Later, Emmett and I sat together on the deck while the guests slowly left. He did not apologize immediately, and strangely, I respected that. He sat quietly for a long time before admitting he had known for months that something was wrong. He had told himself it was manageable because he was afraid to look directly at what was happening. Then he asked me whether I was going to make them leave.

I told him I did not know yet. I had signed the eviction notice to make the consequences real, not because I had already decided how the story would end. What happened next depended on what he was willing to do, and that was not the same thing as what Marguerite was willing to do. The following week, Emmett contacted a family lawyer. Marguerite hired her own attorney, while the forgery investigation continued. Coralie said little publicly, but much of what she privately admitted eventually reached me.