Chapter 2 - The Astoria Connection
The rain had settled into a sullen, persistent mist by the time Dad and I reached a cramped strip mall on 31st Street in Astoria.
Tucked between an off-brand tax preparation service and an incense-choked palm reader's parlor sat *Costello Legal & Notary Services*. The vinyl lettering on the front window was peeling, and the Venetian blinds inside were yellowed with decades of cigarette smoke.
According to the certified deed the responding officer had shown me on his tablet that morning, the document stripping me of my home had been notarized right here. Commission Number: 02CO638912. Notary Public: Salvatore Costello.
I pushed the door open. A brass bell chimed overhead with a tinny clang.
Behind a laminate counter stacked with dusty manila folders sat a man in his late fifties with thinning grey hair slicked straight back. He wore a rumpled maroon dress shirt unbuttoned at the collar, revealing a thick gold chain nestled in grey chest hair. He was nursing a lukewarm cup of deli coffee, eyes glued to a horse race playing silently on a portable television.
"Help you?" he grunted without looking up.
"Mr. Costello?" I asked, stepping forward until my palms rested flat against his counter.
He glanced up, his gaze sliding over my soaked jacket, my pale face, and then lingering on my father, whose imposing, broad-shouldered silhouette blocked the doorway. Costello’s eyes narrowed instinctively. A street-smart defensive shield went up behind his pupils.
"Yeah. What do you need? Affidavits are twenty bucks. Car title transfers, thirty-five."
I pulled out the printed copy of the deed transfer I had forced the county clerk's office to print for me just forty minutes earlier. I laid it on top of his racing form.
"I need to see your official notary journal for October 14th," I said evenly.
Costello didn't flinch, but his fingers twitched against his coffee cup. "Notary journals are private records, lady. I don't show 'em to walk-ins. If you got a legal issue, have your lawyer subpoena me."
"My name is Claire Ortega," I said, leaning in. "According to this deed, I stood right in front of this desk three weeks ago at 2:30 PM. According to this deed, you checked my New York State driver’s license, witnessed me sign over my fifty-percent share of 44-12 39th Avenue, Apartment 4B, and stamped it with your state seal."
Costello pulled the paper toward him, squinting through smudged bifocals. A bead of sweat formed at his hairline, glistening under the flicking fluorescent tube above us.
"Look, lady, I notarize dozens of things a week," he stammered, his Queens accent thickening. "Deeds, powers of attorney, wills. If my stamp is on it, you were here. You showed your ID. Maybe you forgot."
"I was running an eight-deck industrial oven in Long Island City at 2:30 PM on October 14th," I said, my voice dropping so low it sounded like gravel grinding together. "There are forty-two security cameras in that facility. There are eighty coworkers who watched me knead sourdough for seven straight hours. And there is a biometric time clock that scanned my thumbprint at 1:58 PM and again at 4:02 PM."
Costello's throat bobbed. He tried to push the paper back toward me, but Dad stepped forward, his heavy hand coming down flat on the wood. The desk shuddered.
"Where is the journal, Sal?" Dad growled.
"You're threatening a state official!" Costello squawked, half-rising from his rolling chair. "I'll call the one-fourteen precinct right now! Get the hell out of my office!"
"Call them," I said, pulling out my phone and sliding it across to him. "Dial 911. Please. We’ll wait right here for the detectives. And while they're here, I’ll have my lawyer request an emergency audit of your notary commission. We can go through every single fraudulent title transfer you’ve rubber-stamped for cash over the last five years. How much did Ethan pay you, Sal? Five hundred? A thousand? Did he bring in a woman wearing a dark wig to pose as me, or did he just slip you an envelope over a pastrami sandwich?"
Costello froze. The color drained from his jowls, leaving his skin the shade of wet cardboard.
He looked at my phone. He looked at my father’s clenched fists. Then he slowly sat back down, the cheap leather of his chair groaning under his weight.
"I didn't know what it was," Costello whispered, his voice suddenly cracked and dry. "I swear to God, I didn't know the whole story. Ethan said it was an amicable buyout. Said his wife had agoraphobia and couldn't leave the apartment. He brought in her passport, her social security card, and two grand in cash."
"Who was the woman?" I demanded.
Costello swallowed hard. "There wasn't any woman. Just him. He did the signature right here. Sat in that chair you’re standing in front of. Pulled out a trace paper, drew it out twice, then signed the deed. He laughed while he did it. Said his wife wouldn't know the difference until he was sipping margaritas in the desert."
My stomach lurched violently. Ten years. Ten years of sharing a bed, celebrating anniversaries, nursing him through the flu, forgiving his cruel little comments about my bakery shifts.
He hadn't just betrayed me. He had relished the execution.
"The journal," I said, holding out my hand. "Give me the logbook."
"If I give it to you, I lose my license. I could go to jail," Costello pleaded.
"If you don't give it to me," I replied, "you’re going to Rikers Island as a co-conspirator in grand larceny and elder abuse. Choose."
Three minutes later, Dad and I walked out of Costello’s office into the pouring rain. Tucked beneath my coat was a high-resolution photocopy of page 114 of Salvatore Costello’s official notary registry.
Next to the entry for October 14th, in the column marked *Signature of Signer*, Ethan had slipped up. In his supreme arrogance, after forging my name, he had filled out the administrative fee receipt in his own distinct, angular print, and accidentally used his own personal phone number on the contact line.
May you like
The first link in their chain had snapped.
***
