THE HEIR'S REVENGE

chapter 96

I came home that evening with nothing left inside me.

Not in a bad way exactly. Just empty. The way you feel after carrying something heavy for a long distance and finally putting it down. My arms felt lighter but everything else in me felt tired in a deep way that sleep alone could not fix.

I went straight to the study.

I did not turn on the big light. I just sat in the chair near the window with the small lamp on and looked out at the garden. The butterfly garlands were moving slowly in the evening wind. I watched them without really watching them. My mind was somewhere else.

I kept hearing Marcus's voice in my head.

I had built a life. Everything I had was connected to my wife. I was not willing to pay that price.

I thought about how strange it was to finally hear the truth from him. For so many years I had wanted him to say something honest to me. Even one sentence. And today he had said many honest things in front of strangers in a courtroom but it still did not feel like enough.

Maybe nothing would ever feel like enough.

I sat there for a long time without moving.

Then I heard small footsteps outside the door.

Lily pushed the door open slowly. She was already in her pajamas. Her hair was a little messy from her bath. She had her rabbit under one arm and her notebook under the other.

She did not say anything.

She just walked in and sat down on the floor near my chair the way she always did when she wanted to be close to me but did not want to make a big deal out of it.

She opened her notebook.

She picked up her purple crayon.

She started drawing.

I watched her for a while. The way her tongue stuck out slightly when she was concentrating. The way she held the crayon too tightly because her hands were still small.

We did not talk.

The house was very quiet around us. I could hear Henry somewhere downstairs moving things in the kitchen. The fire in the small fireplace cracked softly.

After a long time Lily stopped drawing.

She held up her notebook without looking at me.

I looked at the page.

It was a drawing of a woman. Simple lines, the way Lily always drew people. But there was something careful about this one. The hair was dark and curled gently at the shoulders. The eyes were kind, even though they were just two small circles with dots inside them. There was a small smile on the woman's face.

"I drew her how I imagined she looked," Lily said quietly.

I looked at the drawing for a long time.

My chest felt tight.

"That is exactly how she looked," I said.

Lily looked up at me then. She studied my face the way she always did, checking to see if I really meant what I said.

She must have seen that I did because she nodded once, satisfied.

She tore the page out of her notebook carefully along the edge so it would not rip wrong. Then she placed it gently on my desk, right in the middle, where I would see it first thing in the morning.

She did not ask for it back.

She just turned back to her notebook and started a new drawing. This one looked like it was going to be a butterfly.

I picked up the drawing of my mother and held it carefully in both hands.

I looked at the kind eyes Lily had drawn. The gentle curve of the hair. The small smile.

I thought about how Lily had never met my mother. She knew her only through the stories I had told. A few small details mentioned here and there over months. White flowers. A necklace. A woman who hummed while she worked.

And from those small pieces Lily had built this. A whole face. A whole feeling.

She had given my mother a face that I had been trying to remember clearly for years and could never quite hold onto.

"Thank you," I said softly.

Lily did not look up from her butterfly.

"You're welcome," she said simply, like it was the most normal thing in the world.

Henry came to the door a few minutes later with a tray. Tea for me. Warm milk for Lily. He set both down without saying anything and looked at the drawing on my desk.

He looked at it for a long moment.

Then he looked at me.

"She has her grandmother's eyes," he said quietly. "Your mother's eyes, I mean. Lily got the shape exactly right. I do not know how. She never saw a photograph."

I looked at the drawing again.

He was right. I had not noticed it before but now I could not unsee it. The shape of the eyes Lily had drawn matched something I remembered but had never been able to describe out loud.

"Maybe she just knows things," I said.

"Maybe," Henry agreed.

He picked up the empty cup from earlier and left quietly, the way he always did when he felt a moment did not need him standing in it any longer.

Lily finished her butterfly and held it up for me to see.

"This one is for tomorrow," she said. "Tomorrow is supposed to be about grandpa, right? Henry told me they were going to read his journal in court."

"Yes," I said. "Tomorrow is about him."

She nodded seriously, like she was filing this information away for later use.

"He liked butterflies too?" she asked.

I thought about it.

I did not actually know if Richard Blackwell had liked butterflies. I had never had the chance to ask him. We had only had a few minutes together before he died.

But I thought about his eleven years of searching. About never giving up. About hope that kept getting knocked down and getting back up again.

"I think he would have liked this one very much," I said.