“I want her name off everything,” my father said to the representative. “Every single cent.”

When he hung up, he looked at me.

“She has her own credit cards,” he said. “The ones I pay for.”

“Did you cancel them?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said. “They are gone.”

He stood up, his face set like concrete.

“I’m going home to talk to your mother,” he said.

“Do you want me to come?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “This is between us.”

He walked out of my apartment, leaving the damp smell of rain and soot behind.

Over the next three weeks, my family fell apart.

My father did not just freeze the accounts; he hired a divorce lawyer.

He moved his things out of the house they had shared for thirty-five years and into a cheap motel near the warehouse.

My mother called me thirty times the first day, screaming into the voicemail about how I had ruined the family.

She called me a liar, a bitter sister who was jealous of Megan’s attention.

But the evidence Lauren provided was undeniable.