The Signature On The Last Page Was Supposed To Be Mine

Daniel Pike met us at his office the next morning. He put a blank pad on the table and asked me what I wanted first.

"My son's things," I said. "My pay. And for people to know I didn't steal anything."

He wrote all three down.

"Then we'll start there."

He explained his fees before asking me to sign anything. Ruth had paid for the first records search. Further work would be billed to me under the agreement we read together.

"Owning shares doesn't mean there is a pile of cash waiting," he said. "We need the original trust, the current accounts, and the company records."

"Could all this be a mistake?"

"Some of it could. That's why we check."

He had already found a filed copy of my mother's will. It matched the papers Ruth had saved. My mother had inherited sixty shares from her father. June held the other forty.

June had managed the company after Mom became ill. She had also become trustee of the property Mom left for me.

"The trust called for you to receive control at twenty-five," Daniel said. "When was your birthday?"

"Fourteen months ago."

He wrote that down, too.

Kit sat beside me, drawing a house on the back of an old calendar page. Daniel had asked before giving it to him.

"Do you have to give that back?" Kit asked.

"No," Daniel said. "You can keep it."

At noon, Mrs. Price called. June had let her collect our bags from the shop stairs.

Everything was there except my blue work shirt, which June said belonged to the company. Mrs. Price had also saved the time sheets showing my eighty unpaid hours.

Daniel sent a written demand for the $1,120 in wages and a correction of the theft claim.

I sent June a shorter message.

Do not contact Kit. Speak to my lawyer about money or papers.

She called six times. I let the calls ring.

We moved into a furnished room Ruth found through her church. It cost $165 a week. I paid the first week with a loan recorded beside the motel receipt.

Two days later, I started packing medical linens at a care center for $17 an hour. The manager checked my references. Mrs. Price told her exactly what had happened at the dinner.

For the first time in years, my job and my bed depended on two different people.

That Friday, June waited by my car after work.

"I was worried about you," she said.

I stayed beside the staff entrance.

"Daniel asked you to contact him."

"A lawyer will eat every dollar you think you've found."

"Then show him the records."

Her face changed.

"That company kept food on your table."

"I worked for that food."

"And before that? You were a difficult little girl. You needed help I couldn't give you."

"You could have said you couldn't raise me. You told me my mother didn't want me."

June looked toward the open door behind me. Two workers were coming out.

"You don't know what your mother was like at the end."

"I'm learning."

She left without answering.

That night, Kit showed me his drawing. The house had a porch and two pairs of shoes beside its door.

"Why are the shoes outside?" I asked.

"They're waiting."

I didn't ask for whom. I set the drawing beside my bed.

A week after the dinner, Daniel called me back to his office.

June's lawyer had sent records. There was a proposed sale of the company's buildings, equipment, and customer accounts for $480,000.

"That's less than the preliminary value of the buildings alone," Daniel said. "The buyer's owner also has business ties to June. We need a full review before anything moves."

I looked at the signature page. June had signed as president and trustee.

"Can you stop it?"

"We can ask the court to pause it while the ownership dispute is heard."

He set another page beside the sale.

It was a receipt dated three weeks after my twenty-fifth birthday. It said I had received all property due from the trust and approved June's final account.

The signature looked almost like mine. The M had three sharp points. Mine had two.

"I never saw this."

"Where were you that day?"

I checked the date against my phone calendar.

"Working a double shift at the shop. June had a rush order."

Daniel turned the paper over. A copy of the rush-order time sheet was attached to the records packet.

June had initialed my fourteen hours herself.

Then Daniel showed me the last page: a transfer request sending my supposed final payment into an account held in June's name.