Chapter 3: What Karen Knew
The next morning, Daniel and Linda met with their real estate attorney, Susan Hale.
Susan listened without interrupting.
She examined the county document, then looked at the photograph of the painted chair.
“The chair is one issue,” she said. “The property is another.”
Daniel explained everything Karen had said.
Susan’s expression remained neutral.
“If Karen actually entered your property without permission and damaged the chair, document everything. Photographs. Receipts. Restoration costs. Messages. Don’t confront her again.”
Daniel nodded.
Then Susan tapped the easement document.
“This is what concerns me.”
The easement was legitimate.
But the boundaries were unclear.
A survey conducted decades earlier had placed part of the drainage corridor near the rear patio. A more recent survey, however, appeared to show that a portion of the patio improvements extended into the easement.
Daniel felt his stomach tighten.
“What does that mean for the sale?”
“It means the buyer needs to know.”
Linda looked at him.
“We can disclose it.”
“Yes,” Susan said. “But the buyer may renegotiate.”
That explained the stakes.
The house might still sell.
But the price could change.
Daniel wasn’t happy.
Still, honesty was simpler than deception.
“What does Karen have to do with any of this?” he asked.
Susan folded her hands.
“That’s what we need to determine.”
That afternoon, Daniel noticed Karen standing across the street.
She wasn’t gardening.
She wasn’t walking her dog.
She was watching the house.
When Daniel stepped outside, she turned away.
He didn’t approach her.
Instead, he photographed the chair from several angles.
The paint had soaked into the wood.
He had hoped the original blue finish might be recoverable.
It wasn’t.
That evening, Daniel received an unexpected call from the developer’s representative.
The caller apologized for the confusion and asked whether Daniel and Linda had reconsidered the sale.
Daniel said they were still discussing it.
The representative hesitated.
“We heard there may be a dispute involving the property.”
Daniel stiffened.
“What dispute?”
“I don’t know the details.”
But someone had already told them.
And the only person outside their family who had been aggressively discussing the property was Karen.
The following morning, Susan found something else.
A public-record filing showed that Karen had recently contacted the county about drainage access behind several houses on the street.
Not just Daniel and Linda’s house.
Several.
Karen had apparently been gathering information for months.
The mystery deepened.
Then Linda remembered something.
“Last spring,” she said, “Karen asked whether we’d ever sell.”
Daniel looked at her.
“What did you tell her?”
“That we hadn’t decided.”
“Did she say why she cared?”
Linda shook her head.
“No.”
Daniel sat quietly.
Karen hadn’t simply discovered their plans.
She had been watching them.
But that still didn’t explain the most important question.
Why?
The answer came two days later when Daniel found an envelope pushed beneath his front door.
There was no return address.
Inside was a photocopy of an old property map.
One section had been circled in red.
At the bottom, someone had handwritten four words:
You don’t own all of it.
Daniel stared at the message.
Then he noticed the handwriting.
It wasn’t Karen’s.
It looked familiar.
Very familiar.
