He looked at me. “You’ve already spoken to a lawyer.”
“Yes. And you froze the financing.”
“Your mother contested the financing.”
“You started this,” Marlene interrupted. “Daniel.”
He turned. She pointed to a chair. “Sit down,” and he did. I’d seen my husband negotiate with vice presidents, contractors, clients who owed his company six figures. But he was still Marlene Mercer’s son. For a few seconds, nobody spoke.
Then Daniel leaned forward. “The building went over budget.”
Rachel frowned. “What building, Hawthorne?” She looked at me. I shook my head.
“Slightly.” Daniel continued, “Scott found the property last year. It was undervalued, good location. We had two potential tenants.”
“Did you invest in a building?” Caleb asked.
“Yes.”
“How much?” Daniel ignored that. “A tenant gave up. Renovation costs skyrocketed. Electrical system, air conditioning, roof, everything.”
Caleb said that old commercial buildings are just like that. “I know that now.” There was bitterness in Daniel’s voice, but not towards Caleb. Maybe towards himself. “We needed bridge financing. That was all.”
Marlene stared at him. “With my house.”
“It was temporary. You keep saying that as if temporary debt isn’t debt at all. The property has value, Mom.”
“My house has one too.”
“I know. Apparently.” Daniel rubbed his hands over his face. “I was 90 days away from resolving this.” That caught my attention.
“90 days of what?”
“We had another tenant in line. Once the contract was signed, the building’s income would change. We would refinance. The temporary loan would be repaid.”
“And if the tenant wouldn’t sign, he would sign.”
“That wasn’t my question.” He looked at me. “This was not a reckless gamble.”
“So why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I knew what you would say.” The answer came so quickly that, for a second, I think Daniel didn’t realize what he had admitted.
I said, “What would I have said?”
He leaned back in his chair. “You would have panicked.”
“No. What would I have said?” He looked away. “No.” I shook my head. “And his mother.”
Daniel’s jaw clenched. Marlene answered for him. “I would have said no too.”
Daniel turned to her. “Because you don’t understand the whole situation.”
Marlene’s face remained motionless. “I understand the word ‘no’.” Rachel looked at the table.
Daniel softened his voice. “Mom, I wasn’t taking your house. You were giving it as collateral for 90 days.”
“You don’t know that. I would never let you lose her.”
How did he open his mouth? Marlene didn’t let him answer. “If everything went wrong, Daniel. The tenant quits, the building loses money, Scott disappears. What exactly would you do then?”
Daniel looked at me. And that’s when I understood why our house was on that spreadsheet. He saw that I understood. “No,” he said. I hadn’t said anything. “No, what…I wasn’t going to use our house.”
“You listed it on the paperwork as a potential asset.”
“Mine too. I know that.”
