Chapter 5 - The Other Woman at My Door
Sabrina came to my parents’ house on a Wednesday.
She stood on the porch holding a grocery-store envelope and looking as if she hadn’t slept since the party.
My father wanted to send her away.
I almost let him.
Then she said, “I have messages you need to see.”
I stepped outside.
Theo waited in the backseat of her parked car with an older woman I assumed was his grandmother.
“He’s safe,” Sabrina said quickly. “My mom’s with him.”
“What do you want?”
“To tell you what I should have asked before I believed him.”
We sat on opposite ends of the porch bench.
Sabrina was thirty-two, a physical therapist, and less polished in daylight than she had looked beneath the ballroom chandeliers.
She didn’t offer the excuses I expected.
She offered dates.
When they met.
When Preston said we had separated.
When he claimed I had moved into another part of the house while lawyers worked out custody.
“He said Willa’s health made everything complicated,” she said.
Something hot rose behind my ribs.
“He used my daughter?”
“Yes.”
Sabrina swallowed.
“And I let that stop me from asking questions.”
She handed me printed messages.
Preston had described me as unstable, greedy, and unwilling to accept the end of our marriage.
He had also promised Sabrina that Saturday’s party would be a peaceful public introduction.
“She knows,” one message read. “We’re finally ready to move forward.”
Another came from Eleanor.
A son changes everything, darling.
I put that page down.
Sabrina’s eyes filled.
“I thought I was meeting his family. Then he took out the envelope.”
“You stayed beside him.”
“For a minute.”
“A long minute.”
“Yes.”
She didn’t argue.
That mattered, though it didn’t erase anything.
“What changed?” I asked.
“Willa.”
I looked away.
“She looked at your mother-in-law like she was waiting to be chosen,” Sabrina said. “And I realized I had never asked who paid for the life he was offering me.”
Inside the house, I could hear my mother opening cupboards.
Ordinary sounds.
I clung to them.
“Were you living in a condo he paid for?”
Sabrina nodded.
“He said it belonged to an investment company.”
“What company?”
She gave me the name.
I recognized it from one of the records Ben had asked about.
I took out my phone.
“With your permission, I’d like my attorney to speak with you.”
“You have it.”
“And don’t send me anything else directly. Send it to her.”
“Okay.”
Sabrina stood, then hesitated.
“Will you tell Willa that Theo didn’t understand?”
“I already have.”
Her shoulders folded.
“Thank you.”
“I’m doing that for them.”
“I know.”
Before she left, she opened the grocery-store envelope.
Inside was a small drawing.
A blue figure, a smaller green figure, and what appeared to be a fox.
“Theo said the girl at the party was crying. He wanted to make her something.”
I took it.
I did not forgive Sabrina on that porch.
Forgiveness was too large a word for what I could manage.
But I stopped thinking of her as a rival.
Preston had depended on us seeing each other that way.
That evening, Ben called Maya, who called me.
The company holding Sabrina’s condo had received payments from Hargrove Residential.
The stated purpose was maintenance consulting.
There were other payments too.
Not proof of every suspicion.
Enough to justify a closer examination.
Hargrove Residential operated several apartment buildings, including some with serious repair complaints.
I remembered Arthur’s pride in those properties.
He had believed working families deserved decent homes.
Preston had liked the photographs of ribbon cuttings.
Maya asked whether I knew anyone who had worked on the buildings recently.
One name came immediately.
Daniel Cho, a construction manager from my former firm.
We hadn’t spoken in years.
I sent him a brief message asking whether he would be willing to talk about publicly documented repair concerns.
May you like
He called within ten minutes.
“Audrey,” he said, “I wondered when somebody in that family would finally ask.”
