Chapter 4 - WHAT DAVID HAD BEEN TRYING TO FIND
Natalie had hired a forensic accountant named Eric Vance two weeks earlier.
Not because we knew David had committed a crime.
Because his financial disclosures did not make sense.
David claimed his personal assets had fallen sharply during the final year of our marriage.
Possible.
His company had experienced losses.
Also possible.
But money had left several accounts without appearing anywhere logical afterward.
Eric called them gaps.
David called them business complexity.
I called them the reason I stopped signing things he put in front of me.
The strangest argument happened five days before the mall.
David called and asked whether I had cleaned his home office.
“No.”
“Has anyone?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Why?”
“I left some company materials there.”
“Then tell Natalie what you need and we’ll arrange pickup.”
Silence.
“Hannah, I don’t need a lawyer involved every time I want my own property.”
“It’s still the house where Chloe and I live.”
“My name is on that house too.”
“So talk to your lawyer.”
He hung up.
The next morning, Evelyn called.
She asked whether I still took Chloe to school around seven-thirty.
At the time, I thought she was making conversation.
Now I knew better.
Something remained inside that house.
Something David could not simply request through attorneys.
That night, Chloe and I stayed with my sister Rebecca.
At 10:40, Natalie called again.
“Do you know of a locked storage area in David’s office?”
“A lower filing cabinet.”
“Anything else?”
“A built-in cabinet behind his desk.”
“Does it lock?”
“Yes.”
“Who has the key?”
“David.”
A pause.
“What?”
“Eric found references in company emails to an offline archive.”
“What does that mean?”
“Possibly backup drives. Possibly paper records. We don’t know.”
“David kept company records in the house?”
“Apparently some.”
I remembered the argument after he moved out.
He returned once with a list of items he wanted.
Clothes.
Golf clubs.
Two watches.
A framed photograph of his father.
He never mentioned records.
“What if the stranger is going there for those?”
“That’s one possibility.”
“What’s another?”
Natalie took a moment.
“To put something there.”
That possibility frightened me more.
May you like
Because stealing evidence was one thing.
Planting it meant they might be preparing to blame me for whatever came next.
