Chapter 2 - The Paper Trail
That night, Mary and I sat at the kitchen table in silence. The smart lock had been smashed off the front door with my sledgehammer, replaced by a heavy-duty deadbolt.
"How did we raise her to be like this, Robert?" Mary cried softly, holding a mug of tea she hadn't touched.
"We didn't," I said gently, covering her hand with mine. "Derek infected her. But she made her choice today."
The next morning, I didn't go to my auto shop. I went straight to the county clerk's office, and then to the offices of Vance & Associates, the most ruthless law firm in the county. Arthur Vance owed me a favor from when I rebuilt the engine on his vintage Corvette for free.
Arthur looked over the paperwork Chloe had filed.
"It's a fraudulent quitclaim deed, Robert," Arthur said, adjusting his glasses. "They slipped it into a stack of medical proxies. But because it wasn't notarized in the presence of an impartial witness, it’s completely voidable. I can have a judge strike this down by Friday."
"I don't just want it struck down, Arthur," I said, leaning over his desk. "I want to know why they are so desperate for my house."
Arthur made a few phone calls to his forensic accounting team. Within an hour, we had the truth.
Derek wasn't a successful investment broker like he claimed. He was drowning in debt. He owed over two hundred thousand dollars to private, high-interest lenders, and his company was about to fire him for gross negligence. They needed to force Mary and me into a cheap retirement home, sell our property, and use the cash to bail Derek out of his financial grave.
"They were going to sell it out from under us," I whispered, the reality hitting me like a physical blow.
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"Worse," Arthur said grimly. "Once they had the house, they had full control over your retirement accounts through that power of attorney you signed. They were going to bleed you dry, Robert."
I stood up, buttoning my jacket. "Arthur, freeze everything. My accounts, the trusts, the credit cards I co-signed for Chloe in college. Shut off the tap."
