Chapter 4 - The Condo That Didn’t Exist
By three o’clock, Danielle had a copy of every document.
By four, she had found Northstar Holdings.
By five, she called me.
“Emma, sit down.”
I hated when people started conversations that way.
“What did you find?”
“The LLC was created eighteen months ago.”
“Who owns it?”
“It’s registered through an agent.”
“So we don’t know.”
“We know more than that.”
Paper shuffled on her end.
“The condo was purchased fourteen months ago for four hundred eighty-seven thousand dollars.”
I stopped breathing.
“How?”
“Cash purchase plus a private note.”
“Liam doesn’t have that kind of money.”
“Maybe Liam doesn’t.”
“What does that mean?”
“We’re going to find out.”
I looked around the house.
The nursery rocker.
Our framed wedding picture.
The little scratch in the hardwood from the day we assembled Hailey’s crib.
Everything suddenly looked like evidence from somebody else’s life.
“Could marital money have been used?”
“Yes.”
“Without my signature?”
“Depending on where the money came from.”
I thought of the transfers.
“Danielle?”
“Yes?”
“I want everything found.”
“That’s the plan.”
“No.”
My voice hardened.
“I mean everything.”
That night, I fed Hailey at two fourteen in the morning.
She curled her tiny fingers around mine.
I whispered, “Your father is either an idiot or a criminal genius.”
She yawned.
“Hopefully the first one.”
For the first time all week, I laughed.
Then the doorbell camera notification appeared.
Someone was outside.
At 2:23 a.m.
I opened the feed.
Liam.
He stood on the porch wearing jeans and a dark sweatshirt.
I activated the speaker.
“What are you doing here?”
He looked up toward the camera.
“I need to see you.”
“It’s two in the morning.”
“I know.”
“Leave.”
“Emma, please.”
“No.”
His shoulders dropped.
“I made mistakes.”
I almost admired the understatement.
“You need to go.”
“Is Hailey okay?”
“She’s fine.”
“Can I see her?”
“Not at two twenty-three in the morning.”
“I’m her father.”
“And she is sleeping.”
He stared into the camera.
“Did Rachel contact you?”
There it was.
I said nothing.
His face changed.
“Emma?”
“Goodnight, Liam.”
“Wait.”
I stayed silent.
“If she contacted you, she’s lying.”
“About what?”
Too late, he realized the trap.
I watched the panic flash across his face.
“About…about us.”
“I haven’t told you what she said.”
He looked away.
“Emma, open the door.”
“No.”
“We need to talk.”
“You’ve had two years to talk.”
“This is bigger than our marriage.”
That sentence stopped me.
“What does that mean?”
He rubbed his forehead.
“Just open the door.”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“I’m trying to protect you.”
I almost laughed.
“From what?”
He looked straight at the camera.
“From finding things you don’t understand.”
Then he walked away.
I replayed the video twice.
At six thirty, I sent it to Danielle.
At seven fourteen, she called.
“He’s scared.”
“I noticed.”
“That’s useful.”
“Useful isn’t how I’d describe my life right now.”
“No,” she said gently.
“But scared people make mistakes.”
Liam made his first one that afternoon.
He emptied our joint savings account.
Twenty-six thousand dollars.
Gone.
I discovered it when my debit card was declined buying diapers.
Danielle filed emergency paperwork before the courthouse closed.
By evening, Liam had been formally notified that he could not transfer, hide, or dispose of additional marital assets.
He called twelve times.
I answered on the thirteenth.
“What?”
“You froze everything.”
“You emptied our savings.”
“It’s my money.”
“It’s ours.”
“I earned most of it.”
“I stopped working to care for our daughter.”
“That was your choice.”
I went very quiet.
He heard it.
“Emma, I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
“No, I’m under pressure.”
“From whom?”
Silence.
“Liam.”
“I can fix this.”
“Then return the money.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
Another silence.
Longer.
Then he said, “Because I don’t have it anymore.”
The line went dead.
Twenty-six thousand dollars had disappeared in less than six hours.
And Liam claimed he no longer had it.
That evening, Danielle’s investigator found something else.
Northstar Holdings had not purchased only one property.
There were three.
The condo.
A storage unit.
And a small commercial office registered thirty miles outside the city.
All purchased while Liam and I were married.
And one of them contained my signature.
May you like
Except I had never signed a single document.
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