“Being undercover?”
“Yes. It was a major rush for me. Back then, I liked being in the in crowd and invited to those frenzied parties. It was true that I liked the action and the excitement, the loud music, the dancing like there was no tomorrow, but I never drank. I never did drugs. I never wanted to be out of control in that way. But I liked watching other people. And I was good at the details. And it made me a good undercover cop.”
“So did you actually go to college?”
“Not at first. I did later. Back then you went to college for real and I pretended so I could bust drug dealers and criminals.”
A lightbulb went off in Isabelle’s head. “Which was why your ‘concerts’ really were important.”
Ari smiled. “It was difficult for me not to tell you. I wanted to. There wasn’t really anyone else I could tell.”
“Right. Mom and Dad were gone. We were never close to any of Dad’s family except Gran.”
Ari sat up. “I’m sorry I left you with her right before she died. Then I couldn’t get back for the funeral because of the job I was working on. I know all of that was very difficult. I didn’t realize how much so until recently.”
Isabelle went past the second part and asked, “Did Gran ever know about you being in law enforcement?” Was that why she was so proud of you?
“No! Not even close.” Ari rocked back in her chair, put both hands over her eyes, and sighed. “I got caught up in the new job I had. After some training, I started moving around to different places for work.”
“I know. I got your postcards. Honestly, I appreciated them, as corny and cliché as they were. I was still glad to know you were alive and okay even though we never talked.”
Ari put her wine glass down, crossed her arms, and said, “I know she hurt you, Isabelle. I didn’t realize the extent of the infliction until a few months ago.” And the elephant in the room finally gets noticed.
“A few months ago. I don’t understand. It’s been almost ten years. What did you find out recently?”
“When Gran died, she left some inheritance money to me. At that particular time I didn’t really have a home base. I moved around a lot, but someone got a hold of me on the phone, telling me I had to do something with it. So I had the balance transferred to a trust to hold it until I was ready to cash it in. I figured you’d already claimed your part.”
Isabelle closed her eyes, absorbing the pain of getting left out of the inheritance completely. Maybe she’d finally find out why.
“A few months ago, I got a message from some ancient lawyer who’d apparently handled an addendum to Gran’s will.”
“Addendum? What addendum?”
“The one that added you to the will, Isabelle. Gran never intended to leave you out.”
Isabelle tilted her head to one side. “You’re going to have to explain that to me.”
“Okay. Here it is. When we were born, it turns out that you were underweight, and a bit sickly for a newborn. You spent over a month in the hospital before getting to come home. Turns out the doctors didn’t initially think you’d survive for some reason.”
Isabelle frowned. She remembered her parents mentioning the early hospital stay, but not like it was life or death.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Honestly, I didn’t either. Apparently, the week after we were born, Gran was so excited to finally have a granddaughter, she had her will amended to add me to it, but at that time you weren’t expected to survive. So you weren’t added right away.”
“But I did survive.”
“And on our first birthday, Gran added the addendum to put you in her will.”
“Why am I just finding this out now?”
Ari sighed. “Because she had a falling out with the original lawyer, and set up the addendum with a completely different lawyer. In a different city. The guy didn’t even know she’d passed away until a few months ago. The original lawyer filed his will, but the addendum wasn’t processed because no one knew about it.”
“Why a different lawyer in a different city?”
“Who knows? Anyway, I got a message that the addendum can be enforced up to ten years after the original will. The money given to me, that I put in trust, was always supposed to be divided equally between us. Gran’s only two granddaughters.”
Isabelle’s heart thudded hard in her chest. Tears erupted before she could stop them. “I didn’t want the money.”
Ari moved to sit next to her, pulling her hair back and hugging her tight like when they were little. “I know. I’m so sorry about what happened. You must have felt very left out, but it was never intended to be that way. If Mom and Dad had been alive, they would have known, but as it was…”