Chapter 9 - A Buyer Who Never Met Me
The proposed purchase contract identified Vanessa Pike as an intermediary.
The supposed buyer was an investment company registered out of state.
I had never agreed to sell.
No one had even asked whether the house was available.
Rebecca explained that a business proposal wasn't the same thing as a legally effective sale, but it could still mislead lenders and prospective buyers.
The photograph had been taken from the street.
I recognized the lilac bush Martha had planted beside the front steps.
It was in full bloom, meaning Harry had been using this image for months.
The betrayal felt strangely intimate.
He hadn't merely claimed my money.
He'd turned my memories into marketing material.
Rebecca retained a property-title specialist to check the public record for filings and pending notices.
So far, the deed remained unchanged.
There was no recorded sale.
For the first time that week, I breathed easily for a few minutes.
Then Tiffany called to say Harry had replaced the locks on my study.
“Is he allowed to do that?” she asked.
“I don't know how to answer that without the attorney.”
“I told him it was wrong.”
“What did he say?”
“He said the house is as good as ours.”
I closed my eyes.
“Tiffany, is that what you believe?”
She didn't answer.
The next day she met Rebecca in her office without Harry present.
I was not invited, and I understood why.
My daughter's legal interests might differ from mine.
She needed advice independent of her father's hurt feelings.
That night she called and sounded steadier.
“I signed things I didn't understand,” she told me.
“I know.”
“And I treated you terribly.”
I remained quiet.
“I'm not asking you to forgive me yet.”
That word yet caught in my chest.
“Then what are you asking?”
“I need somewhere to put a few boxes.”
I almost laughed at the awful perfection of it.
We had come from beer to boxes to ownership and back to storage.
Instead I asked whether she was safe.
She said Harry wasn't violent, but he had begun checking her phone and following her movements.
I suggested she contact people equipped to help with controlling behavior and make a safe exit plan rather than rely on an argument with him.
She thanked me.
At midnight, a message arrived from Vanessa.
It was the first direct contact she'd ever made with me.
MR. BENNETT, WE HAVE INFORMATION THAT COULD HELP EVERYONE. MEET ME ALONE TOMORROW.
There was a location beneath it.
An empty lot behind an old tire shop.
I forwarded the message to Rebecca.
Her reply came in less than a minute.
DO NOT GO.
Ten minutes later, Tiffany called, crying so hard I could barely understand her.
“Dad, Harry says Vanessa told him you agreed to meet her.”
“I didn't.”
“He's on his way there now.”
I stared at the location on the screen.
May you like
And I understood that somebody was trying to bring us all to the same place.
