Chapter 4 - The House He Had Already Sold
By noon, Julian's return had become a legal emergency.
Marcus asked everyone except the attorneys to leave the dining room while he called the title company that had recorded my deed.
I went to the kitchen and made coffee I did not want.
My hands were steady until I opened the cabinet and saw Eleanor's blue mug.
It had a faded gold star on the front and a crack near the handle.
She hated every new mug I bought her because none of them held heat the same way.
I touched the rim and suddenly had to grip the counter.
One hundred days was long enough for other people to expect grief to become manageable.
It was not long enough for the body to forget routines.
I still woke at 5:40 some mornings because that was when Eleanor's blood pressure alarm used to sound.
I still bought bananas in bunches of four because she could only eat half of one at breakfast.
I still listened for her walker at night.
Now Julian was in the next room discussing whether he had used her home as collateral for a debt she never knew existed.
The kitchen door opened.
Nadia stepped inside.
"You okay?"
"No."
She nodded.
"Good answer."
I almost smiled.
"How bad is it?"
"We don't know yet."
"That's lawyer language for bad."
"It's lawyer language for don't panic until the document arrives."
I poured coffee into two cups.
"He looked at the ceiling when Marcus asked about security."
"I saw."
"Can he mortgage a house he doesn't own?"
"Legally, no."
"Practically?"
"People file fraudulent documents every day."
A chill moved through me.
"Wouldn't the title company catch it?"
"Usually."
She accepted the coffee.
"Unless the supposed mortgage wasn't recorded here, or he pledged a future interest, or he gave a lender documents that were never meant to reach the public record."
"He knew his mother was alive."
"That hasn't stopped anyone from lying before."
We returned to the dining room ten minutes later.
Marcus was standing by the window with his phone pressed to his ear.
Brandon sat beside Julian, speaking to him in a low voice.
Julian looked irritated rather than frightened now.
That told me he had found someone else to blame.
The moment Marcus ended the call, Julian stood.
"Well?"
Marcus looked at me first.
"Your recorded deed is clean."
I exhaled.
"No mortgage appears after the transfer."
Julian smiled too quickly.
"There you go."
Marcus did not return the smile.
"There is, however, a problem from before the transfer."
Julian's smile disappeared.
Marcus placed his phone on the table.
"Fourteen months ago, a company called Dominion Crest Capital filed a UCC financing statement in Ontario naming Northstar Meridian Ventures as debtor."
I had no idea what that meant.
Nadia did.
"What collateral description?"
Marcus looked at Julian.
"All business assets, receivables, contract rights, and certain personal guarantees."
"Certain?"
"The title company is obtaining the underlying guarantee package."
Julian folded his arms.
"Then why are we still talking?"
Marcus stared at him.
"Because the lender's internal collateral schedule references a beneficial interest in property at this address."
My stomach tightened.
"Beneficial interest?"
Nadia answered gently.
"It means he may have represented that he expected rights in the house even if he didn't own it yet."
Julian seized on that.
"Exactly."
"Except," Marcus said, "the schedule describes the interest as vested."
Brandon closed his eyes for half a second.
Julian did not move.
Marcus continued.
"It also assigns an estimated value of one point two million dollars and identifies Eleanor Vance as deceased."
The room went silent.
I heard the refrigerator motor start in the kitchen.
I heard a truck pass outside.
I heard my own breath catch.
"When was that document signed?" I asked.
Marcus looked at the note on his legal pad.
"Fourteen months ago."
Eleanor had been alive for another eleven months.
Not barely alive.
Not unconscious.
Alive enough to argue about television shows, complain about soup, and insist on writing her own Christmas cards.
Alive enough to sign the deed to me.
Julian stared at Marcus.
"The lender wrote that."
"Did you correct it?"
"I didn't prepare every schedule."
"Did you sign the guarantee package?"
Julian said nothing.
Brandon stood.
"We're done for today."
Marcus did not stop him.
"I agree."
Julian looked at Brandon in disbelief.
"That's it?"
"We need documents."
"I came here for my mother's estate."
"And you just learned there may be a signed representation stating she was dead while she was still alive."
Brandon lowered his voice.
"So yes, that's it."
Julian's gaze moved to me.
"You planned this."
I could not believe the words.
"I planned your loan documents?"
"You and Marcus have been digging through my life for months."
"Your mother asked him to."
"Because you poisoned her against me."
I stood.
"You did not need my help with that."
His face changed.
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means she waited for you."
"I was working."
"She waited while you ignored her birthday."
"I was working."
"She waited while I called you from intensive care."
"I was working."
"She waited while you used her money."
"It was an investment."
"She waited while some lender was apparently told she was dead."
His palm hit the table.
"I did not tell them she was dead."
The sound brought Marcus out of his chair.
Nadia moved beside me.
I did not step back.
"Then prove it," I said.
Julian's nostrils flared.
"You think you won because she gave you a house?"
"No."
"You think you're rich now?"
"No."
"You think everyone is going to believe you were some saint because you wiped her mouth and drove her to appointments?"
My throat tightened.
Marcus said his name.
"Julian."
He kept going.
"She was my mother before she was your project."
That was the sentence that finally made me lose my temper.
"Then where were you?"
The question cracked across the room.
Julian stopped.
I had not raised my voice at him once since the airport.
Now every word came out sharp.
"Where were you when she fell in the bathroom and lay on the tile for twenty minutes because I was buying groceries?"
He stared at me.
"Where were you when she cried before her first dialysis session because she thought the machine would kill her?"
"Where were you when her hair started coming out after the infection?"
"Where were you when she asked me to put your old school picture beside her bed because she said your face looked kinder when you were seventeen?"
His mouth opened.
I did not let him answer.
"You do not get to come home after three years and call love a project because you don't like the accounting."
No one spoke.
I could hear my pulse in my ears.
Julian looked away first.
Brandon gathered his papers.
"We're leaving."
Julian followed him to the front door.
Before stepping outside, he stopped beside Eleanor's altar.
For one moment, I thought he might finally touch the frame gently.
Instead, he looked at the sealed envelope Marcus had placed beside the portrait.
"I want my letter."
Marcus shook his head.
"Not until the first accounting request is served."
"That's not what you said last night."
"Circumstances changed when the collateral issue surfaced."
Julian laughed bitterly.
"You all keep moving the rules."
"No."
Marcus's voice became colder.
"Your mother wrote the rules."
Julian walked out.
The door closed.
I stood staring at the envelope with his name on it.
"What's in the letter?" I asked.
Marcus looked at me for a long moment.
"I don't know all of it."
"You didn't read it?"
"She sealed it herself."
He picked up his case.
"But she dictated a separate memorandum to me the same day."
I felt the room tighten around us again.
"About what?"
Marcus reached into his case and pulled out a single page.
"About a phone call."
My stomach dropped.
"Which phone call?"
"The one she received from Julian eleven months ago."
I shook my head.
"He told me he hadn't spoken to her."
"He lied."
Marcus turned the page toward me.
At the top was a date I recognized immediately.
It was the night Eleanor had been admitted to intensive care with sepsis.
The same night I had called Julian seventeen times.
The same night he never answered me.
Marcus tapped the typed line beneath the date.
"Eleanor reached him from the hospital phone."
I felt cold all over.
"What did he say?"
Marcus did not answer.
May you like
Instead, he looked toward the front window where Julian's car had just disappeared around the corner.
"She recorded it."
