Chapter 5: What Grace Already Knew
Grace Alderman's guest room had a window that faced east.
Sarah noticed that first thing — that in the morning, the light would come in early and warm, and that whoever had chosen this room had wanted the person sleeping in it to wake up to something gentle.
Ethan was asleep on the narrow daybed by ten o'clock.
He had eaten two bowls of soup, said almost nothing, and gone under like a person who had been holding themselves upright for days on will alone.
Sarah sat at Grace's kitchen table with both hands around a mug of tea she wasn't drinking.
Grace sat across from her.
She was sixty-one, small, with reading glasses pushed up into silver hair.
She had been Sarah's attorney for eleven months and Sarah's friend for longer than that, though they had never spoken about the friendship directly.
"The officer called me," Grace said.
"An hour before you arrived."
"I know.
I asked her to."
"She said the documents are in evidence."
"The copies are in your filing cabinet," Sarah said.
"Third drawer.
The folder marked household."
Grace nodded.
She had already checked.
"The property transfer," Grace said.
"Walk me through what you know."
Sarah set down the mug.
"He signed the house to Carla Voss fourteen months ago.
The signature on my line is not mine.
I've had a handwriting analyst look at it.
Her report is in the folder too."
Grace was quiet for a moment.
"He forged your signature on a property transfer."
"Yes."
"And the house is currently in Carla Voss's name."
"Legally, yes.
Which means when I go back for our belongings, I am technically entering property that does not belong to me."
"We'll address that Monday morning," Grace said.
"I'll file for an emergency injunction.
The forged signature alone is enough to begin unwinding the transfer, but it will take time."
"How much time?"
"Months.
Possibly longer if he contests it." Grace paused.
"He will contest it."
"I know."
"Sarah." Grace leaned forward slightly.
"He locked you in a wall for three days.
That is not a man who is going to accept consequences quietly."
"I know that too."
"Then you understand that tonight was not the end of this."
"It was the end of the part where I was afraid," Sarah said.
"The rest of it I can manage."
Grace looked at her for a moment.
"How long have you not been afraid?"
Sarah thought about it.
"Since I packed the bag."
Outside, the street was quiet.
A dog barked once, two houses down, and then stopped.
Grace picked up a legal pad from the counter and sat back down.
"Tell me about the recorded calls."
"Three of them.
The clearest one is from eight days ago.
He tells Carla that once I'm out of the picture, the house transfer finalizes and he'll have full custody of Ethan within six months.
He uses the phrase out of the picture twice."
Grace wrote something down.
"Did he know he was being recorded?"
"No."
"Where was the recorder?"
"In the kitchen.
He thought I was at the school pickup.
I came home early."
"And you said nothing to him that day."
"Nothing," Sarah said.
"I made dinner.
I helped Ethan with his homework.
I went to bed."
Grace set the pen down.
"That must have been very hard."
"It was the easiest night I'd had in months," Sarah said.
"Because I finally knew exactly what I was dealing with."
Grace looked at the legal pad.
Then she looked at Sarah.
"The custody piece worries me most," she said.
"Even with the property fraud and the unlawful confinement — and those are serious — a custody battle with Richard Langford will be expensive and long.
He has resources."
"I know."
"Do you have somewhere to stay that isn't connected to him?
For Ethan's stability, the court will want to see—"
"I have this room for as long as I need it," Sarah said.
"You offered it fourteen months ago and I never forgot."
Grace was quiet.
"You remembered that," she said.
"I remember everything you've told me," Sarah said.
"You're the only person I've been completely honest with for over a year."
Grace picked up her pen again.
But she didn't write anything.
"The recordings," she said finally.
"Out of the picture.
What did you think he meant by that?"
Sarah looked at the mug.
The tea had gone cold.
"I think he meant leaving," she said.
"Leaving voluntarily.
Being pressured out.
Being made to feel so small and so frightened that I would go on my own and leave Ethan behind."
"And if that hadn't worked?"
Sarah didn't answer immediately.
"He locked me in a wall, Grace," she said.
"With no phone.
No food.
No way out."
Grace nodded slowly.
"Then we make sure," Grace said, "that the court understands exactly what kind of man is asking for custody of that boy."
Upstairs, Ethan shifted in his sleep.
The daybed creaked once.
May you like
Both women looked toward the ceiling.
Then Grace uncapped her pen and began to write in earnest, and Sarah finally lifted the cold mug and drank.
