My father threw me out on my eighteenth birthday, stole the $3,000 I’d saved from working after school, and used it for my stepbrother. Nine days later, while I was digging through a restaurant dumpster for something to eat, a stranger in an expensive suit called my name and told me my supposedly dead grandfather had left me everything. But there was one condition nobody had warned me about.

The designation had been filed two months before my mother died.

Richard’s voice softened.

“Your mother may have opened a separate account and named herself as beneficiary of the trust funds.”

I looked at my father.

“Did you know about this?”

“No.”

“Did Grandpa?”

“I don’t know.”

Richard folded the notice carefully.

“The bank should have sent correspondence when the account matured. If your mother was deceased, the funds would have remained frozen until the estate was settled. But someone accessed the account recently.”

“Who?”

He looked at the lower corner.

“There’s a notation.”

I leaned closer.

The handwriting was printed in black ink.

Beneficiary confirmed by legal representative. Transfer pending estate determination.

Richard let out a slow breath.

“This is not a completed transfer. Someone confirmed your mother as beneficiary, but the money is still being held.”

“Who confirmed it?”

He turned the page over.

A reference number had been written in blue ink.