Chapter 9: What Laura Knew
I showed the text to Patricia before I responded to it.
She read it twice, then set my phone on her desk and looked at me.
"You don't have to meet with her," she said.
"She's not a party to the divorce.
She has no legal standing here."
"I know," I said.
"But I want to hear what she has to say."
Patricia studied me for a moment.
"If you meet with her, do it in a public place.
Don't record it without her consent — laws vary and I don't want complications.
But you can take notes afterward, immediately, while it's fresh.
Everything she tells you, write it down."
"Do you think she'll say something useful?"
"I think a woman who texts the wife and says I'm not who you think I am is either trying to protect herself or she's genuinely trying to tell you something." Patricia paused.
"Either way, it's information."
We met at a coffee shop on a Tuesday morning.
Laura Voss was already there when I arrived, sitting at a corner table with both hands around a cup, and she looked younger in person than in her LinkedIn photo and considerably less composed.
She stood when she saw me.
"Thank you for coming."
I sat down across from her without saying anything.
She sat back down.
She looked at the table for a moment, then at me.
"I didn't know he was married," she said.
"Not at first."
I waited.
"He told me he was separated.
That the marriage had been over for two years but you were waiting until your daughter was older." She looked up.
"I know how that sounds.
I know it's the oldest story there is.
But I believed him."
"When did you find out the truth?" I said.
"February.
I found a photo on his phone.
Your daughter's birthday party.
The whole family.
He'd taken it himself." Her jaw tightened.
"He told me it was an old photo.
I almost believed that too.
But I looked at the cake.
It said eight.
Your daughter just turned eight, didn't she."
"In January," I said.
She nodded.
"I ended it in February.
I told him I was done.
He spent three weeks trying to convince me I'd misunderstood." She paused.
"The week he was supposedly at the conference — he wasn't there for the conference.
He came to see me.
I told him to leave.
He wouldn't.
I had to ask the hotel to escort him out."
I sat very still.
"He told you he was at a conference," she said.
"He told me he was ending his marriage.
Neither of us was getting the truth."
"Why are you telling me this?" I asked.
She reached into her bag and pulled out her phone.
She opened it and slid it across the table to me.
It was a screenshot of a text conversation.
Eric's number at the top.
The messages going back to February.
In one of them, Eric had written: *She has no access to the real accounts.
She doesn't even know they exist.*
I read it twice.
"Real accounts," I said.
"I don't know what that means," Laura said.
"But I thought you should."
I looked up at her.
She met my eyes.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"I know that doesn't fix anything."
I slid the phone back across the table.
"Can you send that screenshot to my attorney?" I said.
She already had Patricia's name written on a piece of paper in her bag.
She'd looked her up before we met.
"Yes," she said.
"I'll send everything I have."
I stood up.
My coffee was still untouched on the table.
"The real accounts," I said, almost to myself.
I walked out into the morning air and called Patricia before I reached my car.
May you like
"He has accounts I don't know about," I said.
"Tell me everything," Patricia said.
