Chapter 4 - THE PROMISE HE MADE BEFORE OUR WEDDING
“Seven years ago, Michael proposed to me three days after promising another woman they'd be together.”
Rebecca stared at the photograph in my hand.
“Claire, how did that get inside your necklace?”
“I don't know.”
I examined the pendant.
Michael had given it to me during a weekend in Portland.
He'd fastened it around my neck in a restaurant overlooking the river.
“I want you to have something that stays close to your heart,” he'd said.
At the time, I'd thought it was romantic.
Now I wondered whether he'd been laughing at me.
But there was something wrong with the photograph.
The paper looked newer than seven years old.
The print was glossy.
Its edges were sharp.
Someone had recently placed it inside the pendant.
“Maybe it's a copy,” Rebecca said.
I nodded.
But why?
And who had put it there?
The next morning, I made two decisions.
First, I would not return to Michael.
Second, I would stop letting other people decide which truths I was allowed to know.
Rebecca helped me arrange a consultation with a family-law attorney named Helen Price.
Helen was sixty-one, wore sensible shoes, and listened without interrupting.
When I finished describing the fire, the affair, and the insurance conversation, she placed her pen on the desk.
“Before we discuss divorce,” she said, “I need to ask something uncomfortable.”
“Go ahead.”
“Do you have money Michael cannot access?”
I hesitated.
We had joint checking and savings accounts.
Michael managed most of our investments.
My freelance bookkeeping income went into our household account.
“I have about eighteen hundred dollars in a separate account.”
Helen nodded.
“Keep it separate. Don't withdraw or transfer joint funds impulsively. We'll request financial disclosures through the proper process.”
She wrote something down.
“Do you own any part of Bennett Development Group?”
“No.”
“Are you certain?”
I almost answered yes.
Then I remembered the early years.
Before the luxury apartment.
Before the expensive dinners.
Michael had started his company from a rented office above a dry cleaner.
I'd been working full-time at an accounting firm.
He needed someone to keep the books.
I did it at night.
For free.
When the business nearly failed, I put thirty-eight thousand dollars from my mother's inheritance into it.
Michael said he'd repay me.
Later, he said he'd given me something better.
Ownership.
“There may be paperwork,” I told Helen.
“What kind?”
“Michael said he made me a minority partner.”
“Do you remember signing anything?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have copies?”
“No.”
Helen leaned back.
“Then that's where we start.”
I left her office feeling frightened.
But for the first time since the fire, the fear had a direction.
That afternoon, Rebecca drove me to the public library.
I needed access to an old email account I'd stopped using after Michael convinced me to share everything through our household system.
I recovered the account.
Hundreds of messages appeared.
Old work receipts.
Birthday photographs.
Emails from my mother.
I spent an hour looking through them.
Then I found one from six years earlier.
Subject: YOUR OWNERSHIP CERTIFICATE
It came from Bennett Development Group's former accountant, Arthur Bell.
The attachment was a scanned agreement.
I opened it.
My name appeared on the first page.
Claire Bennett.
Twenty-five percent ownership.
I sat very still.
I'd forgotten the exact percentage.
Michael always referred to it as a small interest.
A gesture of appreciation.
But twenty-five percent was not small.
Especially if the company had grown as much as he'd claimed.
I forwarded the file to Helen.
Then I searched for Arthur Bell.
He had retired to Olympia three years earlier.
His old business email no longer worked.
But the library's public directory listed a mailing address.
I wrote it down.
Rebecca looked over my shoulder.
“What are you thinking?”
“I'm thinking Michael never wanted me to understand what I owned.”
On our way home, my phone rang.
Sophie Lane.
Her name filled the screen.
I hadn't spoken to her since the night I'd seen Michael fastening that bracelet around her wrist at the Space Needle restaurant.
I answered.
“Claire?”
Her voice sounded smaller than I remembered.
“I heard you survived.”
“How disappointing for you.”
She inhaled sharply.
“I deserve that.”
“Yes.”
“I didn't call to fight.”
“Then why did you call?”
A long silence.
“Because Michael's been lying to both of us.”
I almost hung up.
Instead, I waited.
Sophie continued.
“He told me you knew about us.”
I laughed once.
A painful sound.
“He told you his wife knew he was having an affair?”
“He said you were separated. That you stayed married for financial reasons.”
“And you believed him?”
“At first.”
“What changed?”
She didn't answer immediately.
Then she said, “The fire.”
I looked at Rebecca.
Sophie lowered her voice.
“I wasn't supposed to be in that building, Claire.”
“What does that mean?”
“Michael told me to meet him at a hotel. But I went to the apartment because I wanted him to tell you the truth.”
My grip tightened.
“You were inside our apartment?”
“Yes.”
“While I was showering?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
I remembered hearing voices before entering the bathroom.
I'd assumed Michael was on a business call.
“What happened?”
“We argued. He told me to leave. Then he went into his office, and I heard something crash.”
“Did you smell smoke?”
“Not yet.”
“What did you see?”
She hesitated.
“A metal box beside his desk. He was putting papers inside it.”
“What papers?”
“I don't know.”
“Then what?”
“He grabbed my wrist and pulled me toward the service elevator. I told him you were still upstairs.”
My heart began pounding.
“What did he say?”
Sophie's voice broke.
“He said, 'Claire knows how to take care of herself.'”
I covered my mouth.
For a moment, I couldn't speak.
Then I asked the question that had haunted me since the fire.
“Did Michael know the apartment was burning before he took you downstairs?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca gripped the steering wheel.
“And you left anyway?”
Sophie began crying.
“He told me he'd called for help. He said someone was coming for you.”
“Did you believe him?”
“I wanted to.”
I stared through the windshield.
Rain blurred the highway.
“Why are you telling me this now?”
“Because he lied about something else.”
“What?”
“October thirty-first.”
I looked down at the photograph.
“What happens then?”
Sophie inhaled unsteadily.
“Michael told me we'd leave Seattle together after the insurance money arrived.”
The words settled slowly.
“And?”
“He promised me half.”
I closed my eyes.
Then Sophie whispered the sentence that changed everything.
“Claire, the insurance policy isn't on the apartment.”
I sat upright.
May you like
“What?”
“It's on you.”
