Chapter 5 - What Dad Had Promised
We carried six boxes to my car. Gwendolyn watched from the doorway while Dad stayed inside.
The promise in Mom’s letter wasn’t a substitute for the trust or the deed. Nina made that clear. But it showed what my parents had understood when they arranged the house.
“What happened to him?” I asked as we drove away.
Nina kept her eyes on the road. “You can ask him. I don’t think a document will answer that part.”
At my house, I spread the contents of the boxes across the dining table. I found photos of Mom laughing in a paint-stained shirt while Dad stood on a ladder in my old bedroom. On the back, she had written: Paige’s windows are finally in.
My phone rang. Dad.
“Gwendolyn says you took financial records,” he said.
“I took Mom’s letters.”
“She thinks you’re trying to hurt us.”
“She applied for a loan with my name.”
A long breath came through the phone. “She said you agreed to help.”
“When?”
“She told me you’d talked.”
“She lied to you.”
“She showed me an email.”
“Forward it.”
He hesitated, then said he would.
An hour later, an email appeared in my inbox. It was supposedly from me, offering to use my share of the house to help them borrow money. The address looked almost right. There was an extra letter before the @ sign.
I sent the email to Nina.
Chloe called that evening.
“Mom’s freaking out,” she said. “What did you do?”
“I asked the lender to check a signature that isn’t mine.”
Her voice hardened. “Dad could lose the house.”
“Did you know about the loan?”
“No. I just know you’re doing this because of my room.”
I thought of her video and Mom’s curtains on the floor.
“You can keep the room tonight,” I said. “We’ll talk when you’re ready to listen.”
I hung up. Then Rosa sent me a photo of a document she’d found in the kitchen trash.
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It was an estimate from a contractor. The work wasn’t for repairs.
It was for turning the house into a luxury short-term rental.
