Chapter 12 - THE WOMAN WITH MY SAME INITIALS
Rebecca Mercer.
My sister-in-law.
Rebecca Collins.
The corporate attorney.
And me.
Margaret Mercer.
The confusion seemed impossible at first.
Then Caroline explained it the next morning.
One of David’s draft legal packages had been mailed to an address connected to “R. Mercer.”
Someone at the law office had used an old family contact record.
The envelope intended for David’s corporate attorney’s attention had gone to his sister.
Inside were documents Rebecca was never meant to see.
The mistake had exposed the divorce draft.
But more importantly, it exposed the asset list David planned to present.
An incomplete asset list.
Caroline sat across from me.
“He was preparing to file first.”
“Why?”
“Control.”
She said it without hesitation.
“If he filed with a carefully constructed financial picture before you had independent counsel, he could frame the negotiation from the beginning.”
“What about the missing accounts?”
“He may have expected you never to find them.”
I looked toward the window.
“Twenty-eight years.”
Caroline did not respond.
“He really thought I knew nothing.”
“He may have mistaken lack of access for lack of intelligence.”
That sentence stayed with me.
We spent the morning reviewing documents.
By afternoon, the forensic accountant had traced additional funds.
The total was now closer to three million dollars.
Not all of it was necessarily marital property.
But enough was questionable that Caroline immediately requested stronger preservation orders.
David’s attorney called thirty minutes later.
Then David called me directly.
I answered only because Caroline was beside me.
“You froze my accounts.”
“No.”
“My lawyer filed a legal request.”
“You are trying to destroy my business.”
“No.”
“I’m trying to understand my marriage.”
“This has nothing to do with our marriage.”
I almost smiled.
“For twenty-eight years, whenever you wanted access to my time, my labor, my family, or my trust, you called it marriage.”
“Now money is involved, and suddenly it has nothing to do with marriage.”
He exhaled sharply.
“You are becoming vindictive.”
“No.”
“I am becoming informed.”
Silence.
Then his voice softened.
That frightened me more.
“Margaret.”
He rarely used my name.
“You don’t need Caroline.”
“I do.”
“We can divide things fairly.”
“We can sell the house.”
“You can have more than half.”
I looked at Caroline.
She wrote one word on a notepad.
Why?
I asked him.
“Why are you suddenly offering me more than half?”
“I want peace.”
“No.”
“You want speed.”
He did not answer.
I continued.
“What are you afraid Caroline will find?”
His breathing changed.
“Do not listen to people who make money creating conflict.”
“My lawyer did not bring your mistress to our daughter’s wedding.”
“Stop.”
“My lawyer did not hide assets.”
“You do not know that I hid anything.”
“Then disclosure should be easy.”
He went silent.
I waited.
Then he said.
“You always were stubborn when someone filled your head with ideas.”
The old insult.
The old strategy.
Make me doubt myself.
This time, it sounded almost pathetic.
“No, David.”
“What?”
“I was stubborn when I still loved you enough to keep hoping.”
“That is not what this is.”
I ended the call.
Caroline leaned back.
“You did well.”
“I don’t feel well.”
“You don’t have to.”
She gathered the papers.
“You only have to stop giving him the version of you he knows how to manipulate.”
That evening, I drove home.
A package was sitting on the porch.
No return address.
Inside was a flash drive.
May you like
And one handwritten note.
ASK DAVID ABOUT HARBOR VIEW.
