Chapter 3 - The Buried Past
Simone took a slow, deliberate breath, leaning back against the kitchen doorframe. “Your father’s will? Della, Mark Marlow died when you were eight years old. The court ruled he died intestate—without a will.”
“That’s what Mom told everyone,” I said, my voice barely audible above the hum of the old refrigerator. “She claimed Dad left behind nothing but credit card debt and a second mortgage. She used that narrative to justify why we lived so frugally, why I had to work two jobs in high school, while she somehow always had money for European vacations with her ‘friends.’”
“If Mark left a will,” Simone murmured, her legal instincts visibly calibrating, “it would have governed the disposition of his share of the Marlow family holdings. Including this house, the surrounding forty acres, and his shares in the family lumber mill that was liquidated in 2008.”
Tobias walked toward the rear door that led out to the overgrown backyard. He pulled back the faded floral curtain and looked out toward the tree line. Fifty yards into the encroaching brambles stood the carriage shed, an old timber structure with a sagging roofline and collapsed weatherboarding.
“The old septic system hasn't been active since the township hooked this lane up to municipal sewer in ninety-four,” Tobias observed, squinting through the glass. “If someone dropped something down a dry access shaft, it could sit undisturbed indefinitely.”
“We can’t just go digging up septic tanks without a warrant if we’re building an evidentiary chain,” Simone warned, ever the pragmatist. “If Eileen suspects we’re onto Mark’s estate documents, she’ll file an emergency motion to seal all ancestral property records under the guise of an estate dispute.”
“Then we don’t dig with a backhoe,” Tobias said, turning around. “We do it quietly, under the umbrella of a plumbing inspection. I have a fiber-optic camera on my truck. It’s got a fifty-foot snake with an infrared lens. We check the shaft without disturbing the topsoil.”
“And what about the house?” I asked, looking around the kitchen. The water damage was real, even if Vance had exaggerated the structural danger. “Eileen has Julian Vance on her side. Vance Engineering is one of the biggest commercial site preparation firms in the county. If they lean on the local municipal board, they can find an inspector willing to sign a condemnation order.”
Simone opened her briefcase and pulled out a blue legal folder. “Not if we file for an immediate emergency historical preservation hold. Florence’s house was built in 1912. The timber framing was milled by the original Monongahela River logging co-op. If I register the structure on the county’s provisional cultural registry this afternoon, no one can touch it with a wrecking ball for ninety days, regardless of what Julian Vance files.”
“Can you do that before the municipal office closes?” I asked.
“I can be in the county clerk’s office in forty-five minutes,” Simone said, gathering her documents. “Della, stay here with Tobias. Keep the deadbolts thrown. Do not let anyone on this property, not even your sister.”
“Faye doesn't know about this,” I said, though even as the words left my mouth, doubt crept in. “At least... I don't think she does.”
“Faye cashed a check for one hundred and ninety thousand dollars that came out of an account Florence emptied under duress,” Simone said bluntly. “In the eyes of the law, she is either a co-conspirator or an accessory after the fact. Treat her as an adversary until we prove otherwise.”
Simone left through the back porch, her car tires humming softly down the asphalt road.
That left me alone with Tobias Crane in the quiet, echoing house.
Tobias wiped his hands on a clean shop rag from his pocket. He looked at me, his dark brown eyes steady, devoid of the patronizing pity I had endured from my family my entire life.
“You’ve been carrying this family’s weight for a long time, haven't you?” he asked quietly.
I let out a short, self-deprecating breath. “Is it that obvious?”
“My dad worked the timber mill until Eileen Marlow closed the doors,” Tobias said, his voice dropping into a deeper, gravelly register. “He was one of the men who lost their pensions when the corporate holding company bought out the local shares. Your mother was the managing director who signed the liquidation papers. I know what she does to people, Della. She takes what is solid and dismantles it for scrap.”
I looked at him in surprise. “You knew who I was when I hired you?”
“I knew the house,” he corrected gently. “And when I saw your name on the inquiry form, I took the job because I wanted to make sure nobody pushed Mark Marlow’s daughter around on this site. Your dad was an honest man. He kept my family from starving during the winter of ninety-six when the mill flooded.”
The connection hung between us, thick with historical gravity. I wasn't just standing in a decaying house; I was standing in the epicenter of twenty years of quiet, calculated theft.
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“Let’s get that camera,” I said, straightening my shoulders. “Let’s see what’s down that shaft.”
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