Now, the sun had barely cleared the pine trees the next morning when I loaded the children into the Buick. The blue folder Alicia had left on our dining room table sat between the front seats like an unpaid bill.
Ethan did not look at it once during the drive down State Road 200, keeping his eyes fixed on the flat stretch of asphalt ahead. Sophie kept her fingers busy, folding her hair behind her left ear over and over as she stared out the passenger window.
We pulled into the parking lot of the strip mall where Caroline kept her office, right between a dry cleaner and a vacuum repair shop. The vinyl sign on her window was peeling at the corners, but the brass lock on her door was clean and bright.
Caroline was already waiting for us, her desk piled high with yellow legal pads and manila folders. She did not offer us coffee or ask how we had slept, which was her way of showing she understood the gravity of why we were there.
I set the blue folder on the dark wood of her desk and pushed it forward.
“Now, she came to the house yesterday,” I said, twisting my silver wedding ring around my finger.
Caroline did not reach for the folder immediately. She pulled a small blue cloth from her cardigan pocket and began to polish her reading glasses, holding them up to the fluorescent light.
“Did she speak to the children?” Caroline asked, her voice slow and even.
“She told us we belonged to her family,” Ethan said, his voice quiet but steady.
Caroline put her glasses on and drew the blue folder toward her, untying the white string that kept it closed. She turned the first two pages in silence, her finger tracing the typed lines.
“This is not a standard inquiry,” Caroline said, looking up at me.
“What is it then?” Sophie asked, leaning forward so quickly her knees bumped the edge of the desk.
Caroline turned the page over, showing us a seal from a probate court in Hartford, Connecticut.
“It is a petition to clarify the heirs of a trust,” Caroline said, pointing to a bold line near the bottom.
“Does she want us to move there?” Ethan asked, his knuckles cracking under the edge of the table.
“She wants your signatures,” Caroline said. “And she wants them before the end of the month.”
She stood up, gesturing for us to follow her into the narrow back room where she kept her reference library. The air in the back room was cooler, smelling of old leather and the pine floor cleaner the janitor used on Tuesday nights.
Caroline pulled a thick, black-bound volume of state probate laws from the shelf and laid it open on a long folding table. She began to turn the thin pages, her fingers searching for a specific section on out-of-state direct descendants.
“Now, Caroline, what does the law say about a mother who walked away eighteen years ago?” I asked.
“The law says many things, Margaret, but the courts in Connecticut care about the donor’s intent,” Caroline said, her eyes scanning the tiny print.
“Our grandfather’s intent,” Sophie said, her voice sharp as she watched Caroline’s finger stop on a paragraph.
“Exactly,” Caroline said. “The late Mr. Sterling draft-proofed his estate with a very specific clause.”
She tapped the page with her pen, looking at the twins.
“Is the grandfather’s estate really worth millions?” Sophie asked.
“The petition mentions a trust fund and three parcels of commercial real estate,” Caroline said, looking at me over her glasses. “But the loophole is right here in the definition of direct descendants.”
“What does it mean for us?” Ethan asked.
