Chương 10
Then the windows.
Then, embarrassed by myself, the front door again.
“You should sleep somewhere else tonight,” she said.
“I don’t want to.”
“Okay.”
“I know you disagree.”
“I do.”
“Thank you for not giving me a lecture.”
“I can save it for breakfast.”
That made me laugh.
A real laugh this time.
Small and ugly and necessary.
At 11:34, she said, “Send me copies of the documents.”
I hesitated.
“Why?”
“So they exist somewhere he can’t reach.”
That was smart.
I emailed her the amended credit agreement, the recent statements, and screenshots of the transfers.
Then I saved them to a new cloud folder under an account Evan did not know existed.
At midnight, Leah finally said she was going to stay awake until I texted her that the doors were locked and I was upstairs.
I did.
I did not sleep.
I lay on my side facing Evan’s empty half of the bed and watched the clock change numbers.
12:41.
1:16.
2:03.
At 2:27, I got up and went downstairs.
His blue sweater was still draped over the dining chair.
I picked it up.
It smelled faintly of his deodorant.
I held it for one second.
Then two.
Then I folded it.
That made me furious.
Even abandoned, humiliated, and half-convinced my husband had used my identity to secure debt, I was still folding his sweater.
I threw it onto the floor.
Then I picked it up again because I did not want the dog hair from the neighbor’s visiting golden retriever stuck to it.
I sat on the stairs and cried silently until my face hurt.
At 6:12, the coffee maker turned on automatically.
The grinding sound startled me.
For years, Evan had programmed it for weekday mornings.
I stood in the kitchen while coffee brewed for two people.
That nearly broke me again.
Instead, I unplugged the machine.
At 6:40, I showered.
At 7:05, I emailed my assistant and said I was taking a personal day.
At 7:12, she replied, Of course.
No questions.
I stared at those two words longer than they deserved.
At 7:30, Leah arrived carrying coffee, bagels, and the expression of someone prepared to commit administrative violence on my behalf.
She was five foot three, wore enormous tortoiseshell glasses, and had once returned a couch because the stitching was “emotionally uneven.”
She hugged me without speaking.
Then she walked into the kitchen and looked around.
“Did he come back?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She set the coffee down.
“Eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“That is not the same as not needing food.”
“You sound like my mother.”
“Your mother likes me.”
“My mother likes cashiers.”
“Because she is a decent person.”
I tore off a piece of bagel mostly to make Leah stop looking at me.
She opened her laptop.
“I made a list.”
“Of course you did.”
“Do you want the emotional list or the practical list?”
“There’s an emotional list?”
“No.”
I looked at her.
She shrugged.
“I thought asking might make me seem more balanced.”
Despite everything, I smiled.
Then she turned the laptop toward me.
“First, divorce lawyer.”
“Already searched.”
“Searching is how people lose three hours and end up reading a blog called Seven Signs Your Marriage Is Spiritually Bankrupt.”
“That sounds real.”
“It probably is.”
She tapped the screen.
“My firm uses a family-law attorney for executive referrals.”
“You asked your firm?”
“I asked whether the referral still existed.”
“That fast?”
“You called me before eleven.”
She looked offended.
“I have had eight hours.”
I read the name on the screen.
Rebecca Sloan.
Partner at Sloan, Mercer & Hale.
The profile looked expensive.
“How expensive?”
“Very.”
“Great.”
“You can afford expensive.”
“I might be guaranteeing a hundred and fifteen thousand dollars I didn’t borrow.”
“That is exactly when you afford expensive.”
I hated that she was right.
At 8:06, I called.
A receptionist answered.
I gave my name.
I expected an appointment sometime next week.
Instead, when I mentioned the disputed guarantee and business debt, the receptionist put me on hold.
Two minutes later, another woman picked up.
“This is Rebecca Sloan.”
Her voice was calm and brisk.
“Ms. Monroe, I understand you may have a time-sensitive financial issue.”
“Yes.”
“Are you safe?”
The question caught me off guard.
“Yes.”
“Any children?”
“No.”
“Any joint business ownership?”
“No.”
“Any jointly titled real estate?”
“Our house.”
“Any reason to think your husband may move, borrow, transfer, or conceal funds today?”
I looked at Leah.
“Yes.”
Rebecca did not react.
“Then I’d like you in my office at ten.”
I swallowed.
“I can be there.”
“Bring identification, the last three years of tax returns, current bank information, the original and amended loan documents, and anything showing transfers you did not authorize.”
“I have most of that.”
“Good.”
She paused.
“Do not empty joint accounts.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Do not destroy property.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Do not access accounts that are exclusively his unless you are already legally authorized.”
“I won’t.”
“Do not send messages accusing him of crimes.”
That stopped me.
“Crimes?”
“We do not know what happened yet.”
Her tone remained even.
“That is why we preserve evidence before assigning labels.”
I liked her immediately.
Not because she was warm.
She was not.
Because she did not tell me what I wanted to hear.
At ten sharp, Leah sat beside me in a glass conference room while Rebecca Sloan read the amended credit agreement.
She was in her late forties, silver threaded through dark hair, with the kind of stillness that made everyone else seem overanimated.
She read the signature page twice.
Then she looked at me.
“You did not sign this?”
“No.”
“You did not verbally authorize your husband to sign for you?”
“No.”
“You did not approve an electronic signature by email or text?”
“No.”
“Did he have access to your email?”
“Yes.”
“Passwords?”
“Yes.”
“Phone?”
“Sometimes.”
She nodded once.
May you like
“Then we need to separate what is provable from what is suspected.”
I gripped my coffee cup.
