The inheritance had destroyed Brandon’s plan because the moment Vernon’s trust vested, I became someone his creditors couldn’t reach through their scheme. I finally remembered the uncle behind the fortune. Vernon had owned Aldridge Freight, a small trucking company with four tractors and eleven drivers. When I was nineteen, he let me work in his office for a summer. I discovered $31,000 in duplicate fuel charges that a dispatcher had been stealing. Vernon made me a sandwich, told me to check the numbers twice, and then reminded me to check the person. For seventeen years, I sent him Christmas letters. He rarely replied with anything but a folded twenty-dollar bill.

His trust letter explained everything. Vernon had trusted only two people in his life, and I was the only one who had ever asked how he was doing. The money wasn’t a reward, he wrote. It was a tool, and he hoped I would use it better than he had. Meanwhile, Ruth challenged the fraudulent divorce. In November, the court vacated the judgment after reviewing the examiner’s report. Brandon pleaded guilty in January to forgery, perjury, and filing a fraudulent instrument. He received eighteen months of supervised probation and an $87,000 restitution order. He also lost the job he had held for nine years.