“Address?”
“I don’t remember. I can find the listing she sent me.”
“Did you transfer the money to account ending 8814?”
A beat.
“Yes.”
I wrote it down.
Adrian’s tone shifted. Less defensive now. More unsettled.
“What are you telling me?”
“I’m telling you she slept in our bed last night.”
He went silent.
“I’m telling you we had dinner reservations two weeks ago for my birthday. I’m telling you we filed taxes jointly this year. I’m telling you there has been no separation agreement, no discussion of open marriage, no separate bedroom, and until tonight no statement from either of us that our marriage was ending.”
“Tonight?”
“She just left to go clubbing with her ex-boyfriend.”
Adrian swore quietly.
The sound did not make me feel better.
“Daniel?” he asked.
That stopped me.
“You know Daniel?”
“She mentioned him.”
“How?”
“College ex. Someone who keeps trying to reconnect. She said he was annoying.”
“She’s meeting him tonight.”
Another silence.
Then Adrian said, “I need to call her.”
“No.”
The word came out sharper than I intended.
He bristled. “You don’t get to tell me—”
“I’m not telling you what to do. I’m asking you to give me twenty minutes before you contact her.”
“Why?”
“Because if you call right now, she’ll know we spoke, and every record I can still lawfully preserve may disappear before I understand what happened to our joint money.”
That argument reached him.
He exhaled.
“Twenty minutes.”
“Thank you.”
Before hanging up, I asked one more question.
“Adrian, did she leave anything at your place?”
He laughed once without humor.
“Enough that I stopped thinking she planned to stay married.”
I looked at the envelope on the table.
“What kind of things?”
“Clothes. Toiletries. A spare laptop charger. A framed photograph of her mother. A set of keys she said was for the apartment.”
The keys caught my attention.
“What keys?”
“I don’t know. Two brass keys on a blue tag.”
“Did the tag say anything?”
“Number 316.”
I wrote it down.
“Anything else?”
“A folder. I never opened it.”
“What kind of folder?”
“Bank documents, maybe. Her name is on the tab.”
I stared at the transfer history again.
“Please don’t destroy anything.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”