Chapter 11 - PAIGE FINALLY LEARNED WHAT OUR MOTHER DID WITH PEOPLE
Paige did not become innocent because she cooperated.
I reminded myself of that before the meeting.
She had shoved Gwen into a gate.
Held clippers against her head.
Locked doors.
Signed false papers.
Spent money she knew I had earned.
Fear did not erase choices.
Neither did being manipulated by Mom.
Paige met investigators with her attorney.
Sarah attended only the portions relevant to the civil case.
Gwen refused to sit in the room.
“I don’t need to hear her explain me to herself.”
I went.
Paige wore jeans.
No handbag.
No jewelry except a thin wedding-style band Tyler had apparently given her years earlier.
Tyler was gone.
He had moved into his brother’s apartment.
Paige looked at me.
“You hate me.”
“That isn’t why we’re here.”
She almost smiled.
“You sound like Dad.”
That hurt unexpectedly.
Her attorney interrupted.
“Paige is prepared to provide records.”
A phone.
External drive.
Bank statements.
Texts.
She had saved everything because she never fully trusted Mom.
“What did Mom promise you?” I asked.
Paige looked down.
“The house.”
“When?”
“Before construction.”
I stared at her.
“Before?”
“She said you would stay in Canada.”
“I had a four-year contract.”
“She said you’d renew.”
I had renewed once.
“Then what?”
“She said Gwen would eventually leave.”
My throat tightened.
“Why?”
“Because she hated living with us.”
Gwen hated living with people who locked her in rooms.
Remarkable insight.
Paige continued.
“Mom said when you came back alone, she’d put the house in your name and I’d keep the truck.”
“Then why did you think the house would be yours?”
“Later.”
“After what?”
“After Mom died.”
There it was.
A chain of promised ownership.
Mom acted as if property became hers because she managed it.
Then she promised it to Paige because Paige stayed near her.
My labor became family currency.
Gwen was the only person insisting names on deeds meant something.
“What did you find out?”
Paige’s face hardened.
“Mom’s will leaves the house to you.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“She never planned to give it to me.”
The irony almost made me laugh.
Mom stole the house from me.
Then planned to give it back to me when she died.
After using its equity to fund herself and Paige for years.
Paige had been promised inheritance as obedience.
Not ownership.
“How did you find the will?”
“Her safe.”
“Did you have permission?”
“No.”
At least she was consistent.
Paige wiped under one eye.
“I asked her about it.”
“What did she say?”
“That I’d already gotten enough.”
The truck.
Trips.
Jewelry.
Cash.
Paige finally heard the same moral equation Mom used on everyone.
Need determined entitlement.
Mom determined need.
“What happened then?”
“She told me if the fraud came out, she’d say I forged everything.”
I leaned back.
“Did you?”
“Some.”
“Which?”
“The new affidavit.”
Gwen’s fake signature.
Paige swallowed.
“Mom had samples.”
“From where?”
“Old closing documents.”
“Did Sandra know?”
Paige looked toward her lawyer.
Then answered.
“Some.”
Not a full confession for Sandra.
Enough for investigators to keep asking.
“What about the original deed?”
Paige’s eyes filled.
“I wasn’t there when Mom did it.”
“Who was?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did Mom forge Gwen’s signature?”
“I think so.”
“That means nothing.”
“I saw practice pages.”
The room went still.
“What practice pages?”
Paige nodded toward the external drive.
“I photographed them.”
Investigators later confirmed the images.
Sheets of paper.
GWEN COLE.
G. E. COLE.
Gwen Elizabeth Cole.
Signature after signature.
My mother’s dining-room table beneath them.
I felt numb.
Paige continued.
“She practiced yours too.”
The loan.
My supposed signature.
“How long?”
“Years.”
I looked at her.
“Did Dad know?”
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t lie.”
“I don’t know.”
She began crying.
“For once, Gavin, I really don’t.”
I thought about Dad’s toolbox.
His warning.
Maybe he knew enough.
Not everything.
No one ever does.
Paige’s cooperation shifted the cases.
The disputed property transaction had direct evidence of signature practice.
The loan fraud had witnesses.
The coercion against Gwen had videos.
The assault had medical documentation and Tyler’s messages.
Mom’s attorney began negotiating from a much worse position.
But Mom herself remained defiant.
She called me through Sarah.
One permitted call.
Five minutes.
“Paige is lying.”
“About which part?”
“All of it.”
“Did you forge Gwen’s deed?”
“No.”
“Did you hold the camera while Paige shaved her?”
“She needed help.”
I closed my eyes.
“Listen to yourself.”
“You weren’t here.”
“That doesn’t turn cruelty into care.”
“You have no idea what she was like.”
“She wouldn’t sign.”
“Because she wanted control.”
“It was her property.”
“It was family property.”
There.
The belief underneath everything.
“Family property doesn’t mean your property.”
“I built that house.”
“With my money.”
“I managed it.”
“With Gwen’s money too.”
Silence.
She hadn’t expected me to know Gwen paid contractors.
I continued.
“You starved her.”
“She refused food.”
“You locked the pantry.”
“She binged when she was emotional.”
“You locked her room.”
“She threatened to leave in the middle of the night.”
“She was allowed to leave.”
Mom laughed.
“You think marriage means people can just run every time they’re unhappy?”
I stared at the phone.
“Mine does now.”
Silence.
Then Mom said quietly:
“She’ll leave you anyway.”
That sentence found an old wound immediately.
“She doesn’t love you anymore.”
I said nothing.
“She stayed for the house.”
I almost believed her for half a second.
That was how well she knew me.
Then I remembered Gwen on the video.
I’m making sure there’s something left if he does.
I said, “Goodbye, Mom.”
“Gavin.”
I ended the call.
That evening, Gwen and I ate takeout Thai food on the townhouse floor because our borrowed table had broken.
She looked at the carton.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re staring.”
“Mom said you stayed for the house.”
Gwen’s expression went blank.
I regretted the sentence.
Then she laughed.
Not kindly.
“The house?”
“I know.”
“The house with the outdoor dishwashing station?”
“Fair.”
She took another bite.
Then her face softened.
“I stayed for what we were building.”
I looked at her.
“That’s not the same thing.”
“No.”
Before I could ask what it meant, Sarah called.
The bank had completed its first review of the $185,000 loan.
My signature was not the biggest problem.
The loan file contained a recorded telephone verification supposedly made with me in Yellowknife.
The voice identified himself as Gavin Cole.
The bank still had the recording.
May you like
And Sarah recognized the voice before I did.
It was Tyler.
