Chapter 5 - The Tenants Speak
Dawn broke over Seattle in shades of slate gray and freezing drizzle.
I didn't sleep. By 6:00 AM, I was parked two houses down from our family home on Alki Avenue in a rented sedan. The street was quiet, save for the distant cry of gulls over the Puget Sound.
Julian’s eviction threat had clearly cleared the house. Two large commercial moving vans were parked in front of the driveway, their rear doors gaping open.
Two burly men in coveralls were carrying furniture out through the front door.
My stomach dropped.
They were loading Dad’s antique cedar chest. Mom’s dining room chairs. The framed oil paintings my grandmother had painted in the 1970s.
Julian Vance wasn't just foreclosing on the real estate. He was liquidating the contents of the house under an "abandoned property" clause.
I threw open the car door and marched up the driveway.
“Stop right there!” I commanded, pulling out my phone and recording the workers. “Put that chest down! That is stolen personal property!”
One of the movers, a young man with a red beard, paused on the ramp, looking uneasy. “Lady, we’re just hired labor. Apex Horizon gave us a work order to clear the residence before the auction at ten.”
“Apex Horizon does not own the personal property inside that home,” a voice called out from the sidewalk behind me.
I turned.
Standing near the mailbox was a young woman in her mid-twenties, wearing scrubs and a heavy rain jacket. She had dark hair tied in a messy bun and was holding a green canvas backpack.
I recognized her instantly: she was the fourth sublet tenant, the only one who hadn't been in the dining room the night before.
“You’re Jessica... no, Chloe, right?” the young woman asked, walking toward me.
“I’m Chloe Vance,” I said cautiously. “Who are you?”
“My name is Sarah Lind. I was renting the garden studio out back,” she said, her voice trembling slightly with anger. “I’m a third-year nursing student at Seattle University. I came back to get my textbooks before Vance’s thugs threw them in a dumpster.”
Sarah looked at the movers, then stepped closer to me, lowering her voice.
“I know what Valerie was doing to your mother.”
My heart stopped. “You knew?”
“I didn't know the full extent until two weeks ago,” Sarah whispered, her eyes brimming with guilt. “Valerie told all of us that her mother had violent dementia and that the basement was a converted safe suite. She locked the basement deadbolt and warned us that if we ever went down there, Eleanor would attack us.”
“Why didn't you call the police?” I demanded, unable to hide the accusation in my voice.
“Because I didn't have proof—until last Tuesday,” Sarah said, unzipping the front pocket of her backpack. She pulled out a small black flash drive and pressed it into my hand. “Last week, Valerie had a party upstairs while her mother was screaming for water. Valerie was drunk. She was in the kitchen with that monster, Julian Vance.”
“And you recorded them?”
“I hid my phone behind the microwave,” Sarah said. “Valerie was bragging. She was laughing about how easy it was to slip crushed pills into Eleanor’s applesauce. And Vance... Vance told her that as soon as the auction finalized today, they’d split the $400,000 cash equity, and Valerie could put Eleanor in an unlicensed group home in Yakima under an alias so no one would ever trace her.”
A cold chill washed down my spine.
An unlicensed home in Yakima. Under an alias.
Valerie wasn't just stealing the house. She was planning to erase Mom entirely from the system. If I hadn't flown back yesterday, Eleanor would have disappeared without a trace within forty-eight hours.
“There’s more,” Sarah added, glancing nervously over her shoulder toward the street. “Valerie has a boyfriend. A guy named Ray. He’s Vance’s muscle. He handles the cash drops. Ray has been watching the house all morning. He’s parked across the—”
Before Sarah could finish her sentence, a black Dodge Charger with tinted windows roared around the corner, tires screeching against the wet asphalt.
The Charger jumped the curb, blocking my rental car in the driveway.
The driver’s door flew open. A thick-necked man with a shaved head and brass knuckle tattoos across his throat jumped out, holding a steel crowbar in his right hand.
“Hey!” Ray roared, storming toward us. “Give that drive back, you little bitch!”
Sarah shrieked and scrambled back toward the porch.
I didn't run.
Six years in corporate Singapore had taught me how to handle ruthless predators. But more than that, the sight of this scumbag coming at me on the driveway my father had built snapped the last thread of fear inside my soul.
I slipped the flash drive deep into my inner coat pocket, zipped it shut, and stood my ground.
“You take one more step,” I said, my voice dead and cold as winter, “and you won't live to see your boss go to federal prison.”
Ray laughed—a harsh, barking sound. He raised the crowbar.
“You think you’re tough, princess? You’re just another spoiled brat about to get put in her place.”
May you like
He lunged.
***
