"These are the families you mentioned last night?"
Gabriel approached.
"Where did you get this information?"
"County records. I still know how to use a telephone."
Mara leaned over the notebook.
"Mr. Briggs, some of these addresses are correct."
"Good."
"Why are you doing this?"
Walter looked at her.
"Because if somebody is taking houses from people who cannot defend themselves, the least I can do is find out how they're doing it."
He tapped the page.
"Now, tell me about the first family."
Gabriel sat down.
"The first was the Millers."
The Miller family lived on a small property north of Cedar Hollow.
Their farmhouse had white siding, a red barn, and a garden that had once been Eleanor's favorite place to visit.
When Walter arrived with Gabriel and Doc, he noticed that the front porch needed repair.
A woman opened the door.
She was around sixty, with tired eyes and gray hair tied behind her head.
"Can I help you?"
"Mrs. Miller?"
"Yes."
"My name is Walter Briggs."
She looked uncertain.
"Should I know you?"
"Not necessarily. But I think we have something in common."
He showed her the foreclosure letter.
Her expression changed immediately.
"Where did you get that?"
"It was sent to me."
She stepped back.
"Come inside."
The living room was modest.
Photographs covered the walls. A younger couple stood beside a tractor. Two children smiled beneath a Christmas tree. A wedding photograph showed a man with dark hair holding the woman who had opened the door.
Walter recognized the look in her eyes.
Someone who had lost more than a house.
"Your husband?" he asked.
She nodded.
"James."
"Is he around?"
"He passed away four years ago."
Walter lowered his head.
"I'm sorry."
She gestured toward a chair.
"Please sit."
Her name was Ruth Miller.
She explained that her husband had owned the property for thirty-eight years. After he died, she continued paying the mortgage from her pension and the money she earned selling homemade preserves.
Then a representative from Blackridge appeared.
He offered to buy the property.
Ruth refused.
A month later, she received a letter stating that the bank had identified irregularities in the loan account.
She had never understood what it meant.
She hired a lawyer, but the legal fees quickly exceeded what she could afford.
Eventually, the bank began foreclosure proceedings.
"Did you miss any payments?" Walter asked.
"Not one."
"Do you have the receipts?"
Ruth disappeared into another room.
She returned carrying a plastic box.
Inside were dozens of envelopes.
Every payment had been documented.
Walter examined them.
The dates were consistent.
The amounts were correct.
He looked at Gabriel.
"Someone needs to explain this."
Gabriel nodded.
Mara opened the folder she had brought.
She compared the account number on Ruth's statements with the one printed on the foreclosure notice.
Her face went pale.
"These aren't the same accounts."
Ruth stared at her.
"What?"
Mara placed both documents on the table.
"Your payments were deposited into a different account. The bank's internal record shows that your loan was delinquent, but the payment receipts indicate that you continued paying."
Walter frowned.
"How does that happen?"
Mara looked at him.
"Someone changed the account information."
Silence filled the room.
Ruth covered her mouth.
"Are you telling me I paid all those years and somebody made it disappear?"
Mara nodded slowly.
"I can't prove who did it yet. But the records don't match."
Walter stood.
"Then we need copies of everything."
Ruth looked frightened.
"Will that help?"
Walter took her hand.
"I don't know."
He paused.
"But doing nothing certainly won't."
By noon, the Iron Vultures had gathered in the parking lot of a small diner.
Walter sat in a booth with Gabriel, Mara, Doc, and a younger rider named Tommy.
Tommy had been studying accounting before leaving college to help run his family's motorcycle repair business.
He was quiet, observant, and unusually good with computers.
Mara showed him the documents.
He examined them carefully.
Then he leaned back.
"This isn't just one altered account."
"What do you mean?" Gabriel asked.
Tommy pointed to a series of transaction numbers.
"Look here. These payments were processed through the same internal reference system. But the destination accounts changed."
Mara nodded.
"That's what I noticed."
Tommy continued.
"If somebody had access to the bank's payment-processing system, they could redirect funds without changing the customer's receipts."
Walter stared at him.
"So the customer believes the money has gone where it should."
"Exactly."
"And the bank records say otherwise."
"Yes."
Walter looked at Gabriel.
"How many people?"
Tommy tapped the screen.
"That's the problem. We don't know."
Mara leaned forward.
"There could be dozens."
The diner suddenly seemed very quiet.
Walter looked around.
People were eating breakfast, drinking coffee, discussing weather forecasts, and complaining about rising fuel prices.
Ordinary people.