Chapter 4 - GORDON PARKER COMES OVER
Gordon did not answer the first call.
Or the second.
On the third, he picked up.
“Everything okay?”
Daniel laughed.
“Come over.”
A pause.
“What happened?”
“Mara Quinn.”
Silence.
Daniel looked at Sarah.
There.
“Dad.”
“I can explain.”
“Good. Come explain.”
Gordon arrived forty minutes later in a brown jacket and the same silver pickup he'd driven for twelve years.
He walked into the kitchen.
Saw the printed documents covering the island.
Then looked at Daniel.
“You got the servicing update.”
Daniel almost admired the understatement.
“Sit down.”
Gordon removed his jacket.
“Daniel—”
“Sit.”
Sarah touched Daniel's wrist.
Not because Gordon needed protection.
Because Daniel was beginning to sound like someone he did not want to be.
Gordon sat.
Sixty-eight.
Retired insurance adjuster.
Gray hair cut short.
A man who had spent Daniel's childhood explaining every crisis in a tone that made it sound solvable.
Daniel dropped the agreement in front of him.
“Who is Mara Quinn?”
Gordon looked at the page.
“She's connected to the family trust.”
“That isn't an answer.”
“She provided part of the money.”
“Part?”
“All.”
Sarah and Daniel both went still.
Daniel stared.
“You told me you were helping us.”
“I arranged it.”
“You said you were using retirement money.”
“I said I could cover it.”
“No.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“You said, ‘I have enough set aside.’”
Gordon looked down.
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“I wasn't trying to steal from you.”
“That is not the sentence under discussion.”
Sarah stepped in.
“Why is Mara on a lien against our house?”
“Because she wasn't willing to make an unsecured loan.”
“Who is she?”
Gordon hesitated.
Daniel's voice dropped.
“Dad.”
“A relative.”
“What relative?”
Gordon looked toward Sarah.
Then back at Daniel.
“It's complicated.”
Daniel laughed.
“People say that when the simple version is bad.”
Gordon rubbed one hand across his jaw.
“Mara is older than you.”
Daniel stared.
No one had asked her age.
Gordon knew that.
Sarah noticed too.
“So you know her personally.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Gordon stood.
“I don't think this should happen like this.”
Daniel moved between him and the doorway.
“Like what?”
“You angry.”
“You put a hundred-thousand-dollar family lien on my house and hid the lender's identity.”
“I didn't hide the lien.”
“You called it help.”
“It was help.”
“From who?”
Gordon looked at his son.
For one second, Daniel saw fear.
Not financial fear.
Family fear.
Gordon said:
“I need to talk to someone first.”
Daniel's expression changed.
“Mara.”
Gordon did not deny it.
“You've been talking to her.”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
Gordon looked away.
Daniel knew before he heard the answer.
“Most of my adult life.”
Sarah whispered:
“Gordon.”
Daniel took one step back.
“Get out.”
“Daniel.”
“Get out.”
“I'm trying to keep this from becoming uglier than it needs to be.”
Daniel pointed toward the front door.
“That hasn't worked.”
Gordon put on his jacket.
Before leaving, he looked at the paperwork.
Then at Daniel.
“The loan is real.”
“Great.”
“But she is not trying to take your house.”
Daniel stared.
“I didn't ask if she was.”
Gordon's face tightened.
He had revealed another fear.
Then he left.
Sarah stood beside the island.
Daniel looked at the closed front door.
“What did he mean?”
Sarah did not answer.
May you like
Neither of them knew.
But Gordon apparently had been preparing for a fight over Mara Quinn long before their mortgage app ever displayed her name.
