Chapter 13
Then every side of the box.
She removed the top packet carefully.
Property tax receipts.
Old survey notes.
Letters.
The second bundle contained deeds.
The third—
Rachel’s breath stopped.
BOOK 204 PAGE 117 COPY was handwritten across the wrapper.
Walt sat slowly on an overturned crate.
Rachel opened it.
The document was brittle but legible.
Three pages.
Recorded August 19, 1936.
It conveyed water diversion privileges from the Hollis family and Carolina Timber & Light Company to Samuel Harper’s predecessor.
The language was dense.
Rachel read once.
Then again.
Walt asked, “What?”
“I need a lawyer.”
“Bad?”
“Maybe very good.”
She pointed.
The grant included a perpetual right to impound and divert waters originating from three named springs and Black Laurel Creek for domestic, agricultural, milling, hydroelectric, and reservoir purposes.
It also reserved something else.
“No downstream impoundment can materially interfere with the grant holder’s priority use without written consent,” Rachel read.
Walt whistled.
“That’s why they need you.”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“I don’t know if this is enforceable after ninety years.”
“Daniel seems to think it is.”
Rachel photographed every page.
Then she continued searching.
The next bundle changed everything again.
Letters.
Dated 1996.
Addressed to Louise.
Written by Susan.
Rachel recognized her mother’s handwriting from old birthday cards.
Mom,
I can’t come back until I know who changed the survey. They’re using Dad’s signature, but he didn’t sign the easement. I asked him directly before I left.
Another letter.
Evelyn says the county copy of 204/117 has been pulled. She thinks someone inside helped.
Another.
Rachel stopped.
Walt watched her.
“What is it?”
Rachel continued reading silently.
If anything happens, the original goes to Rachel. Not Robert. Not the company. Rachel. Promise me.
Robert.
Rachel’s father.
The company.
“What company?” Rachel whispered.
Walt did not answer.
Rachel looked at him.
“What company?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do.”
“Not enough.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
Walt rubbed both hands over his face.
“Your dad did consulting work for Carolina Mountain Energy back then.”
Rachel frowned.
“My father was a contractor.”
“He was both.”
“I never heard of Carolina Mountain Energy.”
“It folded.”
“When?”
“Ninety-seven.”
“What did it want?”
Walt glanced toward the documents.
“Water.”
Rachel felt the pieces shifting.
Before Daniel.
Before Mountain Crest.
Someone had wanted the same rights.
Her mother had discovered altered surveys.
Then supposedly died.
Then returned.
Then disappeared again.
Rachel searched the box faster but still methodically.
More correspondence.
Survey sketches.
Receipts.
A newspaper clipping about a proposed hydroelectric storage project canceled in 1997.
Then an envelope.
RACHEL — ONLY IF YOU ARE OLD ENOUGH TO CHOOSE.
Her mother’s handwriting.
Rachel sat on the floor.
She opened it.
Inside was a letter.
Sweetheart,
If you are reading this, Evelyn and Grandma decided the truth became safer than the lie.
I hope that means I am sitting beside you.
If I am not, then understand this first: I never left because I wanted a life without you.
Rachel closed her eyes.
For three seconds.
Then opened them.
She continued.
What happened on Route 74 was not the accident everyone thinks it was. The woman in the car was not me. I was supposed to be in that car. Someone changed the meeting location at the last minute, and I realized too late that they knew what I had found.
Your father believes keeping you away from the Harper property will protect you.
May you like
I disagree.
The land itself is not the secret.
