Chapter 2 - CABRILLO POINT
Cabrillo Point was supposed to make the Keller brothers rich.
That was how Wyatt later described it.
Twenty-four luxury townhomes overlooking a narrow coastal canyon.
Buy land.
Build fast.
Sell before interest rates shifted.
Dustin told me the project belonged to Wyatt and Tristan.
He said he had looked at the numbers and stayed away.
Apparently that was a lie.
Dustin owned 35 percent through Bayview Management Group.
Wyatt held 35.
Tristan held 30.
They needed $600,000 in early capital.
They had nowhere near it.
So they borrowed.
Private lenders.
Credit cards.
Friends.
Then family.
Brenda, Dustin’s mother, gave them $70,000 from her retirement account.
I never knew.
When their construction lender demanded additional equity after costs increased, Dustin began transferring our savings.
The first amount was $18,500.
Then $24,000.
Then $9,000.
He probably planned to repay it after the first units sold.
That never happened.
A retaining-wall problem delayed construction.
Then city inspectors found drainage violations.
Then their general contractor demanded payment.
Cabrillo Point became a hole swallowing cash.
Our cash.
I learned most of this from Paige and a forensic accountant named Elena Ruiz.
Elena placed a spreadsheet in front of me.
“Your joint account funded at least $168,742 of project-related expenses.”
“Did Dustin sign?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes?”
She enlarged a bank record.
Several wires showed my digital authorization.
Except I had not made them.
“How?”
“We’re still determining that.”
Then she showed me a device list.
One of the transfers had been approved from our home IP address using my login.
The time:
2:13 a.m.
I was asleep.
Dustin was not.
Another authorization happened during a conference I attended in Phoenix.
But the bank recorded verification through my phone number.
That bothered me.
Then I remembered.
Dustin had called during the conference.
“My phone is being weird. Did the bank send you a code?”
He told me our mortgage autopay had failed.
I gave him the number.
I wanted to throw up.
He had not hacked me.
He had used marriage.
Trust.
Convenience.
The things nobody thinks of as security vulnerabilities until someone abuses them.
Elena continued.
“The $42,000 cashier’s check is different.”
“How?”
“It was issued in person.”
“By Dustin?”
“Yes.”
“With whose money?”
“Joint funds.”
“Could he legally do that?”
The answer was complicated.
As a joint owner, he could withdraw funds.
That did not automatically make every withdrawal criminal.
But divorce court could still consider dissipation of marital assets.
And forged digital approvals were another issue entirely.
Then Paige slid over one more document.
A loan guarantee.
Cabrillo Point Development LLC.
Guarantors:
Dustin Keller.
Wyatt Keller.
Tristan Keller.
And—
Audrey Keller.
My signature appeared on the bottom.
I stared at it.
“I didn’t sign this.”
Paige nodded.
“We know.”
“How much?”
“$310,000.”
The room went quiet.
My husband had not only taken nearly $170,000.
He had also put my name on a guarantee for more than three hundred thousand dollars of additional debt.
“What happens if the project fails?”
Elena answered:
“The lender may attempt collection from every guarantor.”
I felt dizzy.
“So I leave him and still owe for his brothers’ project?”
“Not necessarily.”
Paige leaned forward.
“If your signature was forged, we fight it.”
“If?”
“We prove it.”
She tapped the document.
“Evidence first.”
That became our rule.
No rage.
No revenge.
Evidence.
Then Mom called.
She had remembered something else about the green folder.
A business card.
A notary.
Marissa Cole — Mobile Notary Services.
Paige looked her up.
No current license.
It had been suspended six months earlier.
For irregular notarizations.
The Cabrillo guarantee was notarized by Marissa Cole.
I felt cold.
“Did Dustin forge everything?”
Paige answered carefully.
“We don’t know yet.”
Then her phone buzzed.
She read something.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
“The lender sent us a copy of the identification used during signing.”
She turned the screen toward me.
It was my driver’s license.
But the woman in the notary’s verification photograph was not me.
It was someone wearing my hair color.
My glasses.
A mask.
And beside her, holding the document toward the camera—
May you like
was Wyatt.
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