“What?” she said. “What do you mean sell the house?”
I held her gaze.
“I saw him,” I said. “Monday. In the backyard. With a man in a suit. Talking about square footage. Including my workshop in the deal.”
Shelby turned to Tyson.
“Tell me that’s not true.”
Tyson hesitated.
That was all the answer she needed.
“You said we were just fixing things up,” she whispered.
“I was,” he said quickly. “I was exploring options. For us. For a better future.”
“With my house?” I asked.
He ignored me.
Shelby stood up now, anger rising through her shock.
“You were going to sell my mother’s house without telling me?”
“I was going to handle it,” he snapped. “You worry too much. I had a buyer interested.”
I stepped closer to the table.
“And how exactly were you planning to sell a property that isn’t in your name?”
That stopped him.
For a moment, he had nothing.
Then he said, quieter:
“I would’ve figured it out.”
That was it.
That was the moment something inside Shelby finally broke.
“Figured it out?” she repeated. “Like you figured out how to spend her money? Or how to lie to me every day?”
“Shelby—”
“No,” she said, stepping back. “No, don’t.”
Her eyes filled with tears, but her voice held steady.
“You told me she was controlling. That she didn’t trust you. That she made things up.”
Tyson looked around the room, suddenly aware of the audience he had brought into this.
“This isn’t the time—”
“No,” Shelby said again. “This is exactly the time.”
She held up the paper.
“One hundred fifty-three thousand dollars,” she said. “Do you even understand what that means?”
Tyson stayed silent.
“That’s her life,” she said, her voice breaking now. “That’s everything she worked for.”
