Chapter 5: What Came Through That Afternoon
My attorney's name was Paul Garrett.
I had known him for nine years.
He did not dramatize things.
He did not pause for effect.
When he paused, it was because he was choosing words carefully.
He chose them carefully now.
"The investigator I hired — the one I told you about six weeks ago — he pulled financials as part of the background work.
Standard procedure for custody prep." Another pause.
"Daniel, money has been leaving your joint account for fourteen months."
I was still sitting on the kitchen floor.
"How much?" I asked.
"Across fourteen months, approximately sixty-three thousand dollars."
The refrigerator hummed.
Upstairs, Lily laughed at something her brother said.
"Where did it go?" I asked.
"That's what took time to trace.
It moved through three accounts.
One of them is in a name I don't think you'll recognize." He read it out.
I didn't recognize it.
"It's a shell," Paul said.
"Registered in Nevada fourteen months ago.
One month before the transfers started."
"She opened it."
"The registration documents have a signature.
We're having it verified, but the address attached to the shell company is her sister's house."
Her sister's house.
The same sister I had arranged for Renee to stay with tonight.
"They did this together," I said.
"That's what the evidence suggests.
Yes."
I pressed my back against the kitchen cabinet and looked at the ceiling.
Sixty-three thousand dollars.
Fourteen months.
A shell company.
Her sister.
"Why?" I asked.
Not to Paul.
To the ceiling.
"My best guess," Paul said, "is exit preparation.
She was building a fund you wouldn't know about before she filed.
Or before she pushed you to file."
"She pushed me to file."
"Did she?"
I thought about the last three months.
The escalating tension.
The incidents with Marcus that seemed designed to be visible.
The way she had started arguments on the nights I came home late, then gone cold and distant when I tried to resolve them.
"She wanted me angry," I said.
"She wanted me to file first."
"If you file first, you're the one who appears destabilized.
She has time to prepare her counter.
She has the documentation she's been building.
And she has sixty-three thousand dollars you don't know about, sitting in an account that technically doesn't exist."
"Except now we know it exists."
"Except now we know."
I stood up from the floor.
"What do I do tonight?" I asked.
"Nothing.
Don't confront her again.
Don't mention the money.
Don't let her know we have this."
"She already knows something shifted.
I told her about the recording."
A short silence.
"That's fine.
The recording is legitimate.
But the financial investigation — she cannot know about that yet.
Not until we're ready to move."
"When are we ready?"
"I need forty-eight hours.
I want the signature verified and I want to talk to a forensic accountant first thing tomorrow morning." He paused.
"Can you keep the house calm for forty-eight hours?"
I looked at the kitchen doorway.
Beyond it, the hallway.
Beyond that, the stairs.
"I'll try," I said.
"Daniel." His voice was careful.
"One more thing."
"What."
"The investigator found something else.
Something separate from the financial trail." He paused again.
"It involves Marcus."
My hand tightened on the phone.
"Tell me," I said.
"Not tonight.
I need to confirm it first.
I don't want to give you something I'm not certain of."
"Paul."
"Tomorrow morning.
Eight o'clock.
Come to my office.
Bring the recording from tonight." A pause.
"And Daniel — don't leave Marcus alone with her tonight."
The call ended.
I stood in the kitchen for a long time.
Then I walked upstairs.
Marcus was asleep in Lily's room, curled on top of her spare blanket, his plate empty on the floor beside him.
Lily was asleep next to him, one hand resting near his shoulder.
Noah had fallen asleep in the armchair in the corner with a book open on his chest.
I stood in the doorway and looked at the three of them.
Then I walked to the end of the hall and sat down outside Marcus's bedroom door.
I didn't sleep.
At 2:14 in the morning, I heard Renee's bedroom door open.
Footsteps in the hall.
They stopped outside Lily's room.
I stood up.
The footsteps moved on.
Went back to the bedroom.
The door closed again.
I sat back down.
At 7:55 the next morning, I dropped all three children at my mother's house, told her I needed one day, and drove to Paul Garrett's office.
May you like
He was waiting at the door.
His face told me everything before he said a word.
