Chapter 4 - RICHARD CAME TO THE MANSION
Richard arrived before noon.
I heard his voice from the foyer.
“Where is my wife?”
I froze upstairs.
Ernest’s attorney, Michael Sloan, had arrived an hour earlier after Ernest told him about the letters.
Michael was reviewing my financial situation separately.
When Richard began shouting downstairs, Michael looked at me.
“Do you want to see him?”
“No.”
That answer surprised me.
It also felt wonderful.
We went downstairs anyway.
Richard stood near the entrance in his expensive charcoal coat.
He looked furious.
Then he saw Ernest.
His entire personality changed.
“Mr. Walker.”
Richard knew exactly who Ernest was.
Most people in finance did.
Ernest didn’t offer his hand.
“You emptied Laura’s account.”
Richard looked at me.
“Our account.”
“It was my salary,” I said.
“We’re married.”
Michael stepped forward.
“That doesn’t make every transfer lawful.”
Richard laughed.
“You hired a lawyer?”
“No.”
I looked at Ernest.
“I finally talked to one.”
Richard moved closer.
“You’re embarrassing yourself.”
Those words used to work.
I used to hear them and immediately search myself for whatever mistake I had made.
This time I heard something different.
Fear.
“You need to come home.”
“No.”
“Laura.”
“No.”
His face hardened.
“You think this old man is going to rescue you?”
Ernest’s cane tapped once against the marble.
“I’m not rescuing anyone.”
Richard smirked.
“Good.”
Ernest continued.
“I’m giving her somewhere safe to stand while she rescues herself.”
Richard looked at me.
“You’ll regret this.”
Michael immediately wrote something down.
Richard noticed.
He left.
The front door closed.
My legs began shaking.
Ernest said nothing.
He simply pulled out a chair.
I sat.
Michael opened his laptop.
“We need to talk about your finances.”
For two hours, we reconstructed fourteen years of marriage.
That was when I discovered the overdue bills were not evidence that Richard and I were poor.
They were evidence that Richard had been lying.
His salary had increased dramatically three years earlier.
He had a separate investment account.
A second credit card.
And regular transfers to an account I didn’t recognize.
My household budget had been deliberately starved.
He wasn’t unable to pay.
He wanted me desperate enough to keep working and ashamed enough never to ask questions.
Then Michael found something worse.
A home-equity line had been opened against our house.
My electronic signature appeared on the application.
I had never signed it.
Ernest stared at the screen.
I stared at the forged signature.
And suddenly the question of who my father was became connected to something else entirely.
May you like
Because Richard had recently increased my life-insurance coverage.
Without telling me.
