Leo Driscoll bought a crashed 2012 sedan at a county auto auction for $850 to salvage its engine.
The realization of the forged signature hung heavy in the air. Carla slammed her fist lightly on the workbench, rattling a stack of invoices.
“He really thought he was slick,” she grumbled. “Selling us a hot car under the table, then sending his lawyer after it with a fancy LLC.”
“It makes sense,” Maya said, tapping a finger on her laptop screen. “If the car transfer happened after Julian was declared dead, Marcus couldn’t legally sell it without being the official heir, which he’s not yet. Or, he needed to make it look like Julian himself authorized the sale.”
I traced the shaky lines of the forged signature on the title document. It was sloppy, almost desperate.
“He covered his tracks badly,” I said, feeling a prickle of suspicion. “Why would he forge it instead of going through the proper channels? Unless he didn’t *want* a paper trail connecting him to the sale directly.”
Carla threw her hands up. “So what now, Leo? Do we give the car back? We’ve got labor hours in this thing, and Toby is still living with us!”
Toby, the pitbull mix, had been given a corner of the garage, a bed made of old blankets, and a bowl of fresh water. He watched us with wide, curious eyes from his spot, chewing contentedly on a rubber toy.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “We don’t give it back. Not until we know what’s really going on.”
Maya nodded slowly. “The forged title, the rushed LLC, the injunction… it screams of someone trying to grab something back before it’s thoroughly investigated.”
“But why?” Carla asked, looking from me to Maya. “If he wants the car, why not just offer to buy it back from us? Why all the legal threats?”
“Because he knows there’s something in it,” I said, looking towards the sedan. My gaze went to the trunk. “Something he needs to make disappear.”
The cracked smartphone in my toolbox felt heavy, even though it was out of sight. It was the only tangible link to Julian, the supposed dead man.
“We need to get more out of that phone,” I told Maya. “Everything. Deleted messages, call logs, whatever is buried deep.”
Maya bit her lip, a calculating look on her face. “It’s damaged. We’ll need specialized recovery software, and it’ll take time. The kind of software that sometimes leaves a trace.”
“We don’t have time for hesitation,” I said, my voice firm. “Marcus Brody is coming for this car, one way or another. We need answers before he gets here.”
More Stories
+ There are no comments
Add yours