The bookshop owner smiled.
“Your mother used to say that.”
She nodded.
“She said fear makes every possibility sound like a certainty.”
The group began reviewing documents.
Some concerns were legitimate.
Others were based on rumors.
The attorney explained that each owner's rights depended on their specific leases, deeds, and recorded agreements.
They couldn't simply assume every business had identical legal protection.
But they could identify common issues.
By the end of the meeting, the group had agreed to seek independent technical review and maintain communication about any proposed changes affecting shared access.
The young owner felt cautiously hopeful.
Then her phone rang.
It was the restaurant's accountant.
His voice was unusually tense.
“Can you come upstairs?”
She excused herself.
When she entered the office, the accountant was standing beside her desk.
A letter lay open in his hand.
“What happened?”
He looked toward her.
“The bank wants updated information about the restaurant's credit facility.”
She frowned.
“That's normal.”
“Usually.”
He handed her the letter.
The bank had requested additional financial statements and clarification concerning the potential ownership change.
More troublingly, it referenced a possible material property transaction affecting the restaurant's operations.
The young woman read the sentence twice.
“What property transaction?”
The accountant shook his head.
“Exactly.”
She looked toward him.
“Did we tell the bank we were selling?”
“No.”
“Did anyone authorize a transfer?”
“No.”
She placed the letter on the desk.
Then she called her attorney.
By evening, they had discovered something far more troubling than the unauthorized planning invoice.
A third-party financing package associated with the development contained a document described as a seller acknowledgment.
The document suggested that Het Blauwe Huis had agreed in principle to cooperate with the proposed property redevelopment.
Near the bottom was a signature.
The young owner's signature.
Or something that looked very much like it.
She stared at the copy.
Her hands turned cold.
“I didn't sign this.”
The attorney remained quiet.
She looked at him.
“I've never seen this document.”
He studied the page.
“Then we need to preserve the evidence and determine where it came from.”
She looked again at the signature.
It resembled the one she'd placed on an earlier confidentiality agreement.
But certain details looked strangely familiar.
The shape of the initial.
The spacing between the letters.
The long final stroke.
She opened the earlier agreement on her computer.
Placed the two documents side by side.
Then enlarged the signatures.
Her stomach tightened.
The handwriting appeared extraordinarily similar.
Too similar.
Even the tiny irregularities seemed to match.
The accountant leaned forward.
“Could somebody have copied it?”