He looked at the window, then at the three guns now pointed at him.

“I didn’t do anything,” Ethan said.

His voice cracked, losing its hard edge.

“She signed the deed,” he said, pointing the barrel of his gun toward me.

“She signed it over to the trust.”

“That is a lie, and you know it,” Daniel Voss said.

Daniel did not flinch, even though the gun was still near his line of sight.

“Drop the weapon,” Deputy Miller said, stepping fully onto the attic floor.

“Now.”

For a second, nobody moved.

The only sound was the wind rattling the loose panes of the dormer window.

Then, Ethan’s shoulders slumped.

The gun slipped from his fingers, clattering loudly against the bare pine wood.

An officer lunged forward, grabbing Ethan’s arm and forcing him to the floor.

Ethan’s face pressed against the dusty wood as the officer pulled his wrists behind his back.

The metallic click of the handcuffs was sharp and final.

“We have one suspect in custody,” Miller said into the radio pinned to his shoulder.

Megan sank onto a old wooden trunk, her face buried in her hands.