“Where?” I asked. “A notary in Downtown L.A. I’m on my way there now. Don’t go into the ballroom, Diane. We need to catch them in the act.” I looked at the envelope in my hands. “No. First, they’re going to see me.” I hung up.
I walked toward the stage. My dad saw me when I was already ten feet away. His smile dropped instantly. Carol went white. Lily stopped posing for a photo. I walked up the steps without trembling. “Good evening,” I said into the microphone. The band stopped playing. Everyone turned around.
My dad approached quickly. “Get down from there, Diane.” “Why? Don’t you want to show off your other daughter too?” A murmur rippled through the hall. I pulled out my test result and held it up. “98.7th percentile. I did get in. I lied to see what my father would do when he thought he could no longer use me.”
Carol clenched her jaw. My dad tried to snatch the paper from me, but I stepped back. “And it worked. He kicked me out of the house. Just as he planned.” Lily’s face changed. “Dad?” He turned to her. “Don’t listen to this nonsense.”
Then I played the audio. Carol’s voice came through the small Bluetooth speaker I had hidden in my purse. “Diane just turned eighteen, Arthur. You can finally take the house her mother left her.” The entire ballroom froze. Then my dad’s voice played: “When she fails the exam, I’ll kick her out. She’ll realize that she’s worth nothing without me.” Someone gasped, “Oh, no.”
Carol tried to step forward, but Aunt Susan appeared by my side like a brick wall. “Don’t even think about it.” My dad lowered his voice. “Diane, turn that off. You’re making a fool of yourself.” “No. Making a fool of yourself is sending a stranger to sign for me while you toast to Lily.”
Lily dropped her glass. It shattered on the floor. “What?” My dad looked at me with pure hatred. The mask was entirely gone. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” “Yes, I do. And so does Mr. Sanders.”
At that moment, a man in a gray suit rushed into the ballroom, holding his cell phone. It was my mom’s lawyer. Behind him were two police officers and a woman from the District Attorney’s office. The silence turned into fear. “Arthur Reynolds,” the lawyer said, “we need you to come with us.” My dad tried to laugh. “This is a family party.” “No,” I said. “This was a family trap.”
