The next morning, your legal team arrives.
Not one attorney.
Three.
Arthur Grant, your father’s estate attorney, gray-haired and quietly furious.
Maya Chen, a corporate litigator who once made a billionaire developer cry in a deposition.
And Thomas Reed, a criminal defense attorney turned victims’ rights advocate who looks like he was carved from courthouse stone.
Your father stares as they enter.
“You brought an army,” he says weakly.
You squeeze his hand.
“No. I brought paperwork.”
Arthur opens the trust binder.
Maya opens her laptop.
Thomas speaks to Detective Bennett.
Within hours, emergency petitions are filed.
A temporary protective order.
A freeze on disputed asset transfers.
A request to suspend Vivian’s authority under any recently signed documents.
A medical capacity review.
A court order preventing Marcus or Vivian from entering the Hale estate without supervision.
A preservation demand for all communications, security footage, medication logs, banking records, and notary documents.
Vivian’s world begins shrinking by noon.
By 3:00 p.m., the first bank flags suspicious transfer attempts.
By 4:00, Hale Construction’s CFO calls you.
