Chapter 7: What He Thought He Had on Me
Claudia came to my mother's house the next morning with a leather portfolio and two cups of coffee from the place on Miracle Mile.
She set one in front of me and opened the portfolio without sitting down first.
"Tell me everything about your finances from the last eleven years.
Joint accounts, personal accounts, any transfers you made, any documents you signed without reading fully.
I need to know before his attorney does."
We sat at my mother's kitchen table for two hours.
I told her everything I could remember.
The joint investment account Richard managed.
The home equity line I had co-signed in 2019.
The business expenses I had occasionally transferred money to cover when he said his account was temporarily tied up.
Claudia wrote it all down.
Asked questions.
Circled three items.
"These transfers," she said, pointing to a number I had given her.
"You moved money from your personal account into a holding account he controlled.
Do you remember what he told you they were for?"
"He said they were for a property investment.
A small commercial space in Doral.
He said it was going to be a rental income stream for our retirement."
"Did you ever see the property?"
I stopped.
"He showed me photos."
"Did you ever visit it?"
The coffee cup was warm in my hands.
"No.
He said it was being renovated.
He said it wasn't worth the drive until it was finished."
Claudia set her pen down.
"Maya, there is no property in Doral.
I checked the county records this morning.
That address doesn't exist."
The kitchen was very quiet.
"He took money from me too," I said.
"It appears so.
Which means you're not just a witness in this case.
You're also a victim." She picked her pen back up.
"Which is actually better for you legally, but I want you to hear it clearly so you're not surprised when it comes up."
I wasn't surprised.
I was something past surprise by then.
I was in that flat, clear place where things simply become true and you accept them one at a time.
"What was he going to use against me?" I asked.
"My guess?
He was going to suggest you knew about the transfers.
That you were complicit.
It's a common tactic — if I'm going down, I'll make it complicated enough that you don't want to push." Claudia closed the portfolio.
"It won't work.
The paper trail shows you as the originating account.
There's no evidence you knew where the money was going."
"Because I didn't."
"I know." She looked at me steadily.
"But Richard was counting on the fact that you'd be too afraid of the implication to keep pushing.
He's done this before, Maya.
Not just with your mother.
Not just with the other eleven women.
This is a pattern.
People like this always have a pattern."
I thought about the way he had set his fork down on the plate.
Slowly.
Like a quiet threat.
The way he had said: *I'm your husband.* As if that settled everything.
As if that closed every door.
"He thought I would back down," I said.
"Yes."
"He's known me for eleven years and he still thought I would back down."
Claudia almost smiled.
"People like Richard never really see the people around them.
They see obstacles and tools.
You were a tool that was becoming an obstacle."
My mother came in from the garden then, her hands dirty from the pots, a smear of soil on her cardigan sleeve.
She looked at our faces and read them the way only mothers can.
"He tried to scare you," she said.
It wasn't a question.
"He tried," I said.
She went to the sink and washed her hands.
Dried them on the dish towel hanging from the oven handle.
Then she turned around.
"He tried to scare me too," she said.
"Eight years ago, when I started asking questions about the dissolving timeline.
He came to the house.
Sat right there where you're sitting." She nodded at Claudia's chair.
"He told me that if I said anything to anyone, the forty thousand dollars would be considered income fraud and I would be the one in trouble."
Claudia's pen stopped moving.
"He said that to you directly?"
"Clear as anything."
"Do you remember the date?"
"March.
2019.
Three years after the implant.
I had called the number on the paperwork and it was disconnected.
I told Richard and he came over the next day." She paused.
"I wrote it in my calendar.
I still have the calendar."
Claudia looked at me.
I looked at her.
"Teresa," Claudia said carefully, "would you be willing to speak with the federal agents directly?"
My mother pulled out the chair and sat down.
"I've been waiting eight years to speak to somebody," she said.
"Tell me when and where."
That afternoon, Agent Flores called back.
She had news.
Three of the twelve women on the list had already been located and were being referred for imaging.
Two others had been trying to report unexplained abdominal pain to their doctors for years and had been told it was age-related.
One woman, seventy-four years old, had been hospitalized twice.
I sat on the edge of my mother's bed and listened to Agent Flores read the updates and I thought about twelve kitchen tables.
Twelve envelopes.
Twelve women who had been desperate enough to say yes to a man with a smooth voice and a solution.
"He'll cooperate now," Agent Flores said.
"His attorney contacted us this afternoon.
He wants to negotiate."
"What does he want in exchange?"
"Reduced charges.
He's offering to provide the full Veridian client list and the offshore account routing codes."
"The codes that are stored in the capsules."
"Correct.
He's arguing the capsules are the only complete record."
"They're inside people's bodies."
"Yes." Her voice was flat.
"His attorney is framing it as him facilitating the medical recovery process."
I closed my eyes.
"He put the data inside twelve elderly women and now he wants credit for helping get it out."
"That is, unfortunately, an accurate summary of his position."
I opened my eyes.
On the nightstand was my mother's Bible, the cover worn soft with years of handling.
The place where she had kept that folded document for eight years.
The place she had put the thing that felt wrong because she had nowhere else to put it and no one she trusted enough to tell.
"Make sure the women come first," I said.
"Whatever deal he gets, make sure every single one of those women is referred for medical care before he gets anything."
"That's already our position," Agent Flores said.
"Make it a condition.
In writing."
A pause.
"I'll make sure it's explicit."
After I hung up I sat quietly for a moment.
Then I picked up the Bible and held it in both hands.
May you like
It was heavier than it looked.
Or maybe I was just noticing the weight of it for the first time.
