Page 9 of The Pumpkin Patch Problem

"I understand," Sam answered, his voice soft as he backed away from the cedar post. "But if you change your mind, you have my card. I’ve found that the truth has a way of coming to light, even when we spend our lives trying to keep it in the dark."

He gave her a brief, respectful nod before turning toward his dark utility vehicle parked in the visitors’ parking area. Junie stood behind the sales counter, watching as the car engine hummed to life and the vehicle rolled down the driveway, passing the faded mailbox at the edge of the road.

She stood alone at the farm stall, the scent of damp pine doing little to warm the cold dread settling in her stomach. The embossed silver lettering on the business card felt smooth under Junie's thumb, a small piece of thick cardstock that seemed far too elegant for the rustic pine desk. She turned the card over, tracing the sharp corners with her fingers, her mind returning to the confession Sam had left behind. The name Sarah Sterling seemed to hover at the back of her mind, a shadow from forty years ago that she couldn't quite place. She'd spent her life believing she knew every family history in the valley, but this name was a blank space, a lock without a key.

She set the card down near her cash drawer. The shadow of the old oak tree had lengthened, casting long fingers of shade across the dirt parking lanes. The morning rush of tourists had mostly cleared out, leaving the farm stand in a serene lull that usually brought her a sense of peace. Today, though, the stillness only allowed her thoughts to spin faster, so she was grateful when the afternoon crowd came.

In the late afternoon, the low hum of a familiar diesel engine broke her focus, and she looked up as the green pickup truck rolled to a stop near the equipment shed. Micah turned off the ignition, his wire-rimmed spectacles glinting in the late afternoon sun as he exited the vehicle. He didn't rush his approach, holding his portfolio against his ribs as he reached the farm stand, his expression serious.

Junie stiffened her shoulders as she waited for him to reach her. The memory of their intense confrontation in the office still lingered, a persistent awareness that made her pulse quicken as he paused on the other side of the counter. She wished she didn’t find this annoying man so attractive.

"You look like you’ve had a busy day," Micah observed, his green eyes meeting hers as he rested his folder on the flat top of a cider barrel. "It’s Sunday. Isn’t the farm stand usually closed by now?"

"There are always inventory records to reconcile," Junie replied, keeping her voice level as she adjusted a display of apple butter jars to keep her hands occupied. "And we have another shipment of produce arriving tomorrow morning. I'd rather finish the paperwork now than let it pile up."

Micah looked at the jars, his mouth twitching with a faint trace of amusement before his expression turned sober once more. "Well, I'm not here to audit your inventory. I just wanted to give you a warning before the county office opens tomorrow morning."

Junie sighed, her fingers curling around the glass neck of an apple butter jar. "If the registrar has found another discrepancy in the coordinate maps, I'd rather hear the truth. I'm tired of guessing what's coming next."

"It's not a new discrepancy," Micah explained, his tone direct as he unlatched his leather folder and pulled out a municipal log sheet. "But we had a new inquiry this week. A development company representative arrived at the records annex just before the staff left on Friday. He filed a formal request for copy access to the nineteen eighty-two transfer deeds and the historical coordinates for the southern pasture."

Junie stiffened, her hand dropping from the jar as her chest tightened with a sharp wave of alarm. She reached down and picked up the business card once more, her thumb tracing the embossed silver name as if she could find a hidden connection in the paper. "I know who you’re talking about. Sam Hollis. He asked about those records when he visited the stand earlier today. He wanted to know if we had found any resolution to the boundary discrepancy and wanted to know who had owned it."

"What did you tell him?" Micah asked, his eyes calm as he watched her reaction.

"I didn't give him any details," Junie answered. "I told him the boundary issue was a private family matter. But he asked me about a specific name. He wanted to know if I'd ever seen that particular signature or name mentioned in any of the old papers in our house. Sarah Sterling."

Micah adjusted his spectacles. "Interesting. That signature is on the nineteen eighty-two transfer deed. The signature I told you we suspect may be a forgery."

"I didn’t look at the signature very closely," Junie said, her throat tightening as she stared at the card in her hand. "Sam said Sarah Sterling was his mother. Apparently, she changed her name before he was born, and he only discovered it after she passed away. He said his interest was personal."

"Well, his records request isn't personal," Micah pointed out, his voice calm and unbending as he showed her the municipal log sheet. "He filed under his corporate developer title, using his company credentials to bypass the standard waiting period for public records. He didn't just ask for the deeds. He requested the complete survey file, including any notes on the old foundation that was uncovered."

Junie pressed her knuckles against the pine desk, her mind spinning with a cold dread that seemed to seep through her bones. "Why would the developers care about an old stone foundation that's been buried for decades? If his company is looking for a parcel of land to build a development, there are dozens of empty fields in the valley that don't have messy titles."

"He might have used his employment credentials to get the information, but I don’t think he’s looking for a development opportunity," Micah said, his gaze holding hers with unyielding focus. "He's following a trail. If that signature is on a deed from forty years ago, she was connected to this farm in a way that goes far beyond a simple real estate transaction. I assume he wants to know what she was hiding, and he thinks the answer is buried on your pasture."

"There are clearly secrets about the land we don’t know. But I know my mother. She wouldn’t keep secrets for no reason," Junie insisted. "Nell warned us that careless questions could destroy things that were meant to stay buried. If he uncovers the truth, who knows what will happen?"

"The truth is already going to come out," Micah replied as he rested his hand gently over hers, sending an unwelcome spark up her arm. "The county files can’t just be ignored. Besides, you can't protect the past you know nothing about. Sam Hollis is a corporate developer accustomed to finding information. He won't stop looking just because the registry is a bit messy, especially if this search is personal. If you want to keep your mother’s secrets safe, you have to find the answers before he does."

Junie stared at the log sheet, her chest holding a suffocating pressure that made it difficult to breathe. She looked from Micah's serious, honest face and thought about the locked cabinet in the cider barn. She was no longer just managing a harvest stand or trying to protect her sisters from a tax penalty. She was standing guard over a history she didn't understand, and the blunt, honest county assessor she realized was the steady presence who might be able to help her face the storm.

She turned the card over one last time, then tucked it into her apron pocket. "How do we access the files before he does? I assume his request will take a few days to process."

"We start with the original transfer registry," Micah answered, a faint, encouraging smile touching his lips as he closed his folder. "I'll see you tomorrow after I’ve done some research in the annex. I’ll let you know what I find."

Junie watched him tuck the folder under his arm and turn toward his truck, the evening air carrying the crisp scent of autumn leaves. She stood alone at the farm stand counter, grudgingly admitting to herself that a small piece of her felt grateful to have Micah around.

MICAH

The hum of the basement ventilation system was a low drone that did little to cut the chill of the county records annex. Micah leaned over the wide oak research table, his fingers tracing a column of faded ink in the nineteen eighty-two tax assessment roll. The air in the underground vault was cool and dry, smelling of aged paper, decaying leather bindings, and the faint chemical tang of floor wax. He adjusted his spectacles, his focus absolute as he compared the hand-written coordinates on the yellowed ledger page with the digital parcel maps open on his tablet. He'd spent his entire career untangling these kinds of municipal puzzles, but this particular parcel of land was turning into an administrative maze. He wasn’t complaining though. There was something about Junie he was drawn to.

The annex was silent at this hour of the morning, with only the occasional rustle of paper from the clerk's desk near the microfiche machines. He'd arrived as soon as the doors opened, determined to trace the history of the six acres along Hollow Creek before the afternoon rush began. The rusted address plate stamped with Seventeen Hollow Road was sitting in his office, and the mystery of who had lived on that buried foundation was a puzzle he couldn't leave unsolved. They couldn’t work out who the land currently belonged to if they didn’t trace every transfer carefully.

His search began with the name on the unrecorded nineteen eighty-two deed. He turned to the general index of grantors and grantees, his fingers sliding down the alphabetical listings for the early eighties until he found the entry for Ruth Dwyer. The handwriting was a cramped cursive, recording her purchase of the southern pasture from the Great Northern Timber Company in the spring of that year. It looked official, with the county registrar's stamp and a neat registration number, but as Micah turned to the corresponding page in the mortgage registry, he hit his first blank wall.

There wasn't any mortgage. He turned the pages of the nineteen eighty-two finance ledger back and forth, cross-referencing the transaction number, but the columns remained empty. A private individual purchasing six acres of prime orchard land from a commercial timber corporation typically required bank financing, or at least a recorded lien. Yet there wasn't any record of a promissory note, no bank interest, and no financing agreement. The transaction had been filed as a cash transfer, which would not be out of the ordinary, except for the fact that the capital gains records for that quarter didn't show any corresponding payment from any local bank or trust. It was as if the timber company had simply handed the title to a woman who, according to the county assessor's files, had never owned any other property in the commonwealth.