Colton had opened them a year earlier, using my information, to cover his brother’s restaurant debts. Forty-one thousand dollars. Dad had found out when a collection letter arrived at the shop by mistake. He kept a copy of every letter in a folder labeled Wren. He spent his last months quietly gathering proof, and he made Gideon promise I would see everything before I signed anything, so no one could ever again tell me I was too emotional to understand.

Then Gideon read the will. Everything, the repair shop, the land, and Dad’s savings, went into a trust with me as the only beneficiary and trustee. No spouse could claim it. No in-law could touch it. Colton stared at the table and didn’t say a word. There was one more line, in Dad’s own words. If anyone in my daughter’s marriage tries to take this from her, I hope she remembers she is my daughter.

I filed a police report on the fraudulent loans that afternoon, and I filed for divorce the next morning. Colton was charged with identity theft and ordered to repay every dollar. His brother’s restaurant closed that spring. Patrice never bought the colonial house with the white columns. She called me once, months later, to say she was sorry. I believed she was sorry she got caught. The trust paid for Dad’s headstone, cut from granite he would have liked.

I kept the repair shop. I still drive Dad’s old blue truck to work every morning, and I hired two of his former mechanics back. The shop’s sign still has his name on it. Above my desk, I framed the last page of his will. Some mornings, I play the recording again, not for Colton’s voice, but for Dad’s. Slow and steady. Still looking out for me.