Chapter 5: Filed on Monday

I drove to the docks with the deed on the passenger seat and Maisie singing in the back.

Britt had lent me her car and told me to call every ten minutes.

The company phone Joel had given me had exactly one number in it.

Pier Nine was a gravel yard on the lake, full of containers stacked three high.

Men in orange vests stopped working to look at me.

Joel stood at the gate with his clipboard.

He didn't say I told you so.

He took one look at my face and opened the door of a small office that smelled of coffee and diesel.

"Sit."

I sat. Maisie climbed onto the chair next to me and started pulling the cap off a pen.

I put the deed on his desk.

He read it standing up, with both hands flat on the wood.

I watched his hands. They were big and scarred across the knuckles, and they didn't shake.

"I didn't read what I signed," I said.

"Nobody does."

"It says I witnessed it."

"It says a lot of things." He tapped the page.

"This is how she does it. She never takes anything."

"People hand it to her, and they sign to say they were happy to."

"Who?"

"Everyone. Our father's lawyers. My fiancée, three years ago." His jaw moved. "Tobin."

"Tobin's father owed money," I said slowly. "He told me that once. After his dad died, there were bills."

"A lot of bills." Joel looked at me.

"Ingrid paid every one of them. The hospital, the nursing home, the loan on the farm."

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