Chapter 2 - The Paper Trail
The next morning, I was sitting in David’s mahogany-paneled office overlooking downtown. The adrenaline from the night before had faded, replaced by a cold, sharp clarity.
"They have thirty days," David said, sliding a thick file across his desk. "But Margaret, we have a bigger problem than just getting them out. I ran a preliminary credit check on you this morning. Did you authorize a $45,000 line of credit against your downtown condo?"
My heart plummeted into my stomach. "What? No. I own my condo outright. I haven't taken out a loan since 1992."
David turned his laptop screen toward me. There it was. A joint credit account, opened two years ago, maxed out. "The primary cardholder is Chloe. But your name and social security number are attached as a guarantor. They forged your digital signature."
I stared at the screen, my breath catching. The granite island. The floor-to-ceiling windows. The designer furniture. Julian hadn't just used my kindness; they had stolen my financial security to fund their Instagram-perfect life.
"They didn't just remodel my house," I whispered, the betrayal burning like acid in my throat. "They did it with my own stolen money."
David’s expression hardened into the bulldog demeanor that made him the most feared litigator in the county. "Margaret, eviction is civil. This is criminal fraud. Do you want to protect her, or do you want to destroy him?"
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I thought about Robert’s military flag, unceremoniously shoved in a box so Julian could mount a massive flat-screen TV. I thought about being called a cleaning lady at my own front door.
"Destroy him," I said. "And if she stands by him, she goes down too."
