Five days after my wedding, my mother-in-law walked into my home without knocking, dropped a lease agreement in front of me, and informed me that I now owed her $1,500 a month for the privilege of living with my own husband.

That evening, I returned to my quiet penthouse in the Vance Tower.

The sun was setting over the western horizon, painting the sky in deep shades of gold and violet. I sat at my desk, looking through a stack of personal mail that Harrison had placed in my inbox.

Near the bottom of the stack was a plain white envelope postmarked from Naples, Florida.

No return name. No fancy crest.

I opened it.

Inside was a single sheet of stationery, written in shaky, elegant handwriting:

Emma,

I am writing this not to ask for your forgiveness, because I know I do not deserve it. I am writing because I finally understand.

For forty years, I believed that my name made me better than the people around me. I believed that money was a shield that exempted me from basic human decency. When I handed you that lease on your wedding week, I thought I was teaching you a lesson about your place in my world.

You taught me a lesson about mine.

I watch the news from Chicago. I saw the video of the children at the estate today. For the first time in my life, that house looks like it has a soul.

Thank you for not destroying my son completely. He is becoming a man I can finally be proud of, even if we have nothing left to our name.

Katherine.

I folded the letter carefully, placed it back inside the envelope, and tucked it into the bottom drawer of my desk beside my grandfather’s old pocket watch.