“You’d better see for yourself, Alvin.”
Alvin quietly walked down the side alley and stepped into the shadows of the porch near the kitchen window.
The voices inside were crystal clear.
It was Manuel’s voice first.
“Veronica, is it alright if we eat dinner at the kitchen table tonight?”
A long, heavy silence followed.
Veronica was the wife of Derek, Alvin’s younger brother.
“We’re having company over tonight, Manuel,” she replied coldly.
“It’s better if you two eat in your room.”
“It would only take twenty minutes…”
“Manuel,” Veronica snapped.
“Let’s not go through this again.”
Alvin felt a terrifying, icy rage settle deep inside his chest.
Manuel didn’t argue.
A minute later, Carmen emerged from the back door carrying two small paper plates, accompanying her husband toward a small storage room behind the laundry shed.
Alvin knew that room.
As a boy, he had kept his lawnmower, old bicycles, and holiday boxes in there.
Now, it held two narrow twin cots.
Meanwhile, through the large bay windows of the main house, Alvin could see his parents’ master bedroom.
It had been fitted with new silk drapes, a massive flat-screen TV, and Derek and Veronica’s luggage.
Alvin wanted to force that back door open right then and there.
Instead, he took a deep breath, stepped back into the alley, and pulled out his phone.
He dialed Inez, his family’s corporate attorney.
“Inez,” Alvin said, keeping his voice terrifyingly level.
“I need you to run a discreet, comprehensive check.”
Inez paused.
“Tell me what you need, Alvin.”
“My parents’ house title, their bank accounts, power-of-attorney filings, and every legal document signed under their names in the last two years.”
“Alvin…
what’s going on?”
Alvin looked through the trees toward the shed.
Through the small window, he could see his father carefully tearing a sandwich in half and handing the bigger piece to his mother.
“I don’t know yet,” Alvin said softly.
“But someone is about to answer for every second of this.”
He waited in the darkness until the main lights in the house went out.
A few minutes past midnight, his father stepped out into the yard alone.
Manuel looked around nervously, lifted a hollow garden stone near the shed, and pulled out a small, rusted iron key.
When Alvin stepped out of the shadows, Manuel froze.
