Chapter 6 - The Woman My Mother Investigated Before I Married Him
Months into the separation, Nina received a letter from the firm that handled my mother Joan’s estate.
There was a sealed envelope.
Conditional delivery instructions:
Give to Bernice if she initiates divorce proceedings involving allegations of financial dishonesty, coercive control, title manipulation, or identity fraud.
The instructions were nine years old.
Before my wedding.
I felt betrayed by a dead woman.
“Mom knew?”
“We don’t know what she knew,” Nina said.
“Then why didn’t she tell me?”
“Maybe the envelope does.”
The following Thursday, I went to Nina’s office.
A woman was already waiting.
Late fifties.
Short gray hair.
Dark suit.
Leather portfolio.
Gideon happened to be in the building with his own counsel for a separate scheduled meeting.
He saw her through the glass.
Stopped.
Then turned toward the elevator.
Fast.
I had never seen Gideon frightened before.
The woman introduced herself.
“Evelyn Cross.”
“You knew my mother?”
“She hired me.”
“For what?”
Evelyn looked toward the elevator Gideon had just taken.
“To investigate the man you were about to marry.”
Joan became suspicious because Gideon once lied about an old address.
He claimed he had lived in Oak Park.
A piece of old mail showed Wheaton.
Evelyn traced the address.
A woman named Laura Whitcomb had owned the house.
Gideon lived there with her for almost three years.
Laura worked nights as an air-traffic operations coordinator.
She owned the house before Gideon moved in.
She had a young daughter.
Eight months before Gideon met me, Laura disappeared from ordinary public records.
The house sold.
Gideon received approximately $61,000 afterward.
He later told me that money came from an investment.
It became part of the down payment on the first condo Gideon and I shared.
I felt sick.
“My first home with him was partly funded by another woman’s house?”
“Possibly.”
Evelyn did not overclaim.
My mother had confronted Gideon.
He said Laura moved to Canada after a bad breakup and reimbursed him for renovations.
Evelyn had not found enough to prove otherwise.
So Joan did something deeply imperfect and deeply human.
She preserved the file.
And waited.
Then Evelyn slid an old photograph toward me.
Young Gideon.
Laura.
A little girl around seven.
“Her daughter?”
“Yes.”
“What was her name?”
“Emma.”
My skin prickled.
Years earlier, when Gideon and I discussed baby names, he suggested Emma.
May you like
“I’ve always liked it,” he said.
Now that name felt like a ghost living inside my marriage.
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