Chapter 3 - THE MONEY LILY NEVER KNEW ABOUT
We returned downstairs.
David did not ask for his lawyer again.
Not immediately.
Something in him had collapsed upstairs.
Agent Cole reopened the folder.
He explained what I had discovered three days after Lily’s funeral.
I had gone through our accounts because I intended to file for divorce.
At first, I was searching for evidence of the affair.
Hotels.
Restaurants.
Flights.
Gifts.
Instead, I found transfers from an account I had not checked in nearly a year.
Lily’s trust.
David had volunteered to manage its administrative paperwork.
He had always told me everything was fine.
It wasn’t.
The first missing amount had been thirty thousand dollars.
Then seventy-five thousand.
Then two hundred thousand.
Small transfers had become large ones.
The money flowed through consulting companies, holding companies, and investment accounts.
Eventually, some of it reached JH Performance Holdings.
Julianne’s company.
She stared at the documents.
“I never created this.”
Cole looked at her.
“Your signature appears on the articles of organization.”
“I signed papers David gave me.”
“What did he tell you they were?”
Julianne’s eyes filled with tears.
“Business documents.”
David looked at her sharply.
“Stop talking.”
She turned on him.
“You told me you were starting a wellness company for me.”
“Julianne.”
“You told me it was my birthday present.”
Agent Cole calmly asked, “Did you receive money?”
She hesitated.
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
Cole slid a sheet toward her.
“Approximately four hundred and eighty thousand dollars.”
Her face drained of color.
“I didn’t know.”
David stood suddenly.
One trooper immediately grabbed his arm.
“This interrogation is over.”
Cole remained seated.
“It isn’t an interrogation.”
He closed the folder.
“You are free to stop speaking.”
David’s eyes found mine.
“You went through my accounts?”
“Our accounts.”
“You reported me?”
“I reported what you did.”
His grief disappeared beneath anger.
For one familiar second, I saw my husband again.
The man who believed every consequence was an attack.
“You could have come to me.”
I stared at him.
“I called you fifty times.”
He had no answer.
Cole stood.
“We need to leave.”
As the troopers moved toward David, Julianne stepped backward.
“Am I being arrested?”
“Not tonight.”
Her relief lasted less than a second.
Cole continued.
“But you are now a material witness in a federal investigation.”
David stared at her.
“Don’t cooperate.”
Julianne looked at him differently now.
Fourteen days on a yacht had made her feel chosen.
Fourteen minutes inside our empty mansion had shown her what she had actually been.
Useful.
David was led toward the door.
Just before crossing the threshold, he looked at Lily’s photograph.
Then he looked at me.
“When is the funeral?”
I felt something sharp twist inside my chest.
“You missed it.”
His face went still.
“What?”
“We buried her twelve days ago.”
The trooper opened the door.
Chicago rain blew inside.
David whispered, “You buried my daughter without me?”
I answered quietly.
“You abandoned her before I did.”
May you like
And then they took him away.
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