Chapter 6: Patricia
I had met Patricia Holt eleven times in four years of marriage.
I had counted, because each visit had cost me something.
A comment about my cooking.
A suggestion that I was working too much and not supporting Derek enough.
A question about why we hadn't had children yet, directed at me, never at her son.
She had never once used my name without a slight pause before it, as if she were deciding each time whether I had earned the right to be called anything at all.
The morning after Derek and Suzanne left the apartment, I drove to Patricia's house in Coral Gables.
I did not call ahead.
She answered the door in a housecoat, coffee in hand, and her face went through three expressions in under two seconds: surprise, composure, and then something that looked almost like fear.
"Skylar." The pause.
Right on schedule.
"Can I come in?"
She stepped back.
I walked in.
Her living room was immaculate.
A large framed photo of Derek at his college graduation hung above the fireplace.
Suzanne's children's drawings, framed in matching white frames, lined the hallway.
There was no photo of me anywhere in the house.
I had noticed that at Christmas, two years ago, and said nothing.
I sat down without being invited to.
Patricia remained standing.
"Derek called me last night.
He told me you filed a police report."
"I did."
"He said you provoked him."
"He threw boiling coffee in my face, Patricia."
She looked at her own cup.
Set it down on the side table.
"He has a temper," she said.
"He's always had one.
His father was the same way.
You learn to manage it."
"I'm not here to talk about Derek's temper," I said.
"I'm here to talk about the insurance policy."
The room went very still.
"I don't know what you mean," she said.
"The whole life policy Derek opened in your name six months ago.
The one with Suzanne listed as beneficiary.
The one with premiums being paid from an account opened using my personal information without my knowledge." I watched her face.
"The one with the fraudulent medical declaration signed by a doctor whose license was suspended two years ago."
Patricia sat down.
"I want to know," I said, "whether you signed anything.
Whether you knew what you were signing.
Or whether Derek did all of it without telling you."
She looked at her hands.
"Patricia.
I am not your enemy.
But I need the truth right now, because my attorney is speaking to the insurance fraud division this morning, and whatever you tell me in the next five minutes will determine whether your name is on the wrong side of this."
Her chin lifted.
For a moment I thought she was going to deny everything.
Then she said: "He told me it was estate planning."
"When?"
"Six months ago.
He brought papers.
He said it was a standard policy, that it would protect Suzanne and the grandchildren if something happened to me." She paused.
"He said you had agreed to it."
"He said I agreed."
"Yes."
"And you believed him."
She looked at me.
Something in her face shifted — not guilt exactly, but the particular expression of a woman who had spent decades choosing to believe what was convenient.
"He's my son," she said.
"I know," I said.
"But he used your name, your health information, and my identity to commit insurance fraud.
And if you signed those papers without reading them, you may be considered a participant."
Her hand went to her mouth.
"I need to know what you signed," I said.
"And I need you to tell my attorney exactly what Derek told you.
All of it."
She was quiet for a long time.
Then: "Will they arrest him?"
I held her gaze.
"That depends on what the investigation finds."
Patricia looked at the photo above the fireplace.
Her son at twenty-two, grinning in a cap and gown, the whole world apparently in front of him.
"He was such a good boy," she said softly.
Not to me.
To the photo.
I waited.
May you like
She reached for her phone.
"Give me your attorney's number," she said.
