The recording was from the kitchen the previous Tuesday. Curtis told Paige that the old man would sign if they kept the pressure on, because “people that age fold when they’re tired.” He said the house would be sold within a month and the money would clear his debts. Paige answered that Mom cried every night, and Curtis only laughed. Dad had hidden the recorder in the entry table drawer after Mom called me, the one brave thing he did on his own.

Dana explained the rest. The deed was in my name, with a recorded life estate for my parents, so nobody else could ever sign anything. The forged notary stamp on Curtis’s papers was a felony, and the sheriff had already been called, which was my one phone call. Two deputies stepped through the door a minute later. Curtis shouted that it was a misunderstanding and that Paige had promised him the house was theirs. Paige whispered that she had believed it because she wanted to.

Curtis was arrested for attempted fraud and elder abuse, and the deputies took the folder as evidence. Paige sat on the staircase with her sons, who were crying silently. I knelt in front of Dad and put his sweaters back in the closet, one by one. “I did not want to lose my daughter,” he whispered. I told him he had lost nothing. Mom pressed the anniversary photograph to her chest and finally let herself cry.

Curtis took a plea, paid restitution, and moved out of state. Paige apologized to my parents in the kitchen, with no wine in her hand. She and the boys moved into a small rental nearby, and she found work at a dental office. Mom and Dad stayed in their house. Every summer the boys visit by invitation, and they carry the beach chairs inside before anyone asks.