Chapter 3 - THE CHILD CLAUDIA CALLED HER NIECE
Alejandro came to the hospital less than an hour later.
Rebecca did not let him into my room.
He argued with the nurse.
Then with hospital security.
Finally, Rebecca stepped into the corridor and informed him that all communication regarding the divorce would go through her.
I could hear his voice through the door.
“She’s medicated.”
“She retained counsel before surgery.”
“That doesn’t mean she understood what she was doing.”
Rebecca answered calmly.
“Then I’m sure you won’t object to a judge reviewing the circumstances under which you obtained her signature.”
Silence.
That was the first moment Alejandro understood that the papers he had been so proud to carry away might become evidence against him.
He left.
But not before sending me twelve text messages.
Most were suddenly compassionate.
You need rest.
We can talk when you’re stronger.
I never wanted to upset you before surgery.
Claudia and I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.
The last message was different.
PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT LUCIA.
I showed Rebecca.
She saved it.
Two days later, I was stable enough to walk slowly around my hospital room.
Sofia brought me my laptop.
Against my doctor’s advice, I started looking through old photographs.
Claudia’s supposed Seattle period.
Seven months.
Very few pictures.
Then I found one from Christmas nine years earlier.
Claudia was standing behind my dining table wearing an oversized sweater.
Her hand rested low on her stomach.
I had joked that she was hiding holiday weight.
She laughed.
Alejandro had stared at her.
At the time, I thought nothing of it.
Now the expression on his face made me sick.
Rebecca hired a licensed investigator.
Within twenty-four hours, we learned Lucia lived in Evanston.
With Claudia.
Not Claudia’s sister.
Not another relative.
Claudia.
School forms listed Claudia as mother.
Father section blank.
But emergency contact number number two belonged to Alejandro.
He had attended two school events under the name “Uncle Alex.”
One photograph from a school fundraiser showed him standing beside Lucia while Claudia smiled on the other side.
They looked like a family.
A family I had apparently financed.
Then the investigator found something stranger.
Lucia attended an expensive private school.
Annual tuition:
$34,000.
Claudia’s reported income could not comfortably cover it.
I knew exactly who could.
Rebecca traced payments.
The tuition was paid through Vance Strategic Holdings.
And Vance Strategic Holdings had received repeated transfers from an account funded largely through our household money.
My money.
I felt physically ill.
Then Sofia asked the obvious question.
“If Lucia is nine and the boy is one, how long has this affair actually lasted?”
I didn’t know.
Rebecca did not speculate.
Instead, she said:
“We follow documents.”
The documents led us to a townhouse in Lincoln Park.
Purchased five years earlier.
Owner:
Vance Strategic Holdings LLC.
Estimated value:
$1.4 million.
Resident:
Claudia Moreno.
I stared at the address.
I had been there.
Three years earlier, Claudia invited me to a Christmas cocktail party and claimed the townhouse belonged to her employer.
I had complimented the kitchen.
Alejandro had helped pour wine.
That night, I had stood inside a home my money may have purchased for his mistress.
Then Rebecca received another record.
The original down payment was $280,000.
Source:
May you like
A wire transfer from an account bearing my name.
Except I had never authorized it.
