Chapter 7: What Lawyers Do
My lawyer's name was Carol Vance.
She had handled my affairs for six years — contracts, the estate after Zoe's mother passed, the deed on the house.
She was sixty-one, direct, and had the particular quality of making complicated things feel manageable without pretending they were simple.
I was in her office at nine-oh-three with the folder on the desk between us.
She read the emails without comment.
When she finished she set the last page down and looked at me.
"How long were you married?"
"Fourteen months."
"Children in common?"
"No.
I have a daughter from my first marriage.
She's eight."
Carol looked at the folder again.
"This email.
The one referencing the child." She tapped the page.
"Do you have the original on your phone or computer?
Not just the printout?"
"Diana printed them.
I don't know from what device."
"We'll want the originals if this goes anywhere contested.
The metadata matters." She made a note.
"Did she have access to joint accounts?"
"Yes."
"Check them this morning.
Before you leave this building."
I pulled out my phone.
"Also," Carol said, "the house.
Is it in both names?"
"Mine only.
I owned it before we married.
We didn't do a postnuptial."
"Good.
That simplifies the property question considerably." She folded her hands.
"Tom, I want to ask you something directly.
Is there any part of you that wants to attempt reconciliation?"
"No."
"You're certain."
"She used my daughter to keep me distracted while she maintained a relationship with another man.
She told that man my daughter was useful." I looked at Carol.
"There's nothing to reconcile."
Carol nodded once.
"Then we proceed with a straightforward dissolution.
Given the length of the marriage and the asset structure, this should be relatively clean.
The complicating factor—" she paused "—is if she contests."
"She said she was calling her lawyer."
"Then she may contest." Carol picked up her pen.
"The emails are useful but not decisive on their own.
What would be decisive is documentation of the child's situation.
School records, the teacher's account, any medical records, photographs of the marks you described."
I thought about Ms.
Reeves.
"The teacher called me," I said.
"She has records of Zoe falling asleep in class.
Four times this month."
"Get a written statement if she's willing.
Teachers are credible witnesses." Carol looked at me steadily.
"I want to be honest with you.
If Diana's lawyer is aggressive, they will argue that you're using the child's situation to gain leverage in the divorce.
We need the documentation to be about Zoe's welfare first.
Not about your marriage."
"It is about Zoe's welfare."
"I know that.
We need it to be provable."
I checked my banking app while Carol made notes.
The joint account — a household account Diana had access to for groceries and utilities — had been accessed at seven fifty-eight that morning.
Forty minutes after I had told her to leave.
Three thousand, two hundred dollars.
Withdrawn at an ATM four blocks from the house.
I turned the phone to show Carol.
She looked at it.
Made another note.
"Anything else in that account?"
"About six hundred."
"She left you the six hundred." Carol's voice was dry.
"Considerate." She set down her pen.
"I'll file a motion to freeze joint assets today.
It won't recover what she took but it limits further exposure." She looked at me.
"Is she likely to come back to the house?"
"I told her she could come for her things when Zoe isn't there."
"Change the locks today.
Before she has a chance to return on her own timeline." Carol stood, signaling the meeting was moving toward its close.
"One more thing.
The folder.
You said it was in front of your daughter's medical records."
"Yes."
"She put it there," Carol said.
"In a place she knew you would eventually find it.
That's not careless.
That's deliberate."
I hadn't thought about that.
"Why would she want me to find it?"
May you like
Carol looked at me with the expression of someone who had sat across from a great many people in difficult situations.
"That," she said, "is the question worth answering before she does."
