Fallon's attorney was named Simone Hart.
She worked in a small office above a bookstore.
I drove Fallon there Monday morning, then waited in the car.
She had asked me to attend the meeting.
Simone had suggested they begin privately.
I was relieved.
For too much of our lives, other people had answered questions for my sister.
After an hour, Fallon came outside holding a legal pad.
She climbed into the passenger seat without speaking.
I started the engine.
“Where would you like to go?”
“Coffee.”
We drove to a café near the park.
She ordered hot chocolate and a sandwich.
I ordered tea.
She opened the legal pad.
“Simone says I need a full account of everything Cashin signed using my name.”
“That sounds sensible.”
“She also says being married doesn't mean I automatically agreed to his business statements.”
“Correct.”
“But I did sign the house application.”
“Then she needs the complete file to understand what it means.”
Fallon folded the page back.
“I told her about Thanksgiving.”
“What did she say?”
“She asked me why I signed a transfer I didn't understand.”
I waited.
“I said because Dad told me to.”
Fallon looked across the café at a toddler dropping crackers from a highchair.
“I heard how ridiculous that sounded.”
I did not correct her.
She was learning something she needed to hear in her own voice.
Simone had also reviewed the proposed condo purchase, the investor presentation, and the assignment documents.
Her advice was cautious.
Do not sign additional papers.
Do not make new representations about ownership.
Preserve texts and emails.
Speak truthfully to any lender or lawyer who asks.
Fallon told me these points one by one.
Then she asked about the company I had built.
“Did Dad really take your college savings?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“Enough that I postponed school and worked longer hours.”
“Mom said you refused college because you thought you were too smart.”
I looked at her.
“I wanted to study textile engineering. I took courses part time and finished later.”
She stared into her drink.
“That's not what I was told.”
“I'm sure it wasn't.”
For years, family history had been edited whenever it threatened our parents' preferred story.
My father had once claimed he bought my first industrial machine.
In reality, I had bought it using a purchase order advance and a loan from an equipment supplier.
He had signed one guaranty while the original LLC was still in his name.
That help mattered.
It did not make him the inventor.
My mother had claimed she handled payroll when the business was young.
She had mailed checks twice.
Nora, who later became our chief financial officer, had built the actual accounting controls.
Each family story contained one small truth stretched until it hid everything else.
Fallon looked up.
“Did you ever think about telling me the whole thing?”
“Hundreds of times.”
“Why didn't you?”
“Whenever I tried, you said I was jealous because Dad liked you better.”
Her eyes filled.
“I was awful to you.”
“Sometimes.”
“More than sometimes.”
“Yes.”
She laughed bitterly.
“I thought you would deny it.”
“I'm trying not to pretend anymore.”
On our way home, we stopped at the workshop archive.
I had a reason.
Simone had asked Fallon to gather documents relevant to the assignment, and I wanted her to understand which records she could lawfully request through counsel rather than taking files herself.
I showed her our public annual reports and archived product brochures.
There was a photograph from our first industry trade show.
I was twenty-two, wearing a jacket borrowed from Nora.
Behind me stood a display made from plywood and printed banners.
Fallon studied it.
“Dad told us that booth cost a fortune.”
“It did, relative to our savings.”
“He said he paid for it.”
“A regional grant covered most of the fees. Nora and I paid travel costs.”
She touched the frame.
“I remember you coming home with a suitcase full of samples.”
“I sold enough that week to hire our third employee.”
“Why didn't you celebrate?”
“I tried. Dad said it wasn't real until I turned a profit.”
She looked away.
I did not ask her to defend him.
There was nothing useful to defend.
Before the call, Fallon asked me to help make an inventory of the things she had brought from home.
There were two suitcases, a laptop, a folder of medical records, and a jewelry case.
She placed each item on the guest bed.
“Simone said I should make sure I have my own identification and access to my personal records,” she explained.
“Good advice.”
She lifted a small envelope from the jewelry case.
Inside was a photograph from our childhood.
Fallon and I stood beside a homemade tent in the backyard.
I was holding a ruler.
She had a paintbrush.
The tent was made from old sheets and a broom handle.
“What were we doing?” she asked.
“Selling tickets to a pretend theater.”
She laughed.
“I remember. You made the tickets and I painted the scenery.”
“Mom made us take it down before dinner.”
“Dad said it made the yard look untidy.”
We looked at the photograph together.
We had not always been enemies.
We had once invented games that required both of us.
I had made plans and counted money.
Fallon had imagined characters and painted signs.
Neither skill was more important to our imaginary theater.
Later, when our parents began comparing us, we treated every achievement as something only one sister could possess.
I had become the hardworking one.
She became the charming one.
The labels had been convenient for our parents.
They had been damaging for both of us.
“Do you ever miss that?” Fallon asked.
“The theater?”
“Us.”
I sat on the edge of the bed.
“Sometimes.”
She put down the picture.
“I thought you looked down on me.”
“I looked down on the way you treated people when you wanted to impress Dad.”
She nodded slowly.
“That's worse than I hoped.”
“I don't think you're incapable, Fallon. I think you were rewarded for not trying anything difficult.”
She looked toward the window.
“I did try things.”
“I know. You had a small design business for a while.”
“Dad said it was pointless.”
“He said the same about my company.”
She stared at me.
Then she laughed without humor.
“I thought he only said that because he wanted you to work harder.”
“He may have wanted both of us to depend on his judgment.”
Fallon took a breath.
“I don't want Iris to grow up thinking she has to please one person to be worth something.”
I watched her fold the photograph into a clean envelope.
“You can make different choices.”
She nodded.
“I'm going to try.”
We finished organizing the documents.
She placed the identification in her handbag and the financial papers in a separate folder for Simone.
I reminded her to store digital copies securely and to ask her attorney about access to any shared records.
She thanked me for being practical.
“That used to annoy me,” she admitted.
“It used to annoy me too, when people made me do it.”
I went downstairs to make tea while she called our mother.
The conversation lasted only a few minutes.
When Fallon emerged, she was pale.
“Mom says I'm choosing you over the family,” she said.
“You are choosing to understand documents before signing them.”
“She says you talked me into distrusting Cashin.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I didn't need either of you to decide what I think.”
I smiled.
“That sounds like a reasonable answer.”
She took her cup of tea and looked at the photograph on the table.
“I might frame this for the baby's room,” she said.
“I think she'd like it.”
“I want her to know we used to make things together.”
“You can tell her the truth. We also fought over who got to use the blue paint.”
Fallon laughed.
“That was because you never cleaned the brush.”
For a short while, the house felt like a place two sisters could sit without keeping score.
At the house that evening, Fallon called our mother.
I could hear Genevieve's voice through the doorway.
“Come home,” she said. “Your sister is manipulating you.”
“I met with my own lawyer,” Fallon answered.
“You don't need a lawyer against family.”
“I do when I've signed papers I don't understand.”
“Our father knows what he's doing.”
“Then why did he say I would run Sutton's company when I can't?”
There was a long silence.
Genevieve said something I couldn't hear.
Fallon replied, “I'm not discussing Sutton's attitude. I'm asking about the documents.”
The call ended.
Fallon came into the kitchen.
“She says I'm upsetting the baby.”
“Have you spoken to your doctor about how you're feeling?”
“Yes. I have a regular appointment next week. I'm physically okay.”
“Good.”
She sat at the table and examined the edge of a place mat.
“Dad always said you were difficult.”
“I know.”
“He said I was the easy one.”
I poured her water.
“Easy for whom?”
She looked at me.
It was the first time she seemed to consider the question.
Before she packed her suitcase, she helped me put the kitchen back in order.
We washed cups and wiped the counters.
She asked where I kept the extra towels.
I showed her the linen closet.
“It's strange,” she said. “I used to think you had staff doing everything here.”
“I have a cleaner who comes twice a week. The rest is mostly me.”
“Dad said you had a household manager.”
“He hasn't been here enough to know.”
She shook her head.
“I believed so many things because I wanted him to approve of me.”
I handed her a folded towel.
“You can ask people directly from now on.”
She put it away.
“Even when the answer might make me uncomfortable?”
“Especially then.”
We finished cleaning without talking about ownership.
The quiet work gave us something to do with our hands while we considered what had happened.
When the kitchen was tidy, she looked pleased.
It was an ordinary contribution to an ordinary evening.
Neither of us needed to win anything from it.
I wanted to ask Fallon whether the old photograph changed what she believed about us.
But I chose not to demand an answer.
We had spent years being told what our feelings ought to mean.
She was entitled to make sense of her memories in her own time.
I put another clean towel beside the guest bed and gave her a spare key for the afternoon.
She returned it before she left.
Neither of us made a ceremony of that small act of trust.
Still, I was glad we had managed it.
That night she decided to stay with a friend rather than remain in my guest room.
It was her own decision.
She thanked me for the temporary shelter.
Before leaving, she stopped beside the boxed crib.
“Is that for the baby?”
“Yes.”
She touched the corner of the package.
“You bought it before Thanksgiving?”
“In October.”
Her eyes filled again.
“You thought I'd let you meet her?”
“I hoped so.”
She swallowed.
“I don't know what happens next.”
“Neither do I.”
She took the blankets but left the crib until she had an address where it could be delivered.
I watched her drive away.
Then I went inside and found a voicemail from Kenneth, my father's attorney.
He asked Elena to return his call as soon as possible.
The investor had now demanded written assurances that the presentation would not be used again.
And Cashin was threatening to sue anyone who questioned his authority.
The family conflict was becoming a public business problem again.
Click here to continue reading: PART 8: The Board Reviewed the Threats While a Real Customer Needed Our Attention
The Seven O’Clock Message Revealed What My Father Had Actually Given Away
Part 7 of 12
