“I didn’t sign Amy’s name.”
“The file was uploaded from your home internet connection,” Martin said.
“The contractor preserved the submission record after Amy called them.”
Scott’s mother moved between them.
“This is becoming ridiculous.
He was trying to help his wife move on from a painful situation.”
The neighbor standing nearest us lowered her phone.
“Is that what he was doing?” she asked.
Her name was Mrs.
Alvarez.
She had lived beside my parents for twenty-six years.
She used to bring my mother soup after medical appointments.
Scott stared at her.
Mrs.
Alvarez continued.
“Because this morning he told the foreman his wife would be angry, but she would get over it once she understood there was nothing left to come back to.”
Scott’s father pointed across the street.
“Stay out of this.”
Mrs.
Alvarez raised her phone again.
“I recorded it.”
The street went quiet except for the plastic snapping against the temporary fence.
Scott turned toward me, his expression changing from anger to calculation.
“Amy, we should discuss this privately.”
“You arranged the demolition publicly,” I said.
“I made a mistake.”
“No.
You made a plan.”
I remembered the travel vouchers.
The hotel reservation.
His sudden kindness after my mother’s funeral.
He had not merely taken advantage of my absence.
He had created it.
Martin opened the third document.
It was the contractor’s invoice.
The deposit had been paid with a credit card ending in the same four digits as Scott’s personal card.
A handwritten note from the project manager read: Rush request.
Owner states spouse is emotionally unstable and may interfere.
Do not communicate with her.
My stomach tightened when I saw those words.
Scott had used my grief to make me sound unreliable before anyone met me.
He had known exactly what he was doing.
A police cruiser turned onto the street and stopped beside the curb.
Two officers stepped out.
Martin had called them before arriving, not to demand an arrest, but to preserve the scene and document what remained.
Scott’s father walked toward the officers with the confidence of a man accustomed to talking his way through closed doors.
“This is a domestic disagreement,” he said.
“My son demolished a house belonging to his wife.”
Martin handed one officer the deed.
“It belonged to a trust for two minor beneficiaries,” he said.
“The demolition permit appears to contain a forged trustee authorization.”
The officer looked from the document to the empty lot.
“Who ordered the work?”
Scott crossed his arms.
“I coordinated it.
