Chapter 14 - The Name on the Other Side
The recorded deed transferred Harbor House to Atlantic Reach LLC.
That company had mortgaged the building, then pledged the borrowed money against a second loan.
No one had repaired a single room.
Derek had been stripping value from the property while promising donors it would soon open.
Samuel explained the problem without softening it.
"A forged transfer can be challenged. But undoing liens involving outside lenders takes evidence, hearings, and time. Your father's letter is important. It isn't a magic key."
I hated how reasonable he sounded.
"And the money?"
"Some may be recoverable. Some may not."
I went to the hospital where Dad had spent his final winter.
I walked the same hallway Olivia had photographed and found the room where he'd tried to keep breathing through the night.
A nurse recognized my last name.
"Your father talked about the Navy," she said. "He'd ask us to leave the news on whenever there were ships."
I smiled before I could stop myself.
Then a message arrived from an unknown account.
Attached was an audio clip in which my voice appeared to say, "I authorized the transfer. I knew what Derek needed."
I had never spoken those words together.
They'd been cut from a conversation about moving Dad's care account to a safer bank.
A second message appeared.
WITHDRAW THE PETITION OR EVERY DONOR HEARS THIS.
Then I noticed the file was an unfinished edit.
After my chopped-up words came a click, a chair scraping, and a sentence in a voice I knew better than my own.
My mother's.
"Make sure they think Caroline stole it."
May you like
Someone inside Derek's circle had sent me the rough cut.
Minutes later, a shorter version without her voice began circulating online.
