Chapter 5: What Her Father Never Said
Jasmine didn't tell Jessica what she'd found.
She didn't tell her father either.
Not yet.
She spent the morning in her room with her laptop, reading everything she could find about Gerald Hargrove and property law in their state.
She wasn't a lawyer.
She didn't understand every word.
But she understood enough.
A disbarred attorney couldn't legally execute a property transfer.
Any document he'd signed after his disbarment date was potentially invalid.
The disbarment had been finalized twenty-seven months ago.
The transfer agreement in the envelope was dated four months ago.
The numbers didn't match in Jessica's favor.
At noon, her phone buzzed.
Her father.
*Can you meet me for lunch?
Just us.*
She drove to the small diner three blocks from his office.
He was already in a booth at the back when she arrived, his hands wrapped around a mug of coffee, his face looking like he hadn't stopped thinking since he'd left the house.
She slid in across from him.
"Tell me," she said.
He took a breath.
"When your mother passed," he said, "I wasn't in a good place.
You know that.
But what you don't know is that I made some bad investments.
Trying to — I don't know.
Fill the time.
Keep moving." He stared at the mug.
"I lost a lot of money.
More than I should have.
And then I borrowed to cover it, and that went wrong too."
"How wrong?"
"Wrong enough that I needed someone to help me restructure things quietly.
Without it becoming a legal matter." He finally looked up at her.
"Jessica knew someone.
A lawyer she trusted.
He helped move some of the debt around, restructure the asset record.
It kept things from going further."
Jasmine kept her voice steady.
"Who was the lawyer?"
He hesitated.
"Gerald Hargrove."
She pulled out her phone and set it on the table, the news article already on the screen.
David looked at it for a long moment without touching it.
"I know," he said quietly.
"You knew he was disbarred?"
"I found out about eight months ago."
"And Jessica?"
"She knew before I did." He pushed the phone back toward her gently.
"She told me herself.
She said it didn't matter, that the work he'd done for us was already done, that there was no reason for anyone to look into it." His voice dropped.
"I should have pushed back harder.
I know that now."
"She used him again four months ago," Jasmine said.
"To transfer the house."
His jaw tightened.
"She told me it was a formality.
She said joint ownership would protect us both if anything happened to me.
That it was for your sake."
"She used a disbarred lawyer to do it."
"I know."
"Dad, that transfer might not be legal."
He looked out the window.
"She doesn't know you know that," he said.
It wasn't a question.
"No."
He was quiet for a long moment.
A waitress came and went without either of them ordering anything.
"She has the original paperwork," he said finally.
"And she has records of the financial restructuring.
If she decides to use those — even if Hargrove's involvement makes them questionable — it could get complicated.
Lawyers cost money.
It could take time.
She knows that."
"So she's counting on us not fighting it," Jasmine said.
"That's what she's always counted on."
Jasmine looked at her father.
He looked older today than he had yesterday.
He looked like a man who had been making small concessions for six years and had only just started counting the cost.
"Dad," she said.
"Do you still have the records?
From the original restructuring?"
"Some of them.
In a box in the study."
"I need to look at them."
"Jasmine—"
"I need to look at them," she said again.
"Because right now she thinks she has everything.
And I don't think she does." She folded her hands on the table.
"But I need to be sure before we do anything."
He looked at her across the table.
His daughter.
Nineteen years old.
Sitting like she already knew what she was doing.
"When did you get so steady?" he said softly.
"I learned it from you," she said.
"Before you started making concessions."
He flinched slightly.
Then nodded.
"The box is on the left side of the study closet," he said.
"Brown lid.
It's labeled tax records."
"I'll find it."
She drove home before Jessica returned from wherever she went on Tuesday afternoons.
The study closet was exactly where her father had said.
The box was there.
Brown lid, just as described.
May you like
She carried it to her room and closed the door.
And started reading.
