Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN IN THE RED DRESS
Sloane called me two days later.
I did not answer.
She called again.
Then sent a message.
I DIDN’T KNOW HE WAS HITTING YOU.
I stared at it.
Part of me wanted to reply:
You were sitting there.
But that would have been emotionally satisfying and factually incomplete.
She saw the belt strike me that night.
She may not have known about previous incidents.
I gave the message to Rachel.
“Do I answer?”
“Do you want to?”
“No.”
“Then don’t.”
Simple.
I was learning how many problems had simple answers once Derek was removed from the center.
A temporary protective order restricted his contact with me pending a fuller hearing.
The court also entered temporary financial restraints preventing either of us from dissipating significant marital assets outside ordinary expenses while the divorce proceeded.
Those orders did not freeze his entire life.
He could pay employees.
Business expenses continued.
Mortgages were paid.
Ordinary transactions occurred.
What he could not do was suddenly transfer millions to a friend or empty investment accounts because divorce had begun.
Derek hired separate criminal and divorce attorneys.
Smart decision.
The criminal case concerned the assault.
The divorce concerned our marriage and property.
Different standards.
Different consequences.
I moved back into the house under the temporary order after Derek collected personal items accompanied by counsel-arranged supervision.
Walking through the living room alone felt stranger than leaving it.
The armchair where Sloane sat remained slightly angled toward the fireplace.
Her champagne glass was gone.
The stain beneath it remained.
I stood there longer than necessary.
Then I moved the chair.
Not symbolically.
It blocked the vacuum cleaner.
The next morning, forensic accountant Nathan Price met Rachel and me.
He was fifty-one, soft-spoken, and deeply unimpressed by wealthy people behaving as though accounting were optional.
He reviewed the records I provided.
Our financial structure was complicated.
Derek owned approximately sixty percent of Callahan Ridge Consulting, a cybersecurity and enterprise-risk firm he founded before our marriage but expanded dramatically during it.
I had no direct ownership in the original company.
That did not automatically mean I had no marital claim to any increase in value.
State law and tracing would determine that.
We also jointly owned Callahan Ridge Holdings, an investment LLC created four years into the marriage.
That company held two rental properties and minority investments.
I was a documented fifty-percent member.
That mattered.
Several transfers I found came from Holdings.
Nathan pointed at three.
$175,000.
$220,000.
$310,000.
All to Apex Meridian Strategies.
“What is it?”
I asked.
“Do you know?”
“No.”
Rachel did.
“Vendor to Derek’s operating company?”
“Maybe.”
Nathan shook his head.
“Payment source is Holdings, not Callahan Ridge Consulting.”
“Could Holdings legitimately invest in a vendor?”
“Yes.”
“Did we?”
He looked at me.
“That’s what we need to determine.”
Public records showed Apex Meridian Strategies had been created eighteen months earlier.
Registered agent: Sloane Avery.
My stomach turned.
“That’s hers.”
Nathan nodded.
“What does she do?”
“Brand strategy. Corporate events. Investor relations. Whatever Derek tells people she does.”
The affair began, as far as I could establish, around ten months earlier.
Apex predated it.
Or at least predated when I discovered it.
That was significant.
Payments to Sloane were not necessarily gifts.
She may have performed services.
We needed contracts.
Invoices.
Work product.
Tax records.
Corporate approvals.
Nathan refused to call it theft until the evidence supported that word.
I appreciated that even while wanting to scream.
Then he found another problem.
Callahan Ridge Holdings’ operating agreement required consent from both members for investments above $100,000 outside listed real-estate categories.
My signature appeared on three written consents.
I had never seen them.
One was electronic.
Two were scanned.
I stared at my name.
“That’s my signature.”
Rachel looked at me.
“Did you sign?”
“No.”
“Could it have been copied from another document?”
“Yes.”
Nathan said:
“Then we preserve the files and determine provenance.”
Not:
Derek forged it.
Not yet.
That restraint became important.
Because the first signature file metadata later showed something unexpected.
May you like
It had not been created on Derek’s computer.
It originated from Sloane’s laptop.
