The man in the gray suit stepped forward and introduced himself as an associate of Whit Coleman, sent to carry out the final instructions Warren had left in that downtown office. He opened the briefcase, not to hand out checks, but to remove a certified copy of my husband’s true and final will, along with a recorded video statement. Bethany’s red fingernail was still frozen mid-air over my mother’s clock.

He asked, politely, that no one leave the room. Warren had been very specific, he said, that both children hear every word while standing among the guests they had performed for all afternoon. Then he pressed play on a small tablet, and my late husband’s voice filled the living room he had lived in for twenty-one years. What Warren said next made Grant sit down on his own tape measure.