Chapter 4 - Numbers Don’t Get EmotionalThe next morning, I called a real-estate attorney named Rebecca Sloan.
I knew her professionally.
Two years earlier, my consulting firm had helped one of her clients restructure operations after a merger. She was direct, expensive, and incapable of being intimidated by dramatic men.
Exactly what I needed.
I showed her the document.
She read it twice.
“You did not sign this?”
“No.”
“You did not authorize Daniel to sign for you?”
“No.”
“You did not participate in a remote notarization?”
“No.”
“Were you physically outside Ohio on this date?”
“Yes.”
“Can you prove that?”
“Easily.”
Rebecca leaned back.
“Good.”
That was the first encouraging word I’d heard in twelve hours.
Then she ruined it.
“But we need to treat this seriously.”
“I know.”
“No, Claire. I mean emotionally separate it from the marriage for a minute.”
I almost smiled.
“That’s usually my speech.”
“Then listen to yourself.”
She pointed at the power of attorney.
“This document purports to let someone refinance, lease, and manage property worth substantially more than the debt he described to you. We need to know whether anything was recorded, submitted, or used elsewhere.”
We checked county property records.
No deed transferring ownership had been recorded.
My name remained the sole owner of Unit 12B.
I exhaled.
Rebecca held up a hand.
“Don’t celebrate yet.”
She contacted the title company with me present.
The $180,000 application was suspended and flagged for suspected fraud.
Nothing had funded.
That mattered.
Then we reviewed my joint finances with Daniel.
I had always managed my own accounts.
Daniel managed his.
We had one joint household account for utilities, groceries, travel, and shared expenses.
I opened six months of statements.
At first nothing looked alarming.
Then I saw transfers.
$2,800.
$1,950.
$3,400.
$2,250.
All moving from the joint account into Daniel’s personal account.
Total: $14,600.
“What were those for?” Rebecca asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Did you authorize them?”
“No.”
I had been busy before my sister’s surgery.
Work deadlines.
Medical appointments.
Travel arrangements.
I had stopped looking closely because Daniel always said he was handling the bills.
The same sentence suddenly sounded different.
Then I found payments to a storage company.
A furniture store.
A moving service.
All during the weeks Lorraine had been living in my apartment.
I stared at the screen.
“He used our joint account to move her into my home.”
Rebecca nodded carefully.
“Possibly.”
I appreciated the word.
Possibly.
Facts first.
We printed everything.
That afternoon, I received an email from the title company.
They had attached a second document from Daniel’s application.
A proposed lease.
Landlord:
Claire Bennett, by Daniel Whitmore, Attorney-in-Fact.
Tenant:
Lorraine Whitmore.
Term:
Five years.
Monthly rent:
One dollar.
I actually laughed.
Rebecca didn’t.
“If he believed this power of attorney was valid, he was trying to create a long-term occupancy interest for his mother.”
“Why?”
“So she would be harder to remove.”
My laughter stopped.
Lorraine hadn’t been behaving like a guest.
She had believed she belonged there because Daniel had promised paperwork would make it true.
The most frightening part was no longer that they had tried something reckless.
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It was how much planning had gone into it.
CTA: Daniel had prepared a five-year lease for Lorraine at one dollar a month—and I needed to know who taught him to think he could get away with it.
