Chapter 3

I got home.

I pushed the door open, and the smell of cooking came to me.

On any other day, that smell would have meant I was happy.

That day, it only felt like a joke at my expense.

Alex and Lily were leaning against each other on the living room couch, watching television.

The coffee table was covered with snacks and fruit.

"Jane, you're back?" Lily barely lifted her eyes, and the greeting came out lazy. "Is dinner ready? I'm starving."

Alex glanced at me once and frowned a little. "Why are you so late? More overtime today?

"How much is that company paying you, for you to work yourself to death for them?"

There was distaste and impatience in his voice.

In the past, I would have put on a smile, apologized, and gone straight into the kitchen.

But that day I didn't.

I stood in the entryway and didn't move.

I only looked at them, and there was nothing warm in them.

The two of them sat there in perfect comfort on money I had bled for.

Alex noticed that something about me had changed.

He finally sat up straight on the couch. "What are you staring at me for? Have you gone mute? Go make dinner."

I said nothing.

I changed my shoes, walked right past them, and went toward our bedroom.

"Hey, what's wrong with you?" Lily was offended, and she shouted at my back. "Are you deaf? My brother told you to make dinner."

Alex stood up as well, and his voice turned ugly. "Jane, what has gotten into you today?"

I didn't turn around.

I walked into the bedroom, shut the door hard behind me, and locked it.

The world finally went quiet.

Alex and Lily were swearing on the other side of the door, and I let all of it go past me.

My mind was moving fast.

The copies Michael had given me were in my bag.

That was the most direct evidence I had.

But it wasn't enough.

I had to find that bank card.

I needed to know how much of the seven million was left.

I also needed to know where the rest of it had gone.

Alex had always been a suspicious man.

He would never leave anything important out where it could be seen.

There was only one place in the apartment where he would hide it.

It was the study.

That room was off limits, and even our son wasn't allowed inside it.

I walked up to the study door and found it locked.

I laughed under my breath.

I took the thinnest pin out of my jewelry box.

I had learned to pick a lock from a locksmith years earlier, back when I was young, and it was only a game.

I had never expected it to be useful.

A few minutes later, the lock clicked, and the door opened.

The study was very neat.

There was a huge mahogany bookcase along one wall and a computer desk beside it.

I didn't hesitate, and I went straight to the desk.

Whatever Alex was hiding had to be in there.

I pulled the drawers open.

I went through them one at a time.

There were files, contracts, and odds and ends.

There was nothing.

There was nothing in any of them.

I frowned.

That wasn't possible.

He had hidden it somewhere.

My eyes went to the bottom drawer of the desk.

That one had a small lock of its own.

The pin opened it just as easily.

Inside the drawer, there was only a small velvet box.

I opened it.

It didn't hold the bank card I had expected.

It held a key with an unusual shape.

A bank logo and a string of numbers were cut into the metal.

It was the key to a safe deposit box.

I recognized it at once.

So he had put everything into a box at the bank.

He had been careful about it.

I closed my hand around the key.

Under the box, I found a few receipts.

They were recent.

One was from a jewelry store, for a diamond necklace that cost 100 thousand dollars.

The other was from a high-end car dealership.

It was for a red Porsche, paid in full, 600 thousand dollars.

The name on the delivery paperwork was Lily's.

Something twisted in my chest again.

That was wonderful.

That was truly wonderful.

I had scraped by for years and wouldn't spend 300 dollars on a dress.

He had used my money to buy his sister a 100 thousand dollar necklace and a 600 thousand dollar sports car.

And the woman the money belonged to still took the bus to work.

I put the key and the receipts into my bag.

Then I put the drawer back the way it had been and locked it.

I walked out of the study and locked that door as well.

It looked as though I had never been inside.

As soon as I came back into the living room, Alex was standing there with a look like thunder.

Lily was next to him, feeding the fire. "Alex, look at her. She doesn't want to wait on us anymore. She acts like that job makes her somebody. Everybody works."

The look got worse when he saw me. "Jane, what were you doing shut in the bedroom? Are you making dinner or not?"

I looked at him with cold eyes. "If you're hungry, order takeout. Or let your precious sister cook. She sits at home all day, doesn't she?"

The air in the living room froze.

Alex and Lily both stared at me as though I had come off a spaceship.

They couldn't believe those words had come out of the woman who had always taken whatever they gave her.

"What did you just say?" Alex was angry enough that his lips were shaking. "Jane, have you lost your mind?"

He raised his hand as though he meant to hit me.

I didn't move away.

I only looked at him quietly.

The cold in my eyes was so unfamiliar to him that his hand stopped in the air.

He had never seen me look like that.

Right then, somebody knocked at the front door.

Alex's phone rang at the same moment.

He answered it, and his voice turned sweet in an instant. "Hi, Mom. Are you here already? Sure, I'll open the door right now."

He hung up and gave me a hard look. "My mother is here, so be smart about this. If you upset her, you and I aren't finished."

He went to open the door.

I knew the hard part of that night was only starting.