Chapter 7: The Call to David
I hadn't spoken to David alone since the divorce was finalized.
We communicated through Michael, through lawyers, through the occasional terse email about school fees or holidays.
We had built a careful architecture of distance, and it had held for three years.
Grace dialed his number from her office phone and handed the receiver to me.
He picked up on the fourth ring.
"David.
It's Sandra."
Silence.
Then: "Sandra."
"I need you to listen to me.
All the way through.
Don't speak until I'm finished."
Another silence.
But he didn't hang up.
I told him about Rachel.
About the Meridian account.
About the transfers.
About the flight booked for tomorrow morning.
I told him about the settlement.
When I finished, the line was quiet for so long I thought he'd gone.
"David."
"I knew about some of it," he said.
My hand tightened on the receiver.
"How much?"
"I knew Robert was moving money between accounts.
He told me it was restructuring.
Tax efficiency." His voice was flat.
Emptied out.
"I didn't ask enough questions.
I didn't want to."
"David, that's not—"
"I know what it is, Sandra." A pause.
"I'm not stupid.
I just didn't want to see it."
Grace was watching me from across the desk.
I held up one finger.
"Was it before the settlement?" I said.
"The restructuring.
Was it happening before we signed?"
The silence this time was different.
Heavier.
"Yes," he said.
"Did you know what it would do to my numbers?"
"I told myself it wouldn't make much difference."
"How much difference did it make, David?"
He said the number.
It was larger than what Grace had written on her notepad.
I set the receiver down on the desk.
Not hard.
I just set it down and looked at it.
Grace picked it up.
"Mr.
Harmon.
This is Grace Ellison.
I'm Sandra's attorney." She was already writing.
"I need you in my office this afternoon.
Two o'clock.
If you come voluntarily and cooperate fully, your exposure in this matter will be significantly reduced." She listened.
"That's correct.
Bring nothing.
Just yourself." She hung up.
Michael was standing in the doorway.
He had heard enough.
"He knew," Michael said.
"He told himself a story," Grace said.
"People do that.
It doesn't make it better.
But it does make him useful."
"Useful," Michael repeated.
The word sat badly in his mouth.
"He can give us Robert," Grace said.
"Account access, communications, the full restructuring timeline.
With David's cooperation, the injunction goes through today instead of next week."
She looked at me.
"This is your decision, Sandra.
Not mine.
Not Michael's."
I thought about the seat.
The front row.
Eighteen years of double shifts.
The number David had just said out loud.
"Get the injunction," I said.
"And tell him to be here at two."
David arrived at 1:52.
He sat across from Grace and didn't look at me for the first twenty minutes.
When he finally did, he looked older than I remembered.
Not in the way people look when they age well.
In the way they look when something has been eating at them for a long time.
"I'm sorry," he said.
Not to Grace.
To me.
I didn't answer.
"Sandra—"
"Let's get through the documents first," I said.
He nodded.
He opened the folder Grace slid across to him.
And he started talking.
By 4:30 p.m., Grace had everything she needed for the injunction.
At 5:15, her contact at the financial crimes unit called back.
"They're moving tonight," Grace said after she hung up.
"Not tomorrow.
May you like
Robert changed the flight."
She was already reaching for her coat.
