Page 99 of Truth (Wicked Empire 2)

“I suspect he wanted you to sign off on your trust fund,” he said.

“Sign off? I can’t access that trust until I’m fifty,” I said.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Davit said.

“What did you find?”

“It was hard to come by, but I managed to dig up your original trust papers,” he said.

He handed me his tablet, and I quickly scrolled through. But then I stopped, annoyed at trying to interpret the legalese.

“Putting aside your earlier advice about not reading things, can you give me the abbreviated version?”

“Well, the original trust was set up by your grandfather, which passed to your mother, and then to you, and was set to distribute the principal when the holder reached the age of fifty.”

“But?”

“But that was changed. I’m not entirely sure when, but I suspect when you were a child.”

“Changed to what?”

“Changed so that you could access the bulk of the trust on your eighteenth birthday,” he said.

“You mean I worked two jobs to put myself through college for no reason?”

“So it seems,” he said.

I shrugged, knowing I should be upset, but just not having the energy.

“And…” Davit said, trailing off.

“What else?” I asked.

“Based on what I was able to find, and trust me, finding even what I did was harder than it should have been,” he said. He scrolled through the tablet, and then handed it back to me. “The trust is empty, Amethyst.”

I looked at the page he pulled up, and saw the chart breaking down the trust. Over the years, the bars that indicated value got smaller and smaller and were now basically nonexistent.

“So, he’s been siphoning it off for years,” I said.

He nodded. “He’s had you sign things before?”

“Sure, all the time,” I said.

“Distributions. He was having you sign papers authorizing distribution of the corpus of the trust.”

“Well, if it’s empty, what did he need to have me sign today?”

“It is effectively empty, but a portion of the trust proceeds have been set aside for your expenses. But, if the trust is dissolved…”

“Then he can access what was set aside immediately,” I said.

“Yeah,” he responded.

“He could have just asked,” I said.

He studied me, then grabbed my hand.

“What do you mean?”

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