One week before the apartment sale, my father-in-law told me: «While your husband is away, take a hammer and smash the tile behind the toilet in the bathroom!»…

After her death, I hardly touched her things. Especially at the cottage. The cottage was her world.

She spent every summer there. Maybe, maybe she left something? This thought seemed strange to Emily. What could a woman who died almost a year ago leave? She knew what her son was like, Michael continued, as if talking to himself.

She saw right through him. Just as she once saw through me. She couldn’t fail to notice something was happening with him.

That he was following in my footsteps. The idea was weak, almost mad. But it was something.

The only thread in complete darkness. «Let’s go to the cottage,» Michael said, standing decisively. «Now.»

The cottage was an hour’s drive from the city. An old but well-maintained house surrounded by apple trees and garden beds. Anna adored this place.

She knew every bush, every flower here. They entered the house. It was cold, smelling of dry herbs and dust.

Everything was in its place, as the hostess left it. Stacks of old magazines, jars of jam in the cellar, her embroidery on the armchair. They began the search.

Methodically, room by room. They didn’t know what they were looking for. Just went through things, looked in closets, boxes.

She kept a diary, Michael said, opening a drawer of an old dresser. Here it is. He pulled out a thick notebook in brown binding.

Emily knew this diary. Anna had kept it for many years. But it was mostly entries about the garden, weather, friends’ grandchildren.

Nothing personal. They quickly flipped through it. The last entry was a week before her death.

She rejoiced that her favorite peonies had bloomed. They almost despaired. Searched the whole house.

Nothing. Maybe this was a stupid idea, Emily said, sitting on the old couch. We’re just wasting time.

Michael stood in the middle of the room, looking around. His gaze stopped on Anna’s old writing desk. Massive, oak, with many small drawers.

She hid everything, he muttered. After that story with me, she stopped trusting people. Even me.

She hid all the important things. He approached the desk and began pulling out drawers one by one. All were empty or stuffed with junk, old threads, dried pens, paperclips.

He pulled out the last, bottom drawer. It was empty too. Michael was about to push it back, but something stopped him.

He ran his hand over the bottom of the drawer, then reached deeper and felt the outer bottom side and ran along it. «There,» he said quietly. His fingers felt something taped to the bottom.

He pulled the drawer out completely, turned it over. On the bottom, to the rough plywood, was taped a small notebook. Not a thick notebook like the diary, but a small block in hard black binding.

Emily approached closer. Michael carefully peeled off the tape and took the notebook in hand. He opened the first page.

This wasn’t a diary. This was a ledger, only miniature. In Anna’s neat, tiny handwriting were dates and amounts.

This—Michael peered at the entries. These are my debts. From thirty years ago.

She wrote down everything. Every penny I took from her and didn’t return. Every amount I spent on that woman.

He quickly flipped a few pages. His face was pale. He seemed to be reliving his shame.

Then he stopped. He reached the middle of the notebook. The handwriting and content of the entries changed.

Dates were recent. Last year. Year before.

March 15. David lost $5,000. Called, asked for a loan.

I refused. April 2. Met with Raven at Birch Cafe.

Was with him and someone else, don’t know who. Talked about bets. April 10.

Another meeting with Raven. In a car by the market. David was pale.

Gave him some package. Emily looked at these lines, and her breath caught. Anna knew everything.

She didn’t just guess. She knew about the debts. And the gambling, and her son’s connection to Raven.

She had been tracking him. She documented every step, as methodically and mercilessly as she once documented his father’s sins. She knew her son was following the same path.

And she was preparing. This notebook was her weapon. Her dirt.

She knew her son had become like her husband. And she collected evidence on her own son.

May 25. Talked to Sophia on the phone. Thought I was asleep.

Laughed. Planned a trip to Tahiti. Called her «My queen.»

And Emily—»that chicken.» God, give me strength! At these words, Emily’s vision darkened. She leaned against the wall to not fall.

«That chicken.» That’s what he called her behind her back. While preparing a knife for that very back.

Michael reached the last written page. He froze. Emily saw his back tense.

«What’s there?» she asked quietly. He didn’t answer. He just handed her the notebook.

The last entry. It differed from all previous. This wasn’t just a fact statement.

This was a plan. A plan of desperate defense. The handwriting was the same, but the letters seemed larger, more decisive.

June 12. Talked to Valerie from the city archive. «My old friend.»

Asked her about our house on Main Street. Just out of curiosity. Valerie checked old maps.

The place where our house stands was once part of merchant Filatov’s estate. In the 70s, it was recognized as a historical monument of local significance. Building there was forbidden.

Then, right before construction of our house in the 80s, this status was mysteriously removed. Overnight. By forged documents on dilapidation and lack of historical value.

Emily read. And her heart began beating faster. She didn’t fully understand what it meant, but felt it was important.

The entry continued. Valerie says it was dirty business. Someone from the party elite pushed through building permission for their own.

She said she saw the original file. The one where the land still has protected status. And it’s still in the archive.

In the far storage. They just forgot to destroy it. And at the very end, the last phrase, boxed.

Friend keeps the original. Proof of illegal removal from protection. This could annul the building permit for the whole house.

Emily finished reading and raised her eyes to Michael. He looked at her. In his eyes was shock and admiration.

«I don’t understand,» she whispered. «What does this mean?» «It means,» Michael said slowly, and awe sounded in his voice, that «My wife, your mother-in-law, was a genius.» She didn’t just observe.

She didn’t just collect dirt on her son. She was preparing a weapon. A last-chance weapon.

He took the notebook from her and looked again at the last entry. She found a way to protect her home. Her world.

She found a legal bomb. If the land under our house was allocated for construction illegally, then the construction itself was illegal. And that means all permits issued for the house can be declared invalid.

Emily began to grasp the scale of this discovery. So, she began. So no deal to sell an apartment in this house can be legal, finished Michael for her.

Until this issue is resolved. Any court, seeing such documents, will immediately impose an arrest on all registration actions. On all apartments in the building.

They stood in silence amid the cold cottage house. And both understood what had happened.

Anna, the quiet, downtrodden woman who survived her husband’s betrayal and saw her son following the same path, had prepared a scorched-earth plan. She found a way not just to stop the sale of her apartment. She found a way to paralyze the whole building.

She was ready to collapse the entire house of cards to save her little corner. She said, if this house won’t be mine, it won’t be anyone’s. This was revenge.

Revenge on her husband for his past betrayal. Revenge on her son for his present one. Revenge on the whole world that caused her so much pain.

«She left us this,» Michael said, carefully closing the black notebook. This is her last word. Emily now had in her hands not just an audio recording of her sister’s confession.

Not just a note with threats from a thug. In her hands was a nuclear button. A document that could stop everything.

Not just delay. But completely destroy the possibility of this deal. The question was different.

Would they manage to press this button? And would they have the courage to press it, knowing the blast wave might affect not only David and Sophia. But dozens of other innocent people living in this building. But now, a few hours before the deal, this was their only real chance.

Not just to fight back, but to deliver a crushing blow. A blow prepared by a woman long gone from this world but who never forgave it. They drove from the cottage as the city plunged into pre-dawn gray haze.

The last night before the deal was ending. Emily had the black notebook on her lap. It seemed heavy as a lead ingot.

This was a terrible weapon. But how to use it? What will we do? Emily asked, breaking the silence in the car. Show up at the deal tomorrow and declare the whole building illegally constructed.

They’ll think we’re crazy. No one will believe without documents. Need to find this friend.

Valerie, said Michael. Need to get that file from her. But today is Friday.

Archives open only at nine. Deal at twelve. We have only three hours to find her, convince her to help, and file a claim in court or prosecutor’s office to impose an arrest.

It’s almost impossible. He was right. No time.

Any legal maneuver required time they didn’t have. They could lose this race by minutes. They entered the city.

Emily looked at the waking streets. And suddenly a strange but rational desire overcame her. A desire to make one more, last attempt.

Not legal. Human. In her head stood the image of her mother.

Her anger, her blind defense of Sophia. But she hadn’t seen the evidence. She had heard only one daughter’s screams and the calm, poisonous words of her son-in-law.

What if she showed her everything? Not just tell, but show. The photo of the power of attorney. The audio recording of Sophia’s confession…