The Plan

Chapter 18:

Solomon came back down the stairs with a fresh cup of coffee and a look on his face like he'd already decided I was going to waste his time.

"Talk," he said.

I stood up.

"The hearing is tomorrow at nine. He's gonna walk in with a lawyer and a file and a welfare complaint and he's gonna say I'm unfit and my daughter's at risk and the county needs to intervene. Right?"

"Right."

"So we don't fight it."

Solomon stopped with the cup halfway to his mouth.

"Say that again."

"We don't fight the welfare complaint. We let him file it. We let him have his hearing. And then we turn around and file our own motion in the same courtroom on the same morning."

Solomon set the cup down.

"You want to counter-file at an emergency hearing."

"I want to counter-file at an emergency hearing."

"On what grounds?"

"The land."

Solomon looked at Kael. Kael looked at me.

"Ella," Kael said. "That's not how this works."

"Yes it is."

"No. A welfare hearing is a welfare hearing. It's about Lily. It's not about property."

"So we make it about property." I put my hands on the table. "You said it yourself. The land is the whole point. He doesn't care about Lily. He cares about twenty-two acres on the east end. So we don't let him have a quiet little hearing about whether I'm a good mother. We make it a hearing about whether a man who faked his own brother's death gets to sit in a courtroom and tell a judge what's best for my daughter."

The basement was very quiet.

Solomon took his glasses off. Cleaned them on his shirt. Put them back on.

"That's either the dumbest thing I've ever heard or the smartest," he said.

"Which one?"

"Depends on whether we can prove the fake death by nine AM tomorrow."

I looked at him.

"Can we?"

Solomon sat down. Pulled a file toward him.

"The medical examiner's signature. I've got a copy. I've got the bankruptcy filing. I've got the payment from Kane Holdings. I've got a handwriting expert who owes me a favor and can be in a courtroom by eight." He looked up. "What I don't have is a judge who's gonna let a stranger walk into his courtroom at nine AM and turn a welfare hearing into a fraud trial."

"So we don't make it a fraud trial," I said. "We make it a jurisdictional question."

Solomon's eyebrows went up.

"Go on."

"The welfare complaint is about Lily. Lily lives with me. I live on a compound in the county. If the county's gonna evaluate whether Lily's in a safe environment, they've gotta look at where she lives. And if the place where she lives is a property that's currently in dispute because a man faked a death certificate to get control of it—"

Solomon started nodding.

"Then the whole hearing is premature," he said. "Because you can't evaluate a child's living situation if the legal status of the property is unresolved."

"Exactly."

Kael said, "You're saying we don't fight the complaint. We delay it."

"No," I said. "I'm saying we bury it. We walk in tomorrow morning and we tell the judge there's a pending fraud investigation into the man who filed the complaint. We tell him the complaint is retaliation. We tell him the man who filed it has a financial interest in getting me off that property. And then we ask for the complaint to be dismissed pending a full investigation."

Solomon sat back.

"You've done this before," he said.

"No. I've watched a lot of legal shows."

Solomon stared at me.

"Legal shows."

"I was a waitress. I had a TV."

Solomon looked at Kael.

Kael said, "She's smarter than she looks."

"She looks plenty smart to me." Solomon pulled out a pen. "Okay. Here's what we need. One, we need the medical examiner. Harold Pike. He's retired but he's alive and I've got an address. We need him to sign an affidavit tonight. Two, we need a judge who'll hear an emergency motion at eight AM. I've got one. Judge Marlene Hargrove. She's been on the bench for thirty years and she hates fraud cases because her father was defrauded by a business partner. If we walk in with a fake death certificate and a paid-off medical examiner, she'll listen."

"Three?" Kael said.

"Three," Solomon said. "We need Silas Kane to show up. Because if he doesn't show up we can't ambush him. And if we can't ambush him he gets to file his complaint and walk away clean."

"He'll show up," I said.

"How do you know?"

"Because he called me tonight. Because he came to the gate. Because he wants to see my face when he takes my daughter away."

Solomon looked at me for a long time.

"Okay," he said. "We've got a plan. But we need one more thing."

"What?"

"Proof that the land is yours."

I looked at Kael.

"Solomon," Kael said. "That's what we've been trying to get all night. The deed's at the house on Tuller Street and we can't get to it because Kane's got people on that street."

"I know." Solomon pulled another file. "But we don't need the deed. We need the trust."

"What?"

"The trust that your father set up when you were born. The land was put in trust for you. The trust has a trustee. If we can find the trustee—"

"Who's the trustee?" I said.

Solomon looked at me.

"That's the thing," he said. "The trustee is you. You were named trustee when you turned twenty-one. Your father put it in the paperwork. You've been the trustee of twenty-two acres of land on the east end since you were twenty-one years old and you didn't know it."

The room went very quiet.

"Me," I said.

"You."

"For three years."

"For three years."

I sat down.

"Then who's been managing it?"

"Nobody. It's been sitting there. In your name. Nobody's touched it because nobody knew you were the trustee. And Silas Kane can't touch it without your signature. That's why he needs you out of the picture. That's why he needs you declared unfit. Because as long as you're alive and competent and free, that land is yours."

I put my face in my hands.

"Kael," I said.

"Yeah."

"Did you know?"

"No."

"Did anybody know?"

"Apparently not." Kael walked over and crouched down in front of me. "Ella. Look at me."

I looked at him.

"This is good," he said. "This is the best news we've had all night. You're not just a woman with a daughter and a crazy family. You're a landowner. You're the trustee of twenty-two acres. You're the one Silas Kane has to beat. And he can't beat you if you're standing in a courtroom tomorrow morning telling the truth."

I looked at him.

"And if he wins?" I said.

"He can't win."

"Kael."

"He can't win," Kael said again. "Not if we do this right. Not if we walk in there with Solomon and the medical examiner and the trust paperwork and the fact that he faked his own brother's death and paid off a county official. We walk in with the truth. And the truth is on our side."

I looked at him.

"And if it's not enough?"

Kael's jaw moved.

"Then we don't let him take her," he said. "We fight him every way we know how. And if it comes down to it—"

"It won't," I said.

He looked at me.

"It won't come down to it," I said again. "Because you're not gonna kill him, Kael. And I'm not gonna let you."

"Ella."

"I mean it."

"I know you mean it."

"Then say it."

Kael looked at me.

"I won't kill him," he said. "Unless he makes me."

I looked at him.

"That's not a promise."

"It's the only promise I can make."

I stood up.

"Fine," I said. "Then let's make sure he doesn't make you."

---

We left Solomon's basement at midnight.

Taz's mother gave us coffee in paper cups and a bag of cookies for the road. She kissed my cheek and said "good luck, honey," and I almost cried again.

We drove home in the gray car.

Kael didn't say anything for a long time. He just drove and I looked out the window at the streetlights.

"Kael," I said.

"Mm."

"I need to ask you something."

"Ask."

"When this is over—"

"When this is over."

"When it's done. When Silas Kane is gone and the land is mine and Lily's safe. When we don't have to fight anymore."

"Yeah."

"What happens to us?"

Kael was quiet for a long time.

Then he said, "What do you want to happen?"

I looked at him.

"I don't know," I said.

"Okay."

"I don't know, Kael. I don't know what I want. I don't know what I'm supposed to want. I've known you for five days and I've slept on your floor and I've worn your jacket and I kissed you in a hallway and I'm not — I don't do this. I don't do any of this."

"I know."

"I'm not a woman who gets involved with men."

"I know."

"Then why are you so calm?"

Kael looked at me.

"Because I'm not calm," he said.

"Could have fooled me."

"I've been fooling people for a long time."

I looked at him.

"What does that mean?"

"It means I'm sitting here next to you with my hands on a steering wheel and I'm thinking about all the ways I want to kill a man and all the ways I want to make you stay. And I'm doing neither. Because I made you a promise."

I looked at him.

"Kael," I said.

"Ella."

"I don't know what I want yet."

"That's fine."

"It's not fine. It's not fair to you."

Kael looked at me.

"I don't need fair," he said. "I need you alive."

---

He pulled into the compound at 12:40.

The gate opened. The yard was lit. Men were posted at every corner.

I got out of the car.

And then I heard it.

A voice. Young. Nervous. Coming from the front of the house.

"Excuse me. Excuse me. Are you Ella?"

I turned around.

There was a boy standing on the porch. Twelve, maybe thirteen. A hoodie. A bike leaned against the railing.

Benny was holding him by the shoulder.

"Boss," Benny said. "He came to the gate twenty minutes ago. Said he had a message."

"For who?" Kael said.

The boy looked at me.

"For her," he said.

I walked over.

"What's the message?" I said.

The boy reached into his pocket and pulled out an envelope.

I opened it.

Inside was a photograph.

A photograph of me and Lily. From two days ago. In the diner.

And written across the bottom in black ink:

I know you have the trust. But do you have the deed? See you in court.

— Your uncle, Silas

Chapter 18 Ends.