Chapter 8 - A Husband's Name
I wanted to believe Eric.
That was my first reaction, which told me how deeply the habit of defending him had settled into my bones.
He looked devastated, his elbows on his knees and his hands knotted together.
But I had seen that posture before.
He had used it when he failed a college course, when his first car was repossessed, and when he asked me to cover the mortgage three years earlier.
Some of those crises were genuine.
Others had been made worse by choices he refused to own.
“You're telling me Rachel used your father's identity?” I asked.
He shook his head quickly.
“No, not like that.”
“Then explain what you mean.”
“There's an account label in the investment portal,” he said.
“She named it the Frank Foster Legacy Fund.”
I felt the room tilt slightly.
“Why?”
“Rachel thought using family legacy language would make our pitch more credible.”
“What pitch?”
Eric rubbed his forehead.
They had invested in a business opportunity Dana presented as a real-estate renovation partnership.
Rachel handled promotion and investor relations, and Eric supposedly managed budgets and contractors.
A small strip-mall redevelopment would produce quick gains, Dana had promised.
The Broadleaf loan had provided part of their contribution.
Eric insisted they hadn't used Frank's actual bank identity or applied for credit in his name.
I believed only what I could verify.
“What does the account contain?”
His voice dropped.
“Not much now.”
“How much went into it?”
“Most of the second loan.”
I breathed slowly.
Nearly a hundred and fifty thousand dollars borrowed against a house already struggling to support its first mortgage.
Funds placed into a risky venture neither of them had mentioned to me.
“And you wanted to sell the house to pay back Broadleaf?”
“Yes.”
“Without paying the loan you owe me?”
“We planned to pay everybody.”
“Eric, the numbers don't add up.”
His expression tightened.
“Rachel said if we got the full asking price—”
I stopped him.
“Rachel didn't sign your name on the loan application.”
He looked away.
“You did.”
“Yes.”
“Then take responsibility for the words on it.”
That made him angry.
“You sound like Dad.”
For a moment neither of us moved.
Then I said, “I'm beginning to understand why he sounded that way.”
Eric rose abruptly.
“I'm trying to tell you the truth.”
“Then answer one more question.”
He stood with one hand on the back of a chair.
“Did you know about the release bearing my forged signature?”
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
And finally said, “I knew a release was being recorded.”
“Did you know I hadn't signed it?”
His silence was an answer, though not yet one I could prove.
I felt tired in a way sleep would never fix.
“Please leave,” I said.
He stared at me.
“Mom?”
“You heard me.”
It was my house, this time.
For a terrible second I remembered him ordering me out of his kitchen on Christmas morning.
I hadn't planned to echo him.
But I also wasn't going to pretend we could settle a forged document by talking until I felt sorry for him.
He moved toward the door.
At the threshold he turned.
“Dana has copies of things Rachel didn't want me to see.”
“What things?”
“Messages with Nolan Price.”
“Why didn't she want you to see them?”
Eric's eyes shone.
“Because I think they planned to take our house long before I signed the second loan.”
After he left, Beth emerged from the hallway.
She had not listened to the conversation, but she could read my face.
I repeated his last statement.
Beth looked at the binder on the table.
“Mom, we need to find out who actually benefits if that house is lost.”
At 11:06 that night, the unknown number sent a file attachment.
It was an email chain between Dana and Nolan.
In one message, Nolan had written:
May you like
ONCE THE OLD LIEN IS GONE, WE CAN CONTROL THE EXIT.
