Chapter 5: What Daniel Signed
Uncle Roy called Nathan on Monday at 8:40 in the morning.
Nathan called me at 8:43.
"You need to hear this," he said.
"Can you come to Roy's office?"
Roy Callahan had been our father's older brother, the one who stayed when our father didn't.
He had a small office above a dry cleaner on Merchant Street, and it smelled like old paper and the coffee he'd been making the same way since 1987.
He was seventy-one years old and he did not waste words.
He had a folder open on his desk when we arrived.
"Sit down," he said.
We sat.
"The property in question is a four-bedroom house on Alderton Road.
Asking price, six hundred and forty thousand.
Madison made an offer three weeks ago.
The offer was accepted." He looked at Nathan over his glasses.
"The name on the purchase agreement is Madison Reyes."
Nathan's jaw tightened.
"She used her maiden name."
"She did.
Not yours.
Not a joint name.
Hers alone."
"Can she do that?" I asked.
"She can make an offer in any name she likes.
The problem—" Roy turned a page.
"—is the deposit.
The deposit of sixty-four thousand dollars was paid from a joint savings account that Nathan co-owns."
Nathan went very still.
"She had access to that account," he said.
"She did.
You added her three months ago."
"I was going to transfer my savings into it after the wedding.
We were going to use it for the down payment together." He stopped.
"She knew that."
"She moved sixty-four thousand out on Friday morning," Roy said.
"Two days before the wedding."
The room was quiet except for the sound of traffic on Merchant Street.
"What are my options?" Nathan asked.
"You file a complaint with the bank today.
Unauthorized transfer from a joint account for a personal purchase made without your knowledge or consent.
You also contact the seller's agent and inform them the deposit was made with disputed funds.
That will pause the transaction." Roy closed the folder.
"And then you speak to a family attorney about the marriage itself."
"It's been forty-eight hours," Nathan said.
"I know."
"We haven't even—we were supposed to leave for the honeymoon yesterday."
Roy looked at him steadily.
"I know that too."
Nathan pressed his hands flat on his knees.
"What about Daniel?"
Roy opened the folder again.
"Daniel Reyes.
Her brother."
I looked up.
"He's a licensed real estate agent," Roy said.
"He was the buyer's agent on the Alderton Road transaction.
He would have received a commission on the sale." He set the paper down.
"He was also the person she was speaking to on the phone at the wedding."
"She was buying a house through her brother," Nathan said slowly.
"With my money.
Under her name alone."
"That's what the documents show."
"And the law firm on her phone?"
Roy's expression didn't change.
"Hargrove and Marsh.
They filed a spousal asset disclosure request on Friday afternoon."
Nathan looked at him.
"She filed for legal separation," Roy said, "the same day she moved the money."
The same day she moved the money.
Two days before the wedding.
I thought about her standing at that altar.
The ivory gown.
The diamonds at her ears.
The smile she had given the room when she said I do.
She had already filed.
She had walked down that aisle knowing she had already filed.
"Nathan," I said quietly.
He held up one hand.
Not to stop me.
Just to hold himself together for another moment.
Roy waited.
"Tell me what to do first," Nathan said.
"Bank.
Today.
Before noon if possible."
Nathan stood.
He buttoned his jacket.
He looked, for a moment, like the teenager who used to sit at my kitchen table while I edited his essays, trying to hold his face steady when things were hard.
Then he walked out of Roy's office, and I followed him, and we stood on the pavement outside the dry cleaner in the Monday morning light.
"She had a head start," he said.
"Yes."
"But she didn't know Roy existed."
I looked at him.
The corner of his mouth moved.
Not a smile.
May you like
Something quieter than that.
"Let's go to the bank," he said.
