He gave me the payment information and the number David used.
I asked Marcus to continue sending normal reports so David would not realize we had spoken. Then I arranged for him to meet my attorney.
I drove home without confronting my husband.
During dinner, David casually asked whether I had reconsidered selling the cabin.
“I’m not selling it,” I said.
He studied me for a moment.
“You seem unusually quiet.”
“I’m tired.”
The following morning, after David left for the hospital, I reviewed our bank statements.
Every Friday, he had withdrawn three or four hundred dollars in cash.
The payments were small enough to avoid attention but regular enough to be a salary.
Then I unlocked his office using a spare key I found in the kitchen drawer.
Inside his desk, I discovered a notebook filled with reports about me.
Some entries described places I had actually visited.
Others were complete inventions.
One claimed I had purchased two bottles of wine and appeared unsteady outside the store.
I had gone directly home that day.
Marcus had refused to provide the evidence David wanted, so David had begun creating it himself.
The folder also contained photographs of me at stores, pharmacies, and traffic lights.
