Chapter 5: The Account
I stared at the number.
Unknown.
No name.
The text had been sent eleven seconds after Vanessa walked out the door.
Claire read it over my shoulder.
"She sent that from outside."
"I know."
"She had it ready."
"I know."
I set the phone face-down on the table.
Then I picked it back up because I couldn't leave it face-down.
"Dad." Claire sat across from me.
"Before you call Mom — what do you actually know?
Not what Vanessa said.
What do you actually know?"
I thought about it.
"Your mother's been distracted.
For about three months."
"Distracted how?"
"Quieter.
Working late twice a week.
She said it was a project." I stopped.
"She stopped talking about Donna.
They used to talk every few days.
Then she stopped mentioning her entirely."
"That's not nothing," Claire said.
"It's also not an account."
Rosa was still in the doorway.
The baby had fallen asleep against her shoulder.
"Mr.
Daniel," Rosa said.
"I don't know about any account.
But I can tell you that Mrs.
Vanessa has been coming here more often in the last two months.
Before that, maybe once a month.
Now it was two, three times a week.
And sometimes she came when you were at work.
Just her and Mrs.
Laura."
I hadn't known that.
"They were close before," I said, mostly to myself.
"They seemed close," Rosa said carefully.
"But the last few times — it didn't look like friends.
It looked like—" She searched for the word.
"Business."
I picked up my phone and called my wife again.
This time she answered on the second ring.
"Daniel." Her voice was careful.
Already careful.
That told me something.
"Where are you?"
A pause.
"I'm — I had to step out.
There was a thing with Donna.
I'm sorry I missed your calls, I was going to—"
"Come home," I said.
"Is the baby—"
"The baby is fine.
Rosa kept her safe." I let that land.
"Come home, Laura.
We need to talk."
Another pause.
Longer.
"What happened?"
"I'll tell you when you get here."
She arrived twenty-two minutes later.
I know because I watched the clock.
Claire sat with me.
Rosa put the baby down in the nursery and came back to the kitchen without being asked.
Laura walked in and read the room in one second.
Her eyes went to Claire.
Then to Rosa.
Then to me.
"Where's Vanessa?" she said.
"I asked her to leave."
Her face did something complicated.
"Daniel—"
"Sit down, Laura."
She sat.
I put Claire's phone on the table between us.
The first clip.
The second clip.
The screenshot with her sister's name on it.
She watched all of it without speaking.
When it finished, she didn't look at the phone.
She looked at her hands.
"I need you to tell me about the account," I said.
Her head came up.
"How do you know about—" She stopped herself.
"Tell me," I said.
The kitchen was completely quiet except for the refrigerator hum and the sound of Laura breathing.
"It's not what you think," she said.
Claire's chair scraped back from the table.
May you like
She stood up, walked to the counter, and stood with her back to us.
That was the moment I understood this was going to be worse than I thought.
