Chapter 5: No Contact Saved
I put the phone back exactly where it had been.
I walked to the sink and turned the tap on.
Stood there with the water running over my hands, cold then warm, until I heard the back door open.
"You all right?" Daniel said.
"Just washing up."
He came in, picked up his phone, slid it into his pocket.
"Lily's light is still on.
She said she's reading."
"I'll go up in a bit."
He nodded.
He poured himself a glass of water.
He stood at the counter drinking it, and I stood at the sink, and the kitchen was completely ordinary.
*She knows something.
I need more time.*
I went upstairs.
I sat on the edge of Lily's bed and we talked about her book for ten minutes — a story about a girl who discovers her family isn't who she thought they were.
Lily said she liked it because the main character didn't fall apart.
She just kept going.
"I like that too," I said.
I kissed her forehead and turned off her lamp.
In the hallway, I stood very still for a moment.
Then I went to the bathroom, locked the door, sat on the edge of the tub, and called Carol.
"He's been texting someone with no name saved," I said quietly.
"Last night, after our argument.
He said — he told them — 'She knows something.
I need more time.'"
Carol exhaled.
"More time for what?"
"I don't know."
"Do you think it's another woman?"
"I don't know what it is.
But he said *she knows something*.
Not *she's upset*.
Not *we had a fight*.
Something."
"That's not the language of an affair," Carol said slowly.
"That's the language of someone managing a situation."
I had thought the same thing.
I hadn't wanted to.
"What do you know about his finances?" she asked.
"We have a joint account.
I see the statements."
"Any accounts you don't see?"
I thought about it.
"He handles the savings.
Has done for years.
I never questioned it."
"Can you get access?"
"I'd have to ask him."
"Don't ask him," Carol said.
"Go to the bank yourself.
You're on the mortgage.
You have a right to know what's in every account attached to this household."
I sat with that.
"Carol.
What if I'm wrong?"
"Then you're wrong and you'll know that too." Her voice was careful and steady.
"But Lily is fifteen and she has something on a scan and her father taught her that her pain was an inconvenience.
You are not wrong to look."
The next morning, I went to the bank during my lunch break.
The woman at the desk was patient and thorough.
She pulled up the accounts attached to my name and Daniel's name together.
There were three.
I knew about two.
The third had been opened eighteen months ago.
It was in both our names — which meant I had legal access, which meant Daniel had not expected me to look, or had not thought I would.
The balance was not large.
But the transaction history was.
Over the past fourteen months, money had been moved out of our joint savings in small amounts — never more than four hundred at a time — and deposited into this account.
From this account, it had been transferred out again.
To where, the bank clerk couldn't tell me from her screen.
"How much in total?" I asked.
She looked at the screen.
"From the joint savings into this account, across fourteen months?" She paused.
"Just over nineteen thousand pounds."
I kept my hands flat on the counter.
"Is there anything else I can help you with today?" she asked.
"No," I said.
"Thank you."
I sat in my car for a long time.
Nineteen thousand.
Moved slowly, carefully, in amounts small enough not to trigger a conversation.
Over more than a year.
My daughter had been in pain for months.
The heating pad.
The half-eaten meals.
The slow mornings.
And her father had been moving money out of this family for longer than that.
I called Carol from the car park.
"You need a solicitor," she said before I'd finished speaking.
"Not tomorrow.
Today."
"I don't even know what I'm dealing with yet."
"You know enough." She paused.
"And so does he.
That message last night — *I need more time* — he's not panicking about your marriage, sweetheart.
He's buying time for something else."
I stared through the windscreen at the grey afternoon.
"Who is he texting?" I said.
Not to Carol.
Mostly to myself.
But Carol answered anyway.
May you like
"Someone who knows what he's done," she said.
"And that's the part that should worry you most."
