YOU KNEW ABOUT ME

Thomas didn't seem surprised by my question.

"We believe your identity was used without your knowledge," he said. "That doesn't make these documents harmless. It means we need to establish who actually controlled the accounts."

"Derek will say I did."

"He's already made that accusation," Rebecca said. "Now we can answer it with more than his version of events."

I pulled my chair closer. Lucy sat beside me, her knee touching mine beneath the table.

Thomas showed me signatures, registration forms, and correspondence. Some signatures resembled mine. One looked exactly like my father's.

The date beneath it was eight years after his death.

"That can't be real," I said.

"It isn't," Thomas answered. "But whoever prepared it had access to a good example of his handwriting."

The shoebox. Birthday cards. Letters Derek had taken to dry.

I covered my mouth.

"He used Dad's letters."

"That's one possibility."

I hated the careful language, though I understood why he used it. Possibility, indication, not yet established. Derek had been certain about everything, and certainty had always felt easier to trust.

Thomas set another sheet down. Moretti Maritime Holdings appeared at the top.

I looked at Alexander. "Some of the money came from you?"

"From companies connected to mine. Others too."

"So this was happening before I left."

"Yes."

"How long have you been looking?"

Alexander glanced at Rebecca. "We can discuss my investigation separately."

I heard the familiar shape of that answer. A door quietly closing while someone told me it was for my convenience.

"I want to discuss it now."

He met my eyes. "All right."

Before he could continue, Thomas took out a photograph. Derek stood outside a restaurant beside an older man with pale eyes and a severe mouth.

Vittorio Moretti.

I recognized him from the articles I'd found after Alexander mentioned his father.

"This was taken six months before your wedding," Thomas said.

"Derek said he was in Cleveland that week."

I remembered him calling from a hotel room. He said he wished I were there, then asked whether Mom had found Dad's old account books.

"He knew who I was before he met me," I said.

Nobody contradicted me.

Rebecca closed the folder gently. "We don't have the whole sequence yet. But there is enough here to question the story he gave you."

I stood because I couldn't bear the chair anymore.

Alexander offered to drive me back. I told him I needed to speak with him somewhere we could finish a conversation without a folder being closed.

We returned to his office. Lucy waited downstairs after I promised to call before leaving.

The desk stood exactly where it had on the first night. I was wearing shoes now. My foot was bandaged, and I had my own phone in my hand.

"You knew Derek before I came here."

Alexander remained standing. "Yes."

"And you knew his wife was Daniel Whitcomb's daughter."

"Yes."

"How long?"

"Eleven months."

I put my phone on the desk because my fingers had begun to shake.

"Eleven months."

"We knew he was using your identity. We didn't know what was happening inside your home."

"You could have asked."

He looked down.

"Why did you act surprised when he said Dad's name?"

"I'd never met you. I had a name on documents, not a face I recognized. You came through the door frightened and bleeding. When he said Daniel's name, I understood who was in front of me."

"You knew there was a woman living with a man you thought was a criminal. You knew she was my father's daughter."

"Yes."

"Did you try to call me?"

"No."

The answer hurt more than a complicated excuse would have.

"Why?"

"We thought contacting you would alert Derek. He might move the money, destroy records, disappear."

"So you decided I could wait."

"I thought we could protect you once we had enough to act."

"What if he destroyed me first?"

Alexander's face changed. He reached toward the edge of the desk, then let his hand fall.

"I didn't know about the bruises."

"You didn't know because you didn't ask."

"You're right."

I had prepared for an argument. For someone to explain that important men made difficult decisions and women like me couldn't understand them.

His agreement left me with all the anger and nowhere easy to put it.

"You told me I could decide. But before I got here, you were making decisions about my life without telling me it was in danger."

"I made a calculation," he said. "And I was wrong."

"My father would have hated that."

He closed his eyes briefly. "I know."

I looked toward the sofa where I had cried. Nothing about his help had been imaginary. The doctor, the slippers, the hand waiting instead of pulling. I wanted those things to mean I could forgive this immediately.

They didn't.

"I need somewhere else to live."

"I'll arrange—"

"Sarah is helping me. Lucy too."

He stopped. "All right."

"And I need to hear information about me when you have it. Not when you've decided I can cope with it."

"All right."

"Don't just agree because I'm upset."

He looked directly at me. "I agree because you should have been told."

I picked up my phone and called Lucy. My voice stayed steady while I asked whether she could help me look at an apartment the next day.

It broke only after I ended the call.

"Emily," Alexander said. "I'm sorry."

I nodded, but not to say it was fine.

"You don't get to decide what's worth risking when the risk is my life."

I walked to the door. He didn't follow, didn't offer another room upstairs, didn't remind me what he'd paid for.

I opened it myself.

In the hallway, Marco stepped aside without asking where I was going.

This time, nobody tried to stop me.

Lucy was waiting beside her car, pretending to read a parking sign she must have read a dozen times already. When she saw me, she put the keys in my hand.

"Do you want to pick where we go?"

I looked at the keys, then handed them back. "I don't want to drive. But I want somewhere with coffee that comes in a chipped mug."

"I know just the place."

She didn't ask whether Alexander had upset me until we were seated. Then she listened while I told her everything, and I discovered that I could be grateful to him and angry with him at the same time.