"You haven't been up this mountain in twenty years, Judge Pendelton," Daniel said quietly. "What brings you to Raven Hill in the middle of a winter storm?"

Pendelton stared down into his coffee cup, swirling the dark liquid slowly before looking up. His cloudy blue eyes held the heavy weight of decades of legal compromises.

"Guilt, Daniel," the judge admitted bluntly. "Or whatever is left of it after a lifetime of serving men who thought they owned the judiciary."

"Go on," Daniel prompted, his voice unyielding.

"When your grandfather passed away, and Patricia took over the estate, certain federal files regarding the port trust were quietly altered," Pendelton explained, leaning forward. "Not destroyed—archived under seal in the federal district basement. Files that proved the Cains were systematically framed for antitrust violations back in the nineties to clear the way for corrupt state politicians."

I felt my breath catch in my throat. We thought the Vance fallout had cleared the historical ledger, but deep state secrets were clearly harder to bury than we realized.

"Why are you telling us this now?" I asked, my voice steady. "What do you want?"

"I don't want anything, Mrs. Danielson," Pendelton said softly. "I'm eighty-two years old, my health is failing, and I want to die knowing that history recorded the truth instead of Patricia's lies. I brought the decryption keys to the archive vault."