.
The house is mine.
It was always mine."
A long silence.
"You're a child," he said.
"You don't understand what you're doing."
"I'm twenty-six, Dad."
"You're going to tear this family apart over — "
"You threw me out," Nora said.
"Last night.
At dinner.
In front of everyone.
Diane screamed at me to get out and you sat there and said nothing.
You've been saying nothing for three years." Her voice was steady.
She had not planned for it to be steady, but it was.
"I didn't tear anything apart.
I just stopped pretending it wasn't already broken."
Another silence.
Longer this time.
"Diane didn't mean it like that," he said.
"She was upset.
Keira needed the room and — "
"The house is mine," Nora said.
"You have thirty days to respond to the notice.
Gerald's contact information is on the letter.
I'd suggest you use it."
She ended the call.
Her hands were shaking slightly.
She pressed them flat on her knees until they stopped.
Diane's response came not by phone but by showing up.
Nora was in Gerald's office the following morning when his receptionist knocked and said there was a woman in the lobby who was refusing to leave.
Diane walked in without being invited.
She was dressed carefully — heels, a blazer, the kind of outfit that said *I am a serious person* — but her face was doing something her outfit couldn't control.
"I want to talk to you," she said to Nora.
"Alone."
"Anything you want to say to me, you can say in front of Gerald."
Diane's jaw tightened.
She looked at Gerald, then back at Nora.
"Fine." She sat down in the chair across from Nora without being offered it.
"I want to know what it's going to take."
"For what?"
"For you to walk away from this.
From the house.
From whatever your mother set up." She opened her handbag and placed a folded cheque on the desk.
"Your father and I talked last night.
We're prepared to be reasonable."
Nora looked at the cheque.
She didn't pick it up.
"You came here to buy me out of my own mother's house."
"I came here to offer you a fair settlement so we can all move on like adults."
"You threw a glass at my face four days ago," Nora said.
"The cut is still there.
You can see it."
Diane's eyes moved to Nora's forehead and away again, very quickly.
"Keira didn't mean to hjt you.
It was an accident."
"It wasn't an accident.
And you laughed."
The room was very quiet.
Diane leaned forward.
When she spoke again, her voice had dropped, and the careful tone was gone.
"Listen to me.
You have no idea how much this is going to cost you if you push it.
Your father will contest the trust.
We will find grounds.
We will make this ugly and long and expensive, and you will spend every penny your mother left you fighting us in court while we stay in that house." She sat back.
"Take the cheque.
Start your life somewhere else.
That's the smart choice."
Nora looked at her for a long moment.
Then she looked at Gerald.
"Did you get that?" she asked.
Gerald reached over and pressed stop on the small digital recorder sitting on the corner of his desk.
He had turned it on when Diane walked through the door.
May you like
"Every word," he said.
Diane's face went white.
