Chapter 4 - The Woman With the Deposit
We slept in a small hotel that night.
I pushed the two beds together because Caleb asked if he could reach me from his pillow.
Vanessa called fourteen times.
Her messages changed as the night went on.
You’re overreacting.
Bring my children home.
We need to talk about tomorrow.
Then, just after midnight:
Please don’t answer the door if someone comes early.
I saved that message too.
At seven the next morning, I left the children with Cora and went back to the house.
A woman stood outside our gate carrying a document folder.
She looked past me toward the front door.
“Mrs. Vanessa said you wouldn’t be attending.”
“Attending what?”
“The final meeting.”
Her name was Mrs. Reyes. She had short gray hair and the tired expression of someone who had spent too long worrying about money.
I showed her my identification.
“I’m Joel. This is my house.”
She stared.
“Your wife said you were in Qatar.”
“I was.”
“She said you’d authorized the sale.”
“I didn’t.”
The color drained from her face.
Vanessa opened the front door behind me.
“Mrs. Reyes, please. We had a family emergency.”
The woman ignored her.
“I transferred the deposit.”
“How much?” I asked.
“Eight hundred thousand pesos.”
For a moment, none of us spoke.
Mrs. Reyes opened her folder with trembling hands.
There were copies of identification, property papers, the same authorization I had found, and a receipt bearing Vanessa’s signature.
A broker’s name appeared on the arrangement.
Marco.
“He said he was helping because you couldn’t fly home,” Mrs. Reyes told me.
Vanessa reached for the folder.
“We can settle this privately.”
Mrs. Reyes pulled it back.
“That money came from selling my small store.”
Her voice cracked.
“My husband died last year. I was buying somewhere near my daughter.”
Vanessa looked toward the street.
Still looking for a way out.
I asked Mrs. Reyes to send me copies of everything. Then I called a lawyer whose number a former coworker had given me.
Her name was Mara Santos.
I explained the children first.
Then the document.
Then the deposit.
“Don’t sign anything,” Mara said. “Bring the papers. Keep the messages. We need to move quickly.”
Vanessa caught my sleeve when I ended the call.
“If you do this, you’ll destroy this family.”
I looked at her hand.
“What did you think selling the house would do?”
She let go.
Mrs. Reyes turned another page in her folder.
A printed email was attached.
May you like
My name appeared in the sender’s address.
I had never created that account.
