I thanked my son Douglas for helping me sell my late husband’s Buick. With my move to a smaller apartment approaching, I was grateful he had handled the paperwork. Douglas told me the buyer offered only $3,800, and although letting the car go hurt, I trusted him completely. That trust survived until the following morning, when I walked into his office carrying a folder and quietly asked, “Douglas, where did the other seven thousand dollars go?”

His face changed instantly. The receptionist stopped typing and disappeared into the back room. I pulled out a document Doris’s nephew at the motor vehicle office had obtained for me. “The man from Dubuque paid eleven thousand dollars for my Buick.” Douglas stared at the paper, nervously adjusting his tie. “Mom, please, not out here.” I rested my thumb beside the receptionist’s call bell. “Then explain the Hendricks account before I ring it.” His expression told me immediately: the missing Buick money was only the beginning.

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