Chapter 3: The Woman Who Had Been Watching
Megan read the message twice.
Her thumb hovered over the screen.
She looked up slowly, scanning the faces around her — the woman who had helped her stand, the man near the escalator still watching Grant, the small cluster of shoppers who hadn't moved on yet.
Her phone buzzed again.
*Blue coat.
Near the fountain.
Don't look directly.*
Megan didn't look directly.
She turned toward Grant instead.
"The security office," she said.
"We're going there now."
Grant's jaw tightened.
"I'm not going anywhere with you."
"Then stay here and explain the engagement ring to everyone watching."
He went.
The security office was a small room behind the food court — two chairs, a desk, a wall-mounted camera feed showing the mall entrance.
The officer, a heavyset man named Delgado according to his badge, closed the door and looked between them.
"Do either of you want to file a report?"
"Yes," Megan said.
"No," Grant said at the same time.
Delgado looked at Megan.
"Ma'am, you took a fall.
Are you injured?"
"I'm fine." She wasn't, not entirely — her left palm was scraped and her shoulder ached — but that wasn't why she was here.
"He pushed me.
In front of at least thirty people."
Grant leaned forward.
"She grabbed at me first.
I was defending myself."
"I reached for my mother's bracelet."
"Which you have no proof belongs to you."
Megan looked at him.
Eleven years of marriage.
He was sitting two feet away from her and speaking like she was a stranger contesting a parking space.
"I have photographs," she said.
"My mother wearing it at my wedding.
At my daughter's christening.
At Christmas, every year for as long as I can remember."
Grant said nothing.
Delgado wrote something down.
"Sir, I have you on camera making physical contact with this woman.
That's going to be part of the incident report regardless."
Grant's posture shifted.
Not much.
Just enough.
"Fine," he said.
"Write whatever you want."
Megan's phone buzzed a third time.
*He filed for divorce six weeks ago.
The papers are already drawn.
He was waiting to serve you after he emptied the joint account.
Check your banking app.
Right now.*
Her hand was steady when she opened it.
She didn't know how.
The joint account showed a balance of $214.
Three weeks ago it had held over $40,000.
She set the phone face-down on her knee and breathed through her nose.
"Where did the money go, Grant?"
He looked at the wall.
"Grant.
Forty thousand dollars.
Where did it go?"
"That's a marital asset conversation for our attorneys."
"We don't have attorneys.
We don't have a divorce filing.
We don't have a separation agreement." She paused.
"Do we?"
The silence was its own answer.
Delgado stopped writing.
Megan stood.
Her legs were steadier than she expected.
"I need to make a phone call."
She stepped into the corridor outside the security office and dialed the number that had been texting her.
It rang once.
"I'm glad you called," a woman's voice said.
"My name is Diane.
I used to be Grant's paralegal."
Megan leaned against the wall.
"Used to be?"
"He fired me eight weeks ago.
The day after I told him I wasn't comfortable with what he was asking me to do." A pause.
"I've been building a file ever since."
Down the corridor, through the small window in the security office door, Megan could see Grant on his phone.
His free hand was pressed flat on the desk.
He was talking fast.
"What's in the file?" Megan asked.
"Enough," Diane said.
"But I need you to keep him in that building for another twenty minutes."
May you like
"Why?"
"Because my attorney is parking right now."
