Chapter 6 - The Signature That Wasn’t Mine
At eight the next morning, my father was already waiting in the bank parking lot.
He sat behind the wheel of his truck staring straight ahead.
When James pulled in, Dad got out holding a manila folder.
His hands were shaking.
“Where’s Mom?” I asked.
“At home.”
“Does she know you’re here?”
“No.”
That single word carried thirty years of marriage inside it.
We went into the bank together.
A loan officer named Denise met us in a small glass-walled office. Dad had apparently spoken to her the day before Thanksgiving.
She placed copies of documents on the desk.
“I need to be careful about what I disclose,” she said, “but because Mrs. Walker is a named beneficiary and purported signatory, we have an identity-verification issue.”
Purported.
I hated that word immediately.
She slid a page toward me.
At the bottom was my name.
Claire Bennett Walker.
The signature looked almost right.
Almost.
The C was too round.
The W slanted backward.
And I had never seen the document in my life.
James leaned over my shoulder.
“When was this signed?”
“March eighth.”
I looked at him.
Emma had been born March eighth.
At 6:42 that morning.
I had spent the entire day in a hospital bed.
Denise continued.
“The notarization states Mrs. Walker appeared in person at 2:15 p.m.”
Dad whispered, “Impossible.”
I laughed.
It sounded wrong even to me.
“At two fifteen I was learning how to breastfeed.”
James’s jaw tightened.
“Who notarized it?”
Denise turned the page.
The name was familiar.
Carol Bennett.
My aunt.
The woman who had sat at Thanksgiving dinner pretending to be shocked.
Dad closed his eyes.
“No.”
I remembered Aunt Carol saying Mom had asked her to keep quiet about the camera.
Suddenly that felt tiny.
“What happens now?” I asked.
Denise folded her hands.
“The earlier application was rejected because additional verification was required. A second application was started this month. That appears to be the package you saw last night.”
“So they tried once with a forged signature,” James said, “then tried again by getting Claire to sign for real.”
“That would be my concern.”
Dad pushed away from the desk.
“I’m going to kill them.”
James caught his arm.
“No, you’re not.”
Dad jerked free.
“They forged my daughter’s name.”
“And if you storm over there screaming, Lauren gets exactly what she wanted from me last night—another angry man she can point at.”
Dad stared at him.
The truth landed.
Denise looked uncomfortable.
“There’s something else.”
Of course there was.
She pulled out another sheet.
“This account shows three transfers that were made before the refinance was rejected.”
Dad frowned.
“Transfers from where?”
“From the trust’s cash reserve.”
He went completely still.
“How much?”
“One hundred and twelve thousand dollars.”
I stopped breathing.
Dad whispered, “Susan can’t move that money alone.”
Denise looked at him.
“She didn’t.”
“Who approved it?”
Denise rotated the document.
There were two electronic authorizations.
One belonged to my mother.
The other belonged to my father.
Dad stared at his own name.
Then he said something I will never forget.
“That wasn’t me either.”
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