Chapter 6 - The Trap He Thought I Would Walk IntoMy first instinct was to go.
At midnight, Rebecca convinced Natalie to meet us the next morning at her office instead of coming to the house.
Dad stayed in the guest room.
I locked the bedroom door although Julian was not there.
At 2:03 a.m., I finally opened the makeup bag again.
The burgundy leather looked almost obscene under the bedside lamp.
I removed each item and placed it in a row.
Concealer.
Foundation.
Powder.
Blush.
Lipstick.
Tools for creating a face the world would accept.
Then I found something beneath the cardboard insert.
A small white pharmacy envelope.
Empty.
I turned it over.
A prescription label had been peeled away badly enough that part remained.
Patient name:
V. Mercer.
Medication:
Only three letters remained visible.
…pam.
I photographed it.
At 8:00 the next morning, Rebecca drove us downtown.
Natalie arrived twenty minutes late wearing sunglasses and no makeup.
She looked younger than I remembered.
Also terrified.
She sat across from me but could not maintain eye contact.
“I’m sorry.”
I felt nothing.
Not yet.
“How long?”
“Almost a year.”
Dad shifted beside me.
I held up one hand.
This conversation belonged to me.
“Did you know he was stealing from me?”
Her head snapped up.
“What?”
“Did you know about my trust?”
“No.”
“Did you receive ninety-six thousand dollars from an account funded partly by my money?”
Natalie’s mouth opened.
Then closed.
“He told me it was company money.”
“For what?”
She lowered her head.
“An apartment.”
My stomach twisted.
Julian had rented her an apartment.
“He said he was separating from you.”
“Did he?”
“He said you refused to accept it.”
I laughed softly.
“When was this supposed separation happening?”
“After you moved in with Vivian.”
There it was again.
The move.
Everything depended on the move.
Natalie wiped her palms on her skirt.
“He said your marriage had been over for years but you were financially dependent on him.”
Dad inhaled slowly.
I almost smiled at the absurdity.
“He told you I depended on him financially?”
“Yes.”
“He stole nearly a million dollars from me.”
Her face collapsed.
“I didn’t know.”
Rebecca leaned forward.
“Tell us about Plan B.”
Natalie looked toward the glass conference-room wall.
“Julian started acting strange around six months ago. More secretive. He would take calls outside. Sometimes Vivian called while we were together.”
“His mother knew about you?”
Natalie nodded.
Of course she did.
“Vivian didn’t like me,” Natalie said. “But she told Julian I was more suitable.”
Suitable.
The word sounded exactly like her.
“What else?”
“About two months ago, he asked me whether I knew anyone who could access medical records.”
Rebecca’s pen stopped.
“Why?”
“He said you had psychological problems and needed help.”
“What problems?”
“He said you had paranoid episodes. Memory problems. Mood swings.”
I felt sick.
Natalie continued.
“He said if you refused treatment, the family might have to intervene legally.”
Dad’s expression became stone.
“Did he mention guardianship?”
“Yes.”
Silence.
Rebecca asked, “Did Julian ever discuss Claire dying?”
Natalie’s face turned white.
“No.”
“Life insurance?”
“No.”
“Accidents?”
“No.”
Then she hesitated.
My skin prickled.
“What?”
“There was one thing.”
“Tell me.”
“A month ago we were at dinner. He’d been drinking.”
“What did he say?”
“He complained that you made everything difficult.”
I waited.
Natalie looked at me.
“He said, ‘Sometimes I think everyone would be better off if Claire just disappeared.’”
Dad stood so suddenly his chair rolled backward.
Rebecca touched his arm.
He walked to the window.
I sat completely still.
“Did he say anything else?”
Natalie nodded slowly.
“He said Vivian agreed.”
I looked down at my hands.
My wedding ring was gone.
I had removed it that morning.
A pale strip of skin remained where it had been for five years.
Rebecca asked about medications.
I showed Natalie the pharmacy envelope.
Her eyes widened.
“I’ve seen that.”
“Where?”
“Julian’s car.”
“When?”
“Last week.”
“Did you see the full label?”
“No.”
She looked at it again.
“But there were pills inside.”
“What kind?”
“Small white tablets.”
Dad turned from the window.
Rebecca asked the question none of us wanted.
“Did Julian ever give Claire medication without her knowledge?”
Natalie covered her mouth.
Then whispered, “Oh my God.”
“What?”
“He used to put something in your tea.”
The room stopped.
I stared at her.
“What?”
“I thought it was vitamins.”
My heart pounded.
Natalie began crying again.
“I swear. He said you hated taking supplements, so sometimes he dissolved them in your evening tea.”
I remembered.
Julian bringing tea upstairs.
Sleep well.
You look exhausted.
You’ve been so forgetful lately.
My stomach lurched.
“How often?”
“I don’t know.”
“You saw him?”
“Twice.”
“When?”
“Once in February. Once in March.”
Rebecca immediately called Detective Monroe.
The meeting changed from infidelity confession to criminal evidence.
By noon, investigators were requesting pharmacy records and medical evaluations.
The medication label fragment eventually led somewhere.
Diazepam.
Prescribed to Vivian Mercer.
Not me.
A sedative.
One capable of causing drowsiness, confusion, impaired coordination, and memory problems.
Exactly the symptoms Julian had been accusing me of developing.
Dad looked physically ill when the detective explained it.
I felt strangely calm.
Because suddenly, the past year made sense.
The afternoons when I could barely stay awake.
The mornings when Julian insisted we had conversations I could not remember.
The night I woke on the bathroom floor and he said I had fainted from stress.
Had I?
Or had he drugged me?
Evidence would determine that.
But the possibility alone tore away whatever remained of my old life.
That evening, police searched the house under warrant.
They found no medication in our kitchen.
Julian was not stupid.
But they found something else.
Inside the locked drawer of his home office sat a folder labeled:
C.M. CAPACITY
It contained notes.
Dates.
Descriptions.
“Claire forgot dinner reservation.”
“Claire appeared confused after tea.”
“Claire became emotionally volatile.”
“Claire refuses reasonable family support.”
Some entries were signed by Vivian.
Others by Julian.
At the bottom was a business card.
Dr. Samuel Hawthorne.
The psychiatrist whose practice had received thousands from Mercer Strategic Holdings.
Detective Monroe stared at the folder.
“This was deliberate.”
Rebecca nodded.
Dad said nothing.
I turned to the final page.
A proposed petition declaring me temporarily incapacitated.
It had not been filed.
Yet.
Attached was the unsigned power of attorney.
And a handwritten yellow sticky note.
Vivian’s handwriting.
I had seen it on birthday cards for years.
Three words:
After she moves.
My father came beside me.
“Claire.”
I handed him the note.
He read it.
Then closed his eyes.
Police bagged everything.
At 6:40 p.m., Detective Monroe received a call.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
She listened.
Then looked directly at me.
“Where is Julian?”
“I thought he was with you.”
“He was released pending further investigation on the assault charge.”
My chest tightened.
“Released when?”
“An hour ago.”
Dad immediately reached for his phone.
Monroe continued listening.
Then swore under her breath.
“What happened?”
She lowered the phone.
“The account connected to Mercer Strategic Holdings was accessed twenty-three minutes ago.”
Rebecca stood.
“How much?”
“Almost everything.”
“Transferred where?”
“They’re tracing it.”
I knew before anyone said it.
Julian was running.
Then my phone buzzed.
A message.
From Julian.
A photograph loaded.
My passport.
My mother’s necklace.
And the small metal lockbox I kept hidden in the back of our bedroom closet.
May you like
Below the image were six words.
You want your life back? Come alone.
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