Love always,
Grandpa”
I read it twice.
Then I put it down on Captain Morales’s neat desk and put my hand over my mouth.
Nobody said anything for a long time.
Dalton picked up the second document. He read it carefully, his mustache moving a little as he mouthed some of the words.
“This is a sworn affidavit,” he said quietly. “From Walter Hollis. Dated March 2012. Notarized. It details a forged deed of trust—a loan—against the property, signed with his name without his permission, by Richard Hollis. The loan number. The bank. The amount. The date he discovered it. The date he paid it off.” He looked up. “He kept copies of everything. The bank letters. The payoff statement. The forged signature.”
He turned to the last page.
“And there’s this. A photocopy of the forged loan document.” He held it next to the power of attorney with my name on it.
Captain Morales leaned in to look.
Then she let out a low whistle.
It was the same hand. The same heavy pressure where the writer slowed down. The same strange hook at the end of the last letter, like someone who’d practiced the name but never got the finish right.
“Same person,” said Dalton. “Fourteen years apart. Same exact mistakes.”
“He did it before,” I said. My voice sounded far away. “He did the exact same thing to Grandpa.”
“And your grandfather,” Dalton said, “made sure you’d be able to prove it.”
He set the papers down very carefully, like they might break.
“Captain Hollis,” he said. “In thirty-four years of practice, I have never seen a man protect somebody from beyond the grave quite like this.”
After that, everything moved fast.
Captain Morales got on the phone with the Colorado Springs Police Department. Because the theft and forgery were civilian crimes, it was their case. But because my father worked on post, as a Department of the Army civilian, she also called the Criminal Investigation Division.
