Part 4
Far below, a delivery cyclist swore at a taxi. A couple under one umbrella argued beside a food cart. The vendor lifted the metal lid from a tray, and steam rose into the cold air before vanishing.
“What else did he get?” Clara asked.
“We’ll find out.”
“Today.”
“Not today.”
“Naomi.”
“No. Today we preserve what we can, secure your communications, notify the trust administrator that authorization is disputed, and prevent additional transfers if possible. Then we identify counsel in the jurisdiction where he filed. Then we review every power you gave him while you were away.”
“I gave him temporary management authority.”
“Temporary authority can do permanent damage.”
Clara turned.
Naomi slid one coffee toward her.
“Drink.”
“I don’t want it.”
“I didn’t ask whether you wanted it.”
Clara drank. It had too much milk.
By early afternoon, they knew the eight-million-dollar transfer had not completed. The trust administrator placed a temporary hold after receiving Naomi’s notice, but he refused to discuss previous transactions until the firm completed an identity-verification process.
Clara failed the first verification.
Grant had changed the security questions.
Her mother’s birthplace had been replaced by an answer Clara did not know. The recovery phone ended in digits belonging to Grant. The backup email used a domain registered to Laurel House’s executive office.
“He didn’t just take access,” Naomi said. “He rebuilt your identity around himself.”
They obtained a new phone from a store two blocks away. Clara’s principal credit card was declined. So was the second.
Naomi paid.
“I’ll reimburse you.”
“You bought me a washing machine during law school.”
“It was used.”
“It flooded my kitchen.”
“You overloaded it.”
“It has taken me fifteen years to recover. Let me have this.”
Clara almost smiled.
At four, Marcus drove them to the hotel he had mentioned. The lobby was narrow and warm, with framed theater posters and a brass lamp taped near its base. A teenage boy behind the desk chewed gum while checking Naomi’s identification.
“One bed or two?” he asked.
Naomi looked at Clara.
“One,” Clara said.
Naomi raised an eyebrow.
“You’re not staying.”
“I might.”
“You kick.”
“I do not kick.”
“You kicked me in Napa.”
“That was a spider.”
“It was a sock.”
The boy handed over the keycards without interest.
The room was on the sixth floor and faced a brick wall. Its single window opened three inches. The heater clicked every few minutes with the determination of an old appliance trying not to die.
Clara sat on the edge of the bed.
Naomi placed a legal pad on the desk.
“Passwords,” she said. “Every personal account you can remember. We change them from a clean device. Then we make a list of people who might have received documents, instructions, or money from Grant while you were away.”
“I need clothes.”
“I’ll buy some.”
“I can buy my own clothes.”
“With what?”
The question was practical. Clara received it as an insult.
She stood too quickly. “I am not helpless.”
“No one said you were.”
“You’re speaking to me as though I’m a child.”
“I’m speaking to you as though your cards were declined at a phone store.”
“I own forty-one hotels.”
“Possibly.”
The word landed between them.
Naomi’s expression changed immediately, but she did not take it back.
Clara walked into the bathroom and shut the door.
The room was small enough that her knees nearly touched the vanity when she sat on the closed toilet lid. She stared at the hand towel arranged in a fan above the sink. One of her company’s early properties had done that until Clara removed the practice because guests found it old-fashioned.
She had once spent an entire morning debating folded towels.
Now she did not know whether she owned the company that had paid for the study.
She pressed her fist against her mouth.
The first sound escaped anyway.
It was not graceful. It was not quiet. Grief tore through her chest with an animal force that embarrassed her even alone. She bent forward, elbows on her knees, and cried for the marriage, for the company, for the apartment key in her purse, for the woman in the bridal gown, and for the version of herself who had thanked Grant when he carried her suitcase into the clinic.
Naomi did not knock.
Clara loved her for that and resented her for hearing.
When she came out, Naomi sat at the desk writing names on the legal pad.
“I need a clean dress,” Clara said.
Naomi nodded. “What size?”
“You know my size.”
“I know your old size.”
Clara looked down at herself. The one-shoulder dress had been chosen for a foundation dinner she never attended. She had lost weight in Vermont, then gained some back. She had avoided scales because numbers became rituals when she was frightened.
“Six,” she said.
“Shoes?”
“Eight.”
Naomi wrote it down.
“I’m sorry,” Clara said.
“For what?”
“The washing machine.”
Naomi glanced at her. “It really was a terrible washing machine.”
After Naomi left, Marcus remained in the hallway.
“You can go home,” Clara told him.
“I’d rather stay nearby.”
“You have a family.”
“My daughter is at college. My wife is spending the weekend with her sister, which she enjoys more than spending it with me.”
“That seems unlikely.”
“You’ve met my sister-in-law.”
Clara opened the door wider. “Come in.”
Marcus sat in the desk chair. Clara remained on the bed.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
“Did you know?” she asked.
His gaze moved to the brick wall outside the window.
“About the woman?”
“About any of it.”
“I knew he was seeing someone.”
Clara felt the room tilt, though nothing moved.
“How long?”
“Maybe a year.”
“And you said nothing.”
“He stopped using the company cars. Hired drivers through an app. Sometimes I saw addresses on the expense reconciliation.”
“You manage those accounts.”
“I managed the fleet account. He submitted the others through his office.”
“But you saw.”
May you like
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
