“You need to move your truck now.”
I stepped out.
She stopped when she saw my work boots and dusty jeans.
Maybe I didn’t look like the festival crowd she had been expecting.
“I live here,” I said.
Her smile disappeared.
She studied the farmhouse.
Then me.
“Oh.”
“Who hired you?”
“I’m volunteering.”
“For whom?”
“The HOA.”
That was when I understood.
Cedar Ridge Estates sat east of my property.
Two hundred and forty-one houses built around a private golf course, artificial lake, clubhouse, and enough ornamental stone walls to defend a medieval kingdom.
The development had been built twelve years earlier.
My land existed decades before it.
We shared about three-quarters of a mile of boundary.
We shared nothing else.
Mercer Farm was not part of Cedar Ridge.
Never had been.
Never would be.
But Cedar Ridge had spent years pretending otherwise.
They had complained about my tractors starting before sunrise.
They had complained about cattle smell.
They had complained about dust.
They had complained that my grain bins ruined their homeowners’ “viewshed.”
Once, their architectural committee mailed me a notice demanding approval before I repainted my barn.
I mailed it back with a photograph of my deed.
For three years, things stayed relatively quiet.
Then six months earlier, Cedar Ridge elected a new HOA president.
Her name was Patricia Kessler.
Everyone called her Trish.
She had moved from St. Louis after selling some kind of marketing consultancy.
She drove a pearl-white Range Rover.
She wore oversized sunglasses even on cloudy days.
And she seemed to believe legal authority worked like perfume.
Apply enough of it and everyone nearby was required to smell it.
Two months after becoming president, she sent me a letter offering $150,000 for thirty acres along my eastern boundary.
I declined.
Then she offered $225,000.
I declined again.
Then came a letter saying Cedar Ridge was “reviewing historical access rights affecting surrounding parcels.”
I handed it to my attorney, Rachel Collins.
Rachel replied with one page.
No easement.
No access rights.
No discussion.
That should have ended it.
Apparently, it had only changed Trish’s strategy.
The volunteer folded her arms.
“You should probably speak with Patricia.”
“I probably should.”
“She’s at the clubhouse.”
“Call her.”
The woman hesitated.
“I don’t have her personal—”
A golf cart appeared from behind my barn.
Two men rode in front.
A woman sat in back.
White linen pants.
