Chapter Thirteen F: The Inspection
The independent inspector arrived Thursday morning in a plain white van.
Her name was Adele Kim, and she carried a measuring tape, a flashlight, and a clipboard.
She asked Lena to walk through the property with her rather than waiting inside.
“I prefer owners to see what I’m seeing,” Adele explained.
Lena agreed.
They began at the porch and worked toward the side gate.
Adele tested the new railing, examined the steps, and inspected the fence hinges.
She found a cracked paving stone near the shed and a loose screw in a garden latch.
“Those are maintenance issues,
” she said.
“They aren’t evidence that the house is unsafe to occupy.”
Lena asked whether the inspector would document the repairs Malik had already completed.
Adele said she could describe their current condition but could not certify what they had looked like before the work.
“That’s fair,” Lena said.
At the driveway, Adele paused beside a pale scrape on the fencepost.
“Was this part of the reported interference?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll photograph it separately from the normal inspection findings.”
They finished in the kitchen, where Adele checked the visible outlets and the smoke detectors.
She found no sign of the electrical defects Celia had described.
“I can give you a written report tomorrow,” she said.
“Please make it factual rather than reassuring,” Lena replied.
Adele raised an eyebrow.
“That’s what I always try to do.”
“Then we’re going to get along.”
When the inspector left, Celia stepped onto her porch.
“I see you finally agreed to an inspection,” she called.
Lena was carrying a box of old garden tools.
“I hired an inspector of my choosing,” she said.
“You should have done that weeks ago.”
“I did it because my insurer requested information after receiving a complaint.”
Celia’s expression changed.
“Are you accusing me of contacting your insurance company?”
“I’m telling you why the inspector was here.
”
“You make everything sound like an interrogation.”
Lena put the box down and looked across the street.
“You keep asking questions you don’t want answered.”
Celia went back inside and slammed her door.
Lena carried the tools to the shed.
She had barely closed it when she heard a child calling from the sidewalk.
Ben’s daughter was standing beside her scooter, pointing at a patch of loose gravel.
“Somebody put more stones here,” the girl said.
Lena came closer without stepping on the patch.
The stones were ordinary driveway gravel, but their placement was deliberate.
They had been scattered at the point where a scooter would turn sharply toward the pavement.
Lena asked the girl to wait on the grass while she called Ben.
Ben arrived within minutes and led his daughter away from the corner.
“I thought this was finished,” he said.
“So did I.”
Lena looked at the gravel and felt the familiar temptation to solve the entire problem herself.
Instead, she called Dana and described exactly what she could see.
She did not name Celia.
She did not need to.
