Then screenshots of my deed started circulating.
By two, hundreds of angry ticket buyers were posting refund demands on Cedar Ridge’s Facebook page.
By three, someone discovered the HOA’s event refund policy said tickets were nonrefundable except if the organizer canceled.
Which they had.
At 3:18, the page disappeared.
At 4:00, residents began arriving at the clubhouse.
At 4:40, somebody livestreamed the emergency HOA meeting.
I watched from my kitchen table.
Trish sat at the front of the room beside Bradley Shaw.
Two hundred homeowners shouted questions.
Where was the money?
Why had tickets been sold without confirmed access?
Who authenticated the agreement?
Why was the event insurance carrier denying coverage?
Why had the HOA spent $91,000 before ticket sales were complete?
That number made me sit upright.
Ninety-one thousand dollars.
On a corn maze.
Rachel was watching too.
“Did you hear that?”
“Yes.”
Then a resident asked the question I had been waiting for.
