My phone rang.
Eleanor.
I answered.
“What?”
“You cannot leave us standing outside.”
“You have vehicles.”
“That isn’t what I mean.”
“I know.”
Sophie’s voice suddenly came through.
Apparently Mother put the phone on speaker.
“What do you expect us to do?”
“Find temporary housing.”
“With what money?”
That was new.
I frowned.
“I thought your landlord sold the property.”
“He did.”
“And you had notice?”
Silence.
Adrian said:
“Six weeks.”
“Six weeks?”
Sophie snapped:
“We thought we had another place.”
“What happened?”
“It fell through.”
“Why?”
Another silence.
Interesting.
I said:
“I’ll pay directly for three nights at a hotel in Bellmere so the kids are not stranded tonight.”
Nobody answered.
Then Sophie said:
“Three nights?”
“Yes.”
“We need months.”
“You need housing.”
“I am offering you enough time to start arranging it.”
Mother said:
“You could solve this immediately.”
“That’s exactly the problem.”
“What does that mean?”
“You all arrived believing my house was your solution before I agreed to anything.”
Adrian spoke.
“We already registered the kids using this address.”
I stopped breathing.
“What?”
He went quiet.
“Adrian.”
“For school.”
“You used Cedarbrook Estate as your residence?”
“We needed paperwork started.”
“You do not live here.”
“Mom said you’d agree.”
My eyes moved to the gate screen.
Eleanor was looking away.
“What exactly did you submit?”
Adrian said:
“Nothing major.”
That sentence never means anything good.
“What did you submit?”
“A temporary lease.”
My whole body went cold.
“What lease?”
“We filled out a simple occupancy agreement for the guest cottage.”
“We?”
“Sophie and me.”
“Signed by whom?”
Silence.
I asked again.
“Who signed my name?”
Sophie looked at Adrian.
Adrian looked toward the camera.
Then Mother said:
“Claire, nobody was trying to steal anything.”
I nearly laughed.
“That was not my question.”
Adrian finally answered.
“I used your electronic signature from an old Evermere estimate.”
Everything in me became very still.
Not angry.
Still.
“You forged a lease.”
“I filled it out because we knew you weren’t going to leave the kids without somewhere to go.”
“You knew no such thing.”
“It was temporary.”
“My signature is not temporary.”
