Chapter 12: Calloway

I read the page three times, and the name did not change.

Calloway Capital LLC. Managing member: R. Cordero.

The filing was dated two years ago, three months before Papa took out the loan.

"Maybe he works for them," Dahlia said. "Maybe he signed as an agent."

"There's no agent line." Gabriel's voice was flat. "It says sole member."

"It means he's the lender," I said.

My own voice sounded strange to me, far off and small.

"It means my husband lent my father the money, called the note after the funeral, and then sent a man in a gray overcoat to take my house."

Nobody answered.

I put the page down and picked up the next one.

It was a letter, handwritten, on yellow legal paper.

I knew the writing at once. It sloped hard to the right, the way Papa's did when he was tired.

Rafael, it said. I'll sign whatever you need. Only promise me Odette keeps the house. It's all her mother left her. I'd rather lose everything else.

It was dated the night before he died.

At the bottom, in Rafael's neat engineer's print, someone had written one line.

Signed 11:40 p.m. See that he does not read page four.

I stopped breathing.

I did not cry, because there was nothing left in me to cry with.

Page four, I found, was the one that put the house up as collateral.

Papa had signed it without reading it.

He had signed it the way I had signed the deed.

The kitchen was so quiet that I could hear the refrigerator.

"He was dying," I said. "He could barely stand. And my husband put a pen in his hand."

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