Chương 11
“Daniel.”
“What?”
“Do not go looking for a fight because you are angry with your father.”
“I won’t.”
“You have his temper.”
“I don’t.”
Celia made a noise from the kitchen.
I ignored her.
Mom squeezed my wrist.
“You do.”
The coffee shop Mariana chose was attached to a bookstore in a strip mall near DeWitt.
By the time I arrived, Ernesto was on his second coffee and looked as if caffeine had become a medical necessity.
Mariana sat across from him with the cashier’s check inside a clear plastic document sleeve she had purchased from the bookstore.
“You bought a sleeve?”
She looked at me.
“I didn’t want Ernesto carrying it around folded in his pocket.”
Ernesto lifted both hands.
“It survived Thursday through today.”
“That is not a chain-of-custody standard.”
“You’re a preschool teacher.”
“And you’re apparently a money mule.”
He winced.
“Fair.”
I sat beside Mariana.
She did not move away.
That felt important enough that I noticed.
“Anything on the SUV?”
“No.”
“Did you see the driver?”
“Not clearly.”
Ernesto stirred his coffee.
“Could’ve been a woman.”
“Could’ve?”
“Hair looked long.”
I stared at him.
“That is not useful.”
“I know.”
Mariana slid the check toward me.
Northline Storage Holdings was printed on the payee line.
The remitter field contained the name CR Property Services.
“Claudia’s company?”
“Maybe,” Mariana said.
“The transfers went to an account associated with that name, but I still can’t confirm ownership.”
“Can the bank?”
“Eventually.”
Ernesto leaned closer.
“She always said CR was hers.”
“Why would she route money through your account if she had her own company account?”
He stared at his cup.
“That’s the part that doesn’t make sense.”
“None of this makes sense.”
“It did at first.”
“How?”
Ernesto sighed.
“She told me Rogelio was trying to keep some cash out of the operating account so a lender wouldn’t sweep it.”
Mariana frowned.
“Why would that require your personal account?”
“Because she said the business accounts were cross-collateralized.”
“You know what that means?”
“No.”
“Did you ask?”
“She explained it.”
“What did she say?”
“That if Rogelio defaulted on one loan, the bank could grab money from another account.”
Mariana leaned back.
“That part is at least plausible.”
I looked at her.
“You’re helping him.”
“I’m separating bad decisions from impossible stories.”
Ernesto pointed at her.
“I like her.”
I did not.
Not at that moment.
“Then why cashier’s checks?”
“She said checks made the payments easier to document.”
Mariana stared at him.
“No, they don’t.”
“I know that now.”
“How much did you move altogether?”
He rubbed his face.
“Maybe forty thousand.”
“Maybe?”
“I didn’t keep a spreadsheet.”
Mariana looked personally offended.
“I noticed.”
I almost laughed.
The coffee shop door opened.
All three of us looked up.
A woman carrying a stroller struggled through the entrance while holding a paper cup.
Not Claudia.
We relaxed badly.
“Does Dad know we’re here?” I asked.
“No,” Ernesto said.
“He called six times.”
“You didn’t answer?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m fifty-four years old and still don’t like when my brother yells at me.”
There was no joke in his voice.
Something old moved underneath the sentence.
“When did that start?”
Ernesto shrugged.
“Birth, probably.”
Mariana glanced at me but said nothing.
I looked at the check again.
“What did Claudia say this payment was for?”
“Storage.”
“Of what?”
“Documents.”
Mariana stopped moving.
“What kind?”
“Old company records.”
“Why would she pay thirty-five hundred dollars to store paper?”
“I asked that.”
“And?”
“She said it covered several months.”
“Did you ever see the warehouse?”
“Years ago.”
“Inside?”
“Sure.”
“What was there?”
“Shelving, old tires, attachments, boxed files.”
“Any equipment recently?”
“I don’t know.”
Mariana took out her phone.
“What?”
I asked.
“I’m searching the address.”
“For what?”
“Property records.”
Ernesto leaned over.
“You can just do that?”
“Sometimes.”
“Preschool has changed.”
She ignored him.
After a minute, she turned the screen toward us.
“The warehouse is owned by Northline Storage Holdings.”
I stared at her.
“So the check is being paid to the building owner.”
“Yes.”
“Who owns Northline?”
“That is still obscured through the registered agent.”
Ernesto frowned.
“That building used to belong to Halpern Industrial.”
“When?”
“Maybe ten years ago.”
“Who did Dad rent it from?”
“Halpern.”
Mariana searched again.
A few minutes passed.
I watched customers move around us.
A college student highlighted a textbook.
A man in construction clothes took a video call near the window.
Two elderly women debated whether a muffin counted as lunch.
Normal life again.
It had begun to feel suspicious.
Mariana finally said, “Northline bought the property eighteen months ago.”
“Before Dad’s loan.”
“Yes.”
“Sale amount?”
“Seven hundred and twenty thousand.”
I stared at the warehouse photograph on her screen.
It was an ugly low building with two loading bays and a cracked parking lot.
“Who buys that for seven hundred grand?”
“Someone who wants the land, maybe.”
Ernesto shook his head.
“Not there.”
“What’s nearby?”
“Industrial stuff.”
He squinted.
“Rail spur behind it.”
Mariana tapped through another page.
“There’s also a second parcel.”
“What?”
“Northline owns the vacant lot behind the warehouse.”
“How much?”
“Three hundred ten thousand.”
I felt a slow pressure build behind my eyes.
“One company spent more than a million dollars on two pieces of property and now they’re taking thirty-five-hundred-dollar checks from Claudia?”
Ernesto’s face changed.
“What?”
“What?”
He looked at Mariana.
“Show me the address for the second parcel.”
She did.
He stared.
“Oh, no.”
“What?”
“That lot touches your father’s new equipment yard.”
I sat forward.
“What equipment yard?”
“The one he was trying to buy.”
I looked at him.
“Dad never said anything about buying a yard.”
“He talked about it for years.”
“Where?”
“Behind Northline.”
Mariana’s fingers moved quickly.
“Sterling Equipment does not own that parcel.”
“I know.”
“Who does?”
“Another LLC.”
“What name?”
She looked at me.
“RDS Development.”
My initials were not RDS.
My father’s were.
Rogelio David Sterling.
May you like
A cold sensation moved through me.
“When was it formed?”
