Chapter 6 - The Deposition of Warren Baker
The conference room on the tenth floor of the Wake County Courthouse smelled of industrial floor wax and old legal volumes.
A court reporter sat at the end of the long glass table, her fingers poised over her steno machine. Outside, rain beat a steady rhythm against the panoramic windows overlooking Raleigh.
Warren sat in the center of the table, flanked by Arthur Vance and two junior associates in matching navy suits. Warren wore an bespoke charcoal suit, a gold watch glinting on his wrist, his demeanor projecting the relaxed boredom of an emperor forced to attend a local parish council meeting.
Daniel sat in the far corner of the room, behind his father’s legal team, his eyes fixed firmly on the carpet. He had lost weight in five days; his suit hung loose around his shoulders.
I sat at the defense table next to Marcus Vance. I wore my service dress uniform—dark blue, ribbons straight, the gold insignia of my rank catching the fluorescent light. I had not worn it to intimidate; I had worn it because today was official business.
"We are on the record," Marcus Vance announced calmly. "This is the deposition of Warren Baker, taken in the matter of *Baker Landworks LLC v. Rosalie Hollis Baker*, Wake County Superior Court, Civil Action Number 24-CVS-8891."
Marcus leaned forward, his reading glasses perched on the tip of his nose. "State your full name and occupation for the record."
"Warren Thomas Baker. Chief Executive Officer of Baker Landworks," Warren said, his voice deep and dismissive.
"Mr. Baker, let's turn directly to Exhibit 4. Do you recognize this document?"
Marcus slid a copy of the purchase option across the glass.
Warren glanced at it without picking it up. "It’s the purchase option for the Hollis tract. Signed by Daniel Baker on behalf of his wife."
"Were you present when Daniel signed this document?"
"I was."
"And where did that signing take place?"
"In my office on Six Forks Road."
"On what date?" Marcus asked.
Warren paused, his eyes flicking for a fraction of a second toward Arthur Vance. "The date is on the instrument. March 14."
"March 14 of which year?"
"Two years ago. 2022."
Marcus nodded slowly, making a brief note on his pad. "And was Brenda Howell present in your office when Daniel signed it?"
"Brenda is our notary. She does her job."
"That wasn't my question, Mr. Baker. Was Brenda Howell physically present in the room when your son affixed his signature to Exhibit 4?"
Arthur Vance leaned forward. "Object to form. You can answer, Warren."
"She was in and out," Warren said smoothly. "She witnessed the execution."
Marcus smiled—a small, dangerous smile I had seen him use during general courts-martial. He reached into his leather briefcase and pulled out three distinct manila folders.
"Mr. Baker, I am handing you what has been marked as Defendant’s Exhibit 12. Can you identify it?"
Warren picked up the document. His eyes scanned the header, and his jaw hardened. "It looks like an employment time card."
"It is a certified digital badge-swipe log from the North Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles office in Cary," Marcus said. "It shows that Brenda Howell was standing in line renewing her driver’s license on March 14, 2022, between the hours of 1:15 PM and 4:30 PM. Her signature appears on the DMV electronic pad at 3:42 PM. The timestamp on your purchase option indicates it was notarized at your office at 2:15 PM."
Warren's expression did not change, but a muscle near his left temple began to throb. "A clerical error on the time. Brenda stamped it when she got back."
"Let's move to Exhibit 13," Marcus continued without missing a beat. "This is a sworn deposition taken yesterday afternoon from Brenda Howell, pursuant to a subpoena duces tecum."
Arthur Vance bolted upright. "You deposed Brenda Howell without notice?"
"Brenda Howell was served as a non-party witness on the statutory fraud counterclaim, Arthur," Marcus said, not even looking at him. "You received electronic notice at 8:00 AM yesterday morning. If your associates don't check their email, that's a matter between you and your malpractice carrier."
Marcus turned back to Warren. "In paragraph eight of her sworn testimony, Ms. Howell states—under penalty of perjury—that you presented her with Exhibit 4 on August 12 of *this year*, already bearing Daniel's signature, and instructed her to backdate the jurat to March 14, 2022, using an expired notary stamp that you kept in your center desk drawer. Did you do that, Mr. Baker?"
Warren's face flushed a deep, violent crimson. He shoved the paper away with the back of his hand. "Brenda Howell is an incompetent bookkeeper who’s angry because she was passed over for a performance bonus. Her testimony is worthless."
"Is it?" Marcus asked softly.
He slid Exhibit 14 across the table. It was a single sheet of paper: an email from Warren’s private account to Arthur Vance, sent three weeks before Mabel’s birthday party.
*The girl won't sell,* the email read. *Daniel says she’s stubborn like her mother. Just run the option paperwork through with Daniel’s POA from Fort Bragg. She’s just a housewife now; she won't have the stomach or the money for a civil trial once we drop the summons on her. The bank needs the title binder by the end of the quarter.*
The conference room became so silent that the hum of the fluorescent fixtures sounded like a high-voltage wire.
Arthur Vance closed his eyes. One of his junior associates quietly slid his chair back, distancing himself from the table.
Warren looked across the glass directly at me. His veneer of jovial condescension was completely gone. In its place was the raw, snarling malice of an apex predator that has suddenly realized it is caught in steel teeth.
"You think you're clever, don't you?" Warren rasped, his voice dropping an octave, ignoring his lawyer entirely. "You think you can come into my town, into my company, and burn down what I spent forty years building? You're living on dirt your mother broke her back to pay for! You think some army ribbons make you a player at this table?"
"Warren, be quiet," Arthur Vance hissed, grabbing his client’s arm. "Shut your mouth right now."
Warren yanked his arm free. "She doesn't have the cards, Arthur! She has nothing! She’s living off my son!"
I leaned forward, resting my forearms against the table, meeting his bloodshot gaze with eyes that had watched artillery barrages over the Iraqi desert without flinching.
"Exhibit 15, Warren," I said, my voice cutting through the room like a cold blade.
Marcus slid the final folder across the table.
It was not a legal brief. It was a formal criminal referral to the Special Investigations Unit of the North Carolina Commissioner of Banks and the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, detailing the four-million-dollar fraudulent title binder on Phase II of Whispering Pines. Attached to the cover page was a complete set of internal transfer ledgers, initialed by corporate treasurer Celeste Baker.
Warren looked down at his daughter’s signature on the bottom of the audit sheet.
All the color drained from his face in a single, sickening rush. His mouth opened slightly, his breath catching in his throat with a dry, rattling gasp. The gold watch on his wrist trembled against the mahogany wood.
He looked over his shoulder at Daniel, but Daniel was no longer looking at the floor.
Daniel was looking at his father. And for the first time in his thirty-four years, Daniel looked at Warren not with fear, not with deference, but with a profound, horrified disgust.
"You used my signature," Daniel whispered, his voice trembling as he stood up from his chair. "You told me it was a routine bank verification. You told me it would protect our family."
"Daniel, sit down," Warren croaked, but the command had no teeth left; it was the dry wheeze of an old man whose empire was falling around his ankles.
May you like
Daniel didn't sit down. He took off his Baker Landworks security badge, dropped it onto the center of the conference table, and walked out the door without looking back.
***
