Chapter 2 - The Two Deeds
Skye drove directly to her grandmother's house, a weathered farmhouse at the far end of Willow Creek Lane. June Bellamy was at the kitchen table, sorting seed packets into small jars. She wore thick glasses but needed no help balancing her checkbook or arguing about the weather.
"Did you sell the land?" Skye asked.
June set down a packet of beans. "I talked to a man about the lower pasture. Not the whole place."
"Did you sign anything?"
"I signed an agreement so he could get an appraisal. And I signed a paper saying the old road could be measured. He told me it wasn't a sale."
Skye sat opposite her. "Mason has a deed showing you sold all twenty-two acres. He says the gift you made to me was canceled."
June frowned. "I never canceled that gift. You own half because I wanted you to help keep the place safe when I couldn't work the trees anymore."
"Was anyone with you when you signed?"
"A woman from the developer's office. She brought a notary. I didn't recognize either of them. I asked to see Paige, but the woman said this wasn't legal paperwork."
Skye kept her voice calm. Her grandmother was competent and independent, and Skye refused to speak to her as if age alone made her incapable of understanding a document. The problem was not June's intelligence. It was whether she'd been given accurate information about what she was asked to sign.
Paige arrived an hour later. She laid out the ownership history: June had inherited the property with Skye's grandfather, later became sole owner, and two years earlier recorded a deed conveying a half-interest to Skye while retaining the other half. That transfer had never been rescinded by a recorded deed executed by Skye. June could not simply convey Skye's interest without legal authority.
"The newer affidavit claims an earlier cancellation," Paige explained. "We need to inspect the original and determine who prepared and submitted it. The seller's deed may have transferred whatever interest June actually held, if properly executed, but it wouldn't automatically transfer yours. There are questions about its validity too."
June examined the new signature and shook her head.
"That's not how I write my last name. I always curl the B. My hands shake sometimes, but not like that."
Paige photographed the page. "We'll arrange a qualified examination if needed. We should also preserve any correspondence and ask the register of deeds for certified copies of the recording."
Skye wanted to drive back and tear down the gate. Instead she walked into the back room and found her grandfather's orchard maps in a cabinet. He had planted fifteen varieties of apples, each with notes about which trees thrived in the slope's clay soil. After his death, Skye had spent weekends repairing irrigation and teaching local students how to graft branches.
"Why were you talking about selling the lower pasture?" she asked June when she returned.
"Taxes keep going up. The barn roof is leaking. You're working too hard at your carpentry business and still coming here every Sunday. I thought a small sale might make the rest of the land easier to keep."
Skye looked at her grandmother and felt a sharp embarrassment. She had spent the day shouting that the land was hers without asking what carrying it had cost June.
"You could have told me," she said.
"And you would've said no before I finished the sentence."
Skye could not deny it.
That evening Paige sent formal notice disputing the title claims and requested that the developer preserve documents and suspend any irreversible work while the parties reviewed ownership. She also began evaluating whether emergency court relief was justified. No injunction existed yet; they could not pretend a letter alone had stopped construction.
The next morning Clark called from the road.
"They've started moving the survey stakes toward the orchard," he said. "And they've got your grandmother's signature on a permission form."
"Is Grandma there?"
May you like
"No. But someone told the crew she was coming to show them which trees to cut."
June was still in the kitchen, making toast.
