Chapter 4 - THE WRONG VERSION
I did not open the door.
Ryan continued knocking.
“Olivia.”
I called Samuel.
“He’s outside.”
“Do not let him in if you feel unsafe.”
“He has my folder.”
“What folder?”
“The financial records.”
Samuel’s tone sharpened.
“Call law enforcement.”
I did.
Then I spoke through the door.
“Put the folder down.”
Ryan laughed softly.
“Come on.”
“Put it down and leave.”
“Are you seriously calling the police on me?”
“You removed evidence after being told there was a forged deed.”
“I removed my personal files.”
“My passport was also removed.”
Silence.
Then Ryan said, “Mom probably took it by mistake.”
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“Try again.”
Before he could answer, a patrol car turned onto the street.
Ryan looked toward it.
Then back toward the camera.
Something ugly appeared on his face.
Not rage.
Calculation.
He placed the folder on the porch.
But before stepping away, he removed one sheet.
Folded it.
Put it in his coat.
I saw everything through the camera.
So did the responding officer.
Ryan claimed the document was his.
The officer told him the dispute would need to be handled through attorneys but reminded him not to remove property that did not belong to him.
Ryan left.
The folder remained.
Inside, several originals were missing.
Including the closing statement from when I bought the house.
But one document remained.
A mortgage modification Ryan had pressured me to sign four years earlier.
I had forgotten about it.
At the time, he told me the lender needed updated financial information.
I had signed several forms at our kitchen table.
Most were routine.
One wasn’t.
A durable power of attorney.
My signature appeared at the bottom.
I stared at it.
I had never knowingly signed a power of attorney.
The witnesses were Patricia Hayes and Gerald Voss.
My hands began trembling.
Samuel asked me to photograph every page.
Twenty minutes later, he called back.
“Olivia, this is serious.”
“How serious?”
“The document purports to give Ryan extremely broad authority over certain real-estate transactions.”
“But I didn’t sign it.”
“That needs forensic examination.”
“What if he used it?”
“We find out where.”
That became the next nightmare.
Samuel’s office pulled county records.
Three documents had been recorded during the previous six weeks.
One involved the cottage.
One involved a home-equity application.
And one involved my primary residence.
The primary-residence transfer had not fully processed.
A clerk had flagged a discrepancy in the property description.
It was pending review.
Ryan had been within days of creating a paper trail that made it appear I had willingly transferred my home.
The cottage was worse.
It had been purchased five years earlier using proceeds from the sale of a small rental property my grandmother left me.
I believed it was titled in both our names.
It wasn’t anymore.
A transfer had been recorded.
The cottage now belonged to Hayes Property Holdings LLC.
The LLC Ryan controlled.
I felt physically ill.
Then Samuel found another document.
A loan.
$310,000.
Secured against the cottage.
Money had been disbursed twelve days earlier.
“To where?” I asked.
“We’re tracing it.”
That answer came the next morning.
$150,000 had gone into a business account controlled by Ryan.
$100,000 had been wired to an account belonging to Melissa Crane.
The remaining amount had been used to pay debts I had never known existed.
Credit cards.
Personal loans.
A gambling line.
I stared at the spreadsheet.
Ryan had not merely betrayed me emotionally.
He was drowning financially.
And he had decided my property would save him.
At noon, I met Samuel Price in person.
He was fifty-eight, gray-haired, direct, and almost offensively calm.
I liked him immediately.
“You’re going to want revenge,” he told me.
“I already do.”
“Don’t pursue revenge.”
I frowned.
“Pursue records.”
He tapped the table.
“Records don’t lose their temper.”
I thought of Patricia’s pot.
“Apparently people do.”
Samuel almost smiled.
He explained that we would seek emergency relief concerning the property transfers, preserve financial accounts, and begin divorce proceedings.
Then he asked me the question I had been avoiding.
“Do you want to end the marriage?”
“Yes.”
No pause.
No hesitation.
The answer surprised even me.
Seven years.
A wedding.
Christmas mornings.
Road trips.
Shared jokes.
Medical scares.
Sunday breakfasts.
Thousands of small moments.
And still the answer came easily.
Yes.
Samuel nodded.
“Then we proceed accordingly.”
I signed the initial papers.
When I returned home, someone had left a package on the porch.
No return address.
Inside was my passport.
My grandmother’s will.
The missing closing statement.
And a note.
OLIVIA,
I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT HE WAS REALLY DOING.
PLEASE DON’T CALL THE POLICE.
I WILL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING.
PATRICIA.
Below the note was a motel room number.
And a time.
8:00 p.m.
Samuel told me not to go alone.
Daniel volunteered.
But before we left, another person called me.
Melissa.
Her voice was shaking.
“Olivia, I need you to understand something.”
“What?”
“I didn’t know Ryan was stealing your house.”
I nearly hung up.
May you like
Then she said the one thing that made me stay on the line.
“And I never asked him for your grandmother’s ring.”
