Chapter 6

He slid the letter across the table toward Rosalind.

She didn't want to look at it. She had already seen it, already read it, already understood what it meant. But Hollis didn't pull it back, and the shape of the thing on the table seemed to have its own gravity, so she looked down.

It was the same letter she had read an hour ago, the one dated March, the one that said the ownership had transferred. But there was a second page under it — a page she had not seen, because Hollis had only shown her the first.

The second page was a statement from Tri-State Hearthstone, signed and notarized, dated the day after the closing. It was addressed to the new owner of record, Hollis Vance, and it was an accounting.

Line one: Purchase price, Ridgeline Barn property, in full, as per grant deed recorded 17 March.

Line two: Liabilities assumed by seller, including the following vendor contracts, with remaining terms and monthly payments, enumerated below.

Beneath that, in a neat typed table, was her name. Rosalind Deacon. The contract she had signed four years ago. The monthly fee she paid to Tri-State Hearthstone for the right to host events at the Ridgeline Barn. The contract start date, the renewal terms, the clause on page eleven.

And at the bottom of the page, a line item that Rosalind had to read twice to understand:

"Vendor contract 44-B — Rosalind Deacon Events. Status: ACTIVE. Payment schedule: monthly, in arrears. Signatory authority: transferable. Buyer assumption status: RECOMMENDED–NO CHANGE. Buyer signature: ______"

"She kept paying us," Hollis said. "After March, the management firm stopped being her landlord, but they kept being her bookkeeper. They kept taking her monthly payment and depositing it into the property account, which is mine now. They never kicked the ball back to her, and she never asked.