Chapter 3 - THE CONTRACT WITH MY NAME
The forged signature was not particularly good.
That almost made it worse.
Dileia had not even believed she needed to be careful.
The contract claimed I had agreed to sell Caldwell Street for $238,000.
Forty thousand less than I had paid.
The buyer was an LLC called Blue Ridge Property Partners.
I had never heard of it.
“What happens if this gets recorded somehow?” I asked Patricia.
“The contract itself doesn’t transfer title.”
“Good.”
“But it could create expensive confusion if someone tried to enforce it.”
“Who owns Blue Ridge?”
“We’re tracing it.”
By afternoon, we had the answer.
Not Dileia.
Not Dad.
A man named Curtis Bell.
I recognized the name because Dileia had dated him three years earlier.
Their breakup lasted longer than their relationship.
“What does Curtis do?”
Patricia checked.
“Wholesaling. Small property flips. Private acquisitions.”
The arrangement started making sense.
Dileia could not legally sell my property.
But she could pretend she had a contract to buy it cheaply, then assign that contract to another investor for a fee.
She did not need to own Caldwell Street.
She only needed someone to believe she controlled it.
I called Dileia with Patricia’s approval and recorded nothing secretly. Patricia joined the call.
“Who is Curtis Bell?”
Dileia went quiet.
“Why are you asking?”
“Because Blue Ridge Property Partners has a contract supposedly signed by me.”
“That was preliminary.”
“My signature is on it.”
“Curtis made the paperwork.”
“Did you give him permission?”
She exhaled sharply.
“Ranata, nothing happened.”
“Because I found out.”
“We were going to bring you the offer.”
“You listed my property before bringing me anything.”
“I knew you’d say no if I asked first.”
That sentence was astonishingly honest.
Patricia spoke.
“Ms. Lewis, please direct any further statements through counsel.”
Dileia laughed bitterly.
“Of course Ranata has a lawyer now.”
I almost replied.
Patricia stopped me with a glance.
After the call, I sat silently.
Then Patricia said:
“She just admitted she intentionally bypassed your consent.”
“I know.”
But that wasn’t what bothered me most.
Dileia had said “we.”
Not Curtis and Dileia.
I could hear it in her tone.
There were more people involved.
Patricia traced the payment records attached to the investor post.
A $5,000 earnest-money deposit had already been placed into an escrow account.
The intended recipient if the deal closed?
Not Dileia.
A consulting company called Palmer Family Solutions.
May you like
Palmer was my mother’s maiden name.
And the company’s registered manager was my mother, Denise.
