Chapter 14 - The Person Inside My House
Police took the threat seriously.
For the first time since this began, so did every relative who had called me dramatic.
Amy and Frederick stayed in a hotel under a different reservation.
I joined them.
Rachel hired a private investigator named Marcus Reed to help document Raymond’s movements.
Within forty-eight hours, Marcus found Betsy.
She was staying with a friend outside Nashville.
She had not disappeared because Raymond threatened her.
Teresa had.
Betsy agreed to meet us.
She looked exhausted.
“Your mother said if I testify, she’ll tell the police I planned everything.”
I stared at her.
“Did you?”
“No.”
“But you notarized the deed.”
Her eyes filled.
“Yes.”
“Then tell the truth.”
“I could lose my license.”
“You should.”
Betsy flinched.
Amy touched my arm.
I continued more quietly.
“But losing a license is better than helping them take our house.”
Betsy nodded.
Then she pulled out her phone.
“I saved messages.”
Hundreds of them.
Teresa directing the party expenses.
Teresa discussing the loan.
Teresa telling Betsy how to describe Amy as lazy.
Then we found the message that changed the case.
Teresa wrote:
Luke already got Connor’s files.
Once we have Amy’s signature sample, Raymond can handle the rest.
Amy whispered.
“Signature sample?”
Betsy nodded.
“That’s why Teresa kept asking Amy to sign birthday cards.”
I felt sick.
Every small act had a purpose.
Then Marcus called.
He had identified where the photograph of Frederick had been printed.
A pharmacy six miles from our house.
Security footage showed the person picking it up.
Not Raymond.
Not Teresa.
Luke.
My cousin.
The man who had already admitted taking my financial records.
I called him.
He denied it.
Then Marcus sent me the surveillance image.
Luke stood at the counter holding the envelope.
I drove to his apartment with a detective.
Luke opened the door and immediately started crying.
“I didn’t take the picture.”
“Who did?”
“Raymond.”
“Then why did you deliver it?”
“Aunt Teresa told me it would scare you into dropping the civil case.”
My stomach turned.
“You threatened my son.”
“No.”
“You delivered a photograph of my child with a threat.”
“I didn’t write it.”
“You carried it.”
Luke sank onto the couch.
“I needed money.”
I almost laughed from pure disbelief.
“Again?”
He covered his face.
Then he said something I never expected.
“Aunt Teresa has been paying me for months.”
“How much?”
“Two thousand a month.”
“From where?”
“I don’t know.”
I did.
My three thousand dollars.
Teresa had been taking money I sent to support my wife and baby and using it to pay the person helping her steal more from us.
Luke was arrested for his role in the threat and document theft.
As the detective led him away, he looked at me.
“I’m sorry.”
I said nothing.
May you like
Because some apologies arrive after the damage is already complete.
---
