He had clearly gone down to his study, taken whatever sedative he mistakenly thought he hadn’t consumed, or perhaps the sheer exhaustion of the night combined with his own medication had finally knocked him out.

But he wasn’t alone. Standing over him, looking wildly around the room, was Kimberly.

She was fully dressed in black, clutching a thick manila folder and a small leather lockbox. “Dad?” she hissed, kicking his shoe. “Dad, get up! They’re going to be here in ten minutes.” My blood ran cold. They? I quietly hurried down the stairs, adrenaline completely overriding my fear.

“Kimberly,” I said sharply as I stepped into the light. She violently jumped, dropping the lockbox. It hit the floor and popped open, spilling thick stacks of hundred-dollar bills and several pieces of heavy, antique jewelry across the rug. My jewelry. The heirlooms my grandmother had left me, which I kept in a locked safe in my and Nathan’s bedroom.

Kimberly’s face drained of all color. “Hannah? What are you doing awake? You’re supposed to be asleep!” “What is going on?” I demanded, stepping closer. I looked down at the folder she was still clutching. “Why do you have my things? And why did your father try to drug me?” Kimberly backed up, cornered.

The spoiled, entitled girl was gone, replaced by a terrified, desperate young woman. She looked at her unconscious father, then back at me, and finally broke down. “He didn’t want to hurt you,” she sobbed, the words tumbling out of her in a chaotic rush.

“He just needed you to sleep heavily so you wouldn’t hear the appraisers. Hannah, we’re broke. The family is completely bankrupt.” I stared at her, unable to process the words. “Bankrupt?

Walter’s pension…” “Is gone,” Kimberly interrupted, wiping at her eyes. “He made terrible investments years ago.

He took out massive loans to keep up the country club facade, to pay for my cars, to keep Mom living the lifestyle she expects. But it wasn’t enough. Six months ago, he started quietly taking out loans in Nathan’s name. When those ran dry, he looked at your accounts.” My stomach bottomed out.

“He can’t touch my accounts. Nathan and I signed a pre-nup to protect my inheritance.” “I know,” Kimberly whispered, looking down at the scattered jewelry. “That’s why he needed the physical assets. He hired some men from the city. They deal in black market antiques.

They were supposed to come tonight, appraise your grandmother’s jewelry, and pay him in cash so he could stop the bank from foreclosing on this house on Monday. He put a heavy prescription sleeping pill in your juice so you wouldn’t wake up when I picked the lock to your bedroom safe.” The magnitude of the betrayal washed over me like ice water.

The “perfect” Anderson family was nothing but a hollow shell of lies, built on fraud and theft.