Chapter 5 - The Silent Investigation
I didn't confront him that night,
or the next.
Instead,
I became a shadow in my own home,
watching and waiting.
I began to look through the bank statements,
the ones he thought I never checked.
I found the payments for the Hamptons house,
hidden under a corporate shell company.
I found the hotel bills,
the florist orders,
the dinners at restaurants I had never been to.
He was bleeding our life away,
penny by penny,
transferring the wealth he had built to a woman who hadn't earned it.
I went to his office one afternoon,
under the guise of bringing him lunch.
The receptionist smiled at me,
that pitying smile that people give to pregnant women.
"He's in a meeting,
Mrs. Mercer,"
she said.
"But you can wait in his office."
I sat in his leather chair,
surrounded by his awards and his books.
I opened his desk drawer,
looking for anything that might help me.
I found a folder,
thick with legal documents.
They were divorce papers,
already drafted,
waiting for his signature.
He was planning to leave me after the baby was born.
He was going to wait until the "Mercer Heir" arrived,
and then he was going to discard me like a piece of old furniture.
The cruelty of it was breathtaking.
He wanted the child,
he wanted the image of the perfect father,
but he didn't want the wife.
I read through the terms,
the measly settlement he was offering,
the custody arrangements that favored him.
He thought I was weak.
He thought I was too distracted by the pregnancy to notice.
I took pictures of every page with my own phone,
my hands steady and cold.
I heard voices in the hallway,
Grant laughing with a colleague.
I closed the drawer and sat back in the chair,
my heart a cold stone.
When he walked in,
he looked surprised to see me.
"Claire?
What are you doing here?"
"I missed you,"
I lied,
the words like ash in my mouth.
"I brought you the salad you like."
He looked at the bag on his desk,
then at me.
"Thank you,"
he said,
but he didn't move toward me.
"I'm really busy,
though."
"I know,"
I said,
standing up.
"I just wanted to see you."
I walked out of the office,
the weight of the secret nearly crushing me.
I wasn't just a wife anymore,
I was a strategist.
I was a woman at war,
and the enemy was sleeping in my bed.
I drove to a lawyer’s office across town,
someone who didn't move in Grant’s circles.
I told her everything.
I showed her the pictures.
"He's going to try to take the baby,"
I said,
my voice cracking for the first time.
"He won't,"
she promised,
her eyes sharp and fierce.
"Not if we get to him first."
The battle lines were drawn,
May you like
and for the first time in months,
I felt like I was in control.
