My husband believed that being pregnant, raising two children, having no job, and depending on him financially meant I would never have the courage to leave.

Rachel Harlow's office was on the fourth floor of a building that smelled like carpet cleaner and old coffee.

It was not glamorous.

The chairs in the waiting room were the kind that had been reupholstered once too many times.

A small fish tank in the corner had three fish and a plastic castle.

Amelia pressed her nose against the glass and announced that the smallest fish was called Gerald.

Lucas sat beside me and read a magazine about tractors with the focused seriousness of a person who had decided that tractors were important and that was that.

Rachel came out herself to get us.

She was in her mid-fifties, with short grey hair and reading glasses pushed up on her head.

She shook my hand, then crouched down to Lucas's level.

"You must be Lucas."

"Yes," he said.

"That fish is called Gerald."

"He's been called Gerald for two years," Rachel said.

"He seems to like it." She stood and looked at me.

"Evelyn's already inside.

She insisted on coming."

"I know.

I didn't try to stop her."

Rachel smiled.

"Smart woman."

The meeting room had a long table and a whiteboard with nothing written on it.

Evelyn was seated at the far end with a cup of tea she hadn't touched.

She had brought a folder.

I hadn't known about the folder.

Rachel set a thick file on the table and opened it.

"I want to walk you through what David Fenwick brought to us," she said, "because I want you to understand the full picture before we talk about what it means for the petition."

"All right."

"Over the past twenty-two months, Brandon made a series of transfers from the joint household account and from two business accounts to which you were listed as a co-signatory." She turned a page.

"The transfers were structured to stay below the threshold that would trigger automatic review.

Small enough individually.

Significant in total."

"How significant?"

Rachel looked at me steadily.

"Two hundred and forty thousand dollars."

Evelyn set her teacup down.

"He was moving it to a private account," Rachel continued.

"One you had no access to and no knowledge of.

The account was opened eighteen months ago.

The named beneficiary, in the event of Brandon's death, is Cynthia Vance."

The room was quiet for a moment.

"He was planning this for eighteen months," I said.

"At minimum.

David believes the relationship with Cynthia began closer to two years ago.

The account timing supports that."

"And David came to you because—"

"Because Brandon asked him to process a transfer last month that David felt crossed a line he wasn't willing to cross.

A transfer of the remaining balance in the children's education fund." Rachel's voice didn't change.

"Forty-seven thousand dollars.

Brandon told David it was being reinvested.

David checked.

It wasn't."

Evelyn made a sound that was not quite a word.

I looked at the whiteboard.

Blank.

Clean.

I thought about Lucas packing his sister's bag without being asked.

I thought about Amelia naming a fish Gerald.

"What does this mean for the petition?" I asked.

"It means we go after the full two hundred and forty thousand in addition to standard asset division.

It means we have documented evidence of financial deception during the marriage, which affects how the court views Brandon's credibility on every other matter." Rachel folded her hands on the table.

"It also means that if Brandon attempts to claim you were financially irresponsible or unstable during these proceedings, we have a forensic accountant prepared to explain, in precise detail, exactly where the money went and who moved it."

I nodded slowly.

"There's one more thing," Rachel said.

She turned to the last page of the file and slid it across the table toward me.

It was a photograph.

Printed from what looked like a security camera feed.

Brandon and a man I didn't recognize, standing outside a building I didn't recognize, shaking hands.

"The man on the right," Rachel said, "is a property developer named Garrison Cole.

Three weeks ago, Brandon signed a preliminary agreement to sell the family home."

My hands went flat on the table.

"He can't do that without my signature."

"No," Rachel said.

"He cannot.

Which is why the agreement is preliminary and why Garrison Cole is currently unaware that the property has two legal owners." She paused.

"He was going to present you with the sale as a fait accompli after the baby was born.

His plan, as best as David can reconstruct it, was to have you out of the house, the sale completed, and the assets moved before you had time to retain counsel."

I looked at the photograph for a long moment.

"He thought I wouldn't have counsel already," I said.

"Yes."

"He thought I'd wait until after the baby."

"Yes."

I slid the photograph back across the table.

"What do we do about Garrison Cole?"