A relative helped them.
Evelyn told everyone I had thrown her onto the street.
I stopped defending myself publicly.
I had spent too much of my life trying to win trials where my mother was both prosecutor and judge.
The people who wanted facts asked me privately.
I gave them facts.
The people who wanted drama could keep it.
Then the airline called.
Their investigation had uncovered something strange.
The representative asked me to verify several charges.
I recognized none of them.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
There was a pause.
“Ma’am, have you ever authorized your mother to use the card ending in 4408?”
My blood went cold.
That card had been closed two years earlier.
“No.”
The representative transferred me to their fraud department.
The Tahiti tickets were only the surface.
My mother had used old payment details and loyalty credentials connected to accounts I had once shared with her for emergency travel.
