A Woman With Secrets. Inglath Cooper
him say that as far as he could see, she had knowingly and willingly given her husband the authority to do with their joint funds as he had seen fit. “His name is on all the accounts, dear,” he’d said, Southern disdain for her idiocy marking each word. “Your husband might have made some bad decisions, but there’s no law against that. I suggest you be careful who you marry next time, young lady.”
So there was no law against robbing your wife blind. There was, however, a law against breaking and entering. She sent a quick glance over both shoulders, then turned the flashlight around and placed the butt of it against the glass pane nearest the door handle. A quick jab, and the glass shattered, falling to the floor on the other side. She reached through the open cavity and pressed the lock. The door swung open, and the silence exploded.
She jumped as if poked with a cattle prod, even though she’d fully expected an extra-loud alarm system. Extra was Karl’s style. If you could super-size it, his name was on the dotted line.
She stepped inside and closed the door, using the flashlight to wind her way down the hall to the front of the house.
The control panel was where she’d thought it would be: to the left of the door. She had forty-five seconds to figure out the code and turn off the alarm before the security company called. Earlier that day, she’d invested a couple of hours in coming up with the combinations Karl might have used.
Being married to Karl had left her with an absolute understanding of the three engines that pulled his train of thought: golf, women and money. And not necessarily in that order.
From her pants pocket, she pulled the piece of paper on which she’d written her best guesses.
First, golf. With one gloved finger, she punched in the two scores he had bragged about so often that the numbers were seared in her brain. 6265.
But the ear-piercing wail continued.
Door number two: women. She punched in 3624, picturing Karl’s wife—Tiffany-the-interior-decorator, her surgically enhanced figure leaving little doubt as to what had initiated his defection.
But clearly Karl had not immortalized Tiffany’s measurements in his alarm control panel. It continued its wail. Her nerve endings were beginning to feel as if they’d been dipped in Tabasco Sauce.
One more. Time was running out. She had ten seconds max. Next on the list: Karl’s penchant for picking stocks. He played the market the way little old ladies in Las Vegas played the quarter slot machines, going online ten or fifteen times a day to monitor his latest picks. He’d hit the jackpot once, quoting the stock’s sell price to anyone who would listen. She glanced at the piece of notepaper on which she’d written the last of her three guesses.
What if she were wrong?
She drew in a deep, hopeful breath and punched in the numbers.
The wailing immediately ceased. Ah. Silence. Peaceful, blessed silence.
And then she grew indignant again. It figured, after all. When it came right down to it, everything that mattered most to Karl centered around money. Without it, he couldn’t afford golf or women.
She leaned her head against the wall, gathering up her now shredded nerves of steel. A neighbor could have heard the alarm. The police could be on their way right this minute.
Even as she indulged her paranoia, she knew the closest house lay well out of earshot. It wasn’t likely that the police would have been notified. Now that the alarm was off, she should have all night to search the house.
Still slumping with relief, she turned around and waved the flashlight across the room. The main living area looked like a candy cane factory, the red-and-white stripes on the walls nearly blinding her. A hysterical giggle bubbled up from her throat and broke free, the sound ridiculous in the otherwise tomb-still house. Appearances were important to Karl. She wondered if he provided his business associates with protective eyewear when he entertained here.
She left the vertigo-inducing living room and aimed the flashlight down the hallway that led to the rest of the house. Tiffany’s touch had found its way to these walls as well. Karl now had stripes in black and white, green and white, pink and white. The upside? If she could find something to convince the police he was a crook, he’d have no problem adjusting to his prison uniform.
The house felt eerie, pitch black as it was. But she didn’t dare turn on any lights for fear that someone would notice and report it. Like the alarm code, she had planned this part of her efforts as well. She’d start with the most obvious place: Karl’s office. Using the flashlight as a guide, she poked her head inside several different rooms until she found it.
Here, Tiffany had given up the striped wallpaper for paint. Purple was her color of choice, although Kate would bet Karl had dubbed it eggplant.
She headed for the desk, sat down in Karl’s leather chair and began opening drawers, using the flashlight to illuminate their contents. The first three yielded nothing more than paper clips and files full of papers that meant nothing to her.
The bottom drawer was locked.
But she’d come prepared for locked drawers. She reached inside her vest pocket and pulled out the small black case that held a series of lock picks she’d managed to purchase at a pawn shop in the seedier part of Richmond.
She chose one and got to work, fumbling at first, then getting the hang of it. The first four did nothing. The fifth one, however, did the trick.
The drawer popped open. Again, there were files, neatly organized. Behind them sat a metal box. She reached for it first, surprised to find it unlocked. She popped the latch and then sat a little straighter at the sight of the gun nestled inside. What was Karl doing with a gun? A big one at that. In three years of marriage, she’d never known he had one.
Maybe he and Tiffany played games with it. A mental picture she didn’t need.
Glad she’d reached the point where she could actually joke about the biggest mistake of her life, she slammed the lid closed and stuck the box back in the drawer. She worked on the files then, leafing through each of them in the hope that something incriminating would jump out at her.
Nothing did.
Twenty minutes later, she’d found little more than records of car loans, garage services, health insurance.
She slumped in the chair, her ponytail squished against the cushioned back. There had to be something in this mausoleum of a house to prove what a lying, cheating…
She put the brakes on that particular rant. It was old territory, after all. Trekked across one too many times.
Looking back, she could see everything so clearly now. Not that it did her any good to have such remarkable hindsight—a worthless commodity, after all.
With renewed determination, she got up from the chair and headed for the master bedroom, where lace and mirrors were the key decorating ingredients. She wondered where Tiffany had actually managed to get her hands on an interior design degree. The house was an aesthetic assault to the senses.
She started with the nightstands by the bed, emptying the contents of their drawers on top of the black duvet. She shook her head. Black? Really.
She rifled through hand lotion, Chap Stick, a few receipts, theater ticket stubs. She worked her way through each drawer in the room, ending up in an enormous walk-in closet that could easily double as a retail store. She closed the door and flipped on the light switch. She patted down every suit, looked under every sweater, opened every shoe box.
Nothing.
She sank onto the floor and dropped her head in her hands. Maybe it was time to accept the fact that she had been used. That she’d let herself be conned by a man who planned her fleecing down to the last dime. Maybe it was time to put it all behind her and start over again. At McDonald’s, maybe. Polyester uniforms could do a lot for a girl with natural curves. Emphasis on natural.
She got to her feet and glanced at her watch. Time to admit defeat. She gave one