Chapter 9 - THE NIGHT AT THE DOOR
I moved Dustin away from the front window.
Then I called 911.
Nathan remained on the porch.
He looked directly into the doorbell camera.
“Lauren, open the door.”
I did not answer.
He lifted the gasoline can.
“It’s empty.”
“I brought it for the lawn mower.”
The lawn mower used electricity.
Nathan knew that.
“Stop making this dramatic.”
He tried the door.
The new deadbolt held.
“You changed the locks.”
I remained in the hallway with Dustin behind me.
The dispatcher stayed on the phone.
Officers were less than four minutes away.
Nathan knocked harder.
“This is my home too.”
He stepped backward and looked toward the upstairs windows.
“Dustin.”
My son froze.
“Come talk to me.”
I covered Dustin’s ears.
Nathan’s voice rose.
“I know you can hear me.”
“Tell your mother you lied.”
Dustin began trembling.
I led him into the pantry beside the kitchen.
The same place where Margaret had locked him.
He stopped at the doorway.
“No.”
The panic in his voice broke my heart.
“We’re not hiding in there.”
I opened the small door beside it that led to the laundry room.
We waited inside.
Nathan walked around the side of the house.
His shadow passed the window.
Then glass shattered.
He had struck the kitchen door with something.
The alarm began screaming.
I heard him curse.
A patrol car entered the driveway.
Nathan ran.
He made it across the backyard before two officers stopped him near the fence.
The gasoline can fell from his hand.
It was not empty.
Officers found a lighter inside his jacket.
Nathan claimed he carried it because he smoked.
He had never smoked.
He claimed the gasoline was for his truck.
The truck used diesel.
He claimed the broken glass was an accident.
The security footage showed him striking it with a metal wrench.
He was arrested for violating the protective order, attempted unlawful entry, intimidation of a witness, and criminal damage to property.
The prosecutor also considered an arson-related charge.
At the police station, Nathan demanded to speak with me.
I refused.
He called Margaret from jail.
The call was recorded.
Nathan did not ask how she was.
He did not ask about Ellie.
He did not ask about Mason.
His first question was about the house.
“Did you find the original deed?”
Margaret answered.
“No.”
“Then find it before the police search Ellie’s place.”
“The copy isn’t enough?”
“I need the original signature page.”
“For what?”
Nathan lowered his voice.
“To prove Lauren transferred the house.”
Margaret became quiet.
“You said the notary handled that.”
“He will, once he gets the document.”
The police listened to the call.
So did Rebecca.
Nathan had planned to forge a property transfer.
The “refinancing appointment” on Friday had never been with a legitimate bank.
The man Nathan called a loan officer was a former notary named Gerald Pike.
Pike had lost his commission after falsifying signatures.
Police arrested him the next morning.
Inside his office, they found a partially completed quitclaim deed.
My name had already been typed beneath the signature line.
Nathan’s name appeared as the new owner.
Pike also had copies of my driver’s license and Social Security card.
I had reported both missing months earlier.
Nathan told me I must have misplaced them.
He had stolen them from my desk.
The house was never meant to become shared property.
It was meant to become his property.
After the transfer, Nathan planned to borrow against it.
The house had nearly four hundred thousand dollars in equity.
His gambling debts were much larger than I knew.
He owed almost two hundred thousand dollars.
May you like
The people he owed had begun threatening him.
Instead of facing what he had done, he offered them my son’s home.
