Six Months Later.
The ribbon-cutting ceremony was modest, just the way Nana Rose would have liked it.
I stood in the lobby of the newly renovated wing of the city’s Veterans’ Legal Aid Clinic. The air smelled of fresh paint and hope.
On the wall, a bronze plaque shone under the recessed lighting: The Nana Rose Center for Justice.
I had kept enough of the inheritance to pay off my own law school loans and buy a small house near the base. The rest—nearly four million dollars—I had donated here.
It was a fund specifically designed to provide free legal defense for elderly veterans and their spouses who were victims of financial fraud and familial abuse.
It was poetic justice. My parents had tried to steal from an old woman; now, that woman’s money would stop people like them forever.
My phone rang in my pocket. I pulled it out. It was a call from a blocked number.
I knew who it was. My parents had lost their house three months ago. My father avoided jail time by pleading guilty to a lesser charge, but his reputation was destroyed. My mother was living with her sister in Ohio. They called me once a week, asking for a loan, asking for “just a little help until we get back on our feet.”
I watched a young law student helping a homeless Vietnam vet fill out a disability claim form. The vet was crying, thanking the student.
I looked at the phone.
I didn’t answer. I pressed the “Block Caller” button.
My grandmother didn’t leave me the money because I manipulated her. She left it to me because she knew I was the only one strong enough to do the right thing with it. She knew I wouldn’t spend it on fur coats or gambling. She knew I would turn it into a weapon for good.
As I walked out of the clinic into the bright afternoon sunlight, I put on my sunglasses. A black sedan was waiting for me at the curb.
“Airport, Major?” the driver asked.
“Yes,” I said, sliding into the back seat. “I have a flight to catch. Germany.”
There was a new case waiting for me in Stuttgart. A complicated fraud ring targeting junior enlisted soldiers. I was the lead prosecutor.
I opened my laptop as the car merged onto the highway. The file was already open.
The court of family drama was finally closed. The real work—the work that mattered, the work that defined me—was waiting.
I typed my login password and got to work.
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