Its mailing address matched Brenda’s house.
“Can someone just change a certificate?” Daniel asked.
Morgan answered that a document could be altered, but the insurer could determine only whether it came from an authorized source.
She offered to refer the suspicious certificate to the company’s fraud team.
Daniel gave her Priya’s contact information.
On his way home, his phone rang.
The caller identified himself as Logan Price, the founder of a small event rental platform named BlueHour.
“We’ve received a complaint about the listing at your address,” Logan said.
Daniel pulled into a parking lot.
“The listing has never been authorized.”
“I understand,” Logan replied.
“We suspended future reservations while we review ownership records.”
“How many reservations were there?”
Logan hesitated.
“I can’t release customer information without the appropriate process.”
Daniel looked out at the traffic.
“Children were swimming without a lifeguard.”
“Someone got injured.”
“Then I need you to preserve every relevant record.”
Logan promised to contact the platform’s legal team immediately.
He also revealed that the listing had not been created three months earlier.
It had been active for nearly nine months under different names.
Daniel asked him to repeat the number.
“Nine months,” Logan said.
Daniel remembered the first paper cup in his pool.
The trespassing had started long before he noticed.
Chapter 6: The Neighbor Who Watched
Across the street lived an elderly woman named June Talbot.
She had occupied the same brick ranch house since the neighborhood was built.
Her husband died fifteen years earlier, and she spent warm afternoons tending roses beside her front steps.
June stopped Daniel as he collected his mail.
“I heard Brenda was using your pool,” she said.
Daniel had not told her about the booking confirmation.
“How did you hear that?”
June held up a folded grocery receipt.
On the back, she had written several dates in careful blue ink.
“Because people kept asking me where the rental entrance was.”
Daniel unfolded the paper.
There were seventeen dates.
Some included license plate numbers.
“I thought you had started a business,” June said.
“You were away so often, and Brenda told everybody you were her silent partner.”
Daniel felt anger rise behind his ribs.
“Why didn’t you mention it?”
June looked genuinely hurt.
“I didn’t want to interfere with your livelihood.”
He apologized immediately.
June led him inside and showed him recordings from a doorbell camera her grandson had installed.
In one clip, Brenda stood beside a minivan and pointed toward Daniel’s gate.
In another, she told a customer that the owner was an engineer who preferred to remain anonymous.
