Chapter 2 - Eighteen Thousand Four Hundred Dollars
I drove home with both hands locked around the steering wheel.
At the first red light, I called my bank.
By the time I reached the apartment, I had learned three things.
The transfer had been initiated that morning.
It had come from the joint savings account Derek had convinced me to open when we first moved in together.
And because he was a joint account holder, the bank couldn't simply treat his withdrawal as an unauthorized stranger's transaction.
The representative helped me secure my personal and business accounts and opened a review of the activity.
But she couldn't promise the money would come back.
Eighteen thousand four hundred dollars.
My mother's life insurance had paid for her funeral. Everything left in that savings account had come from me.
From late nights.
Skipped vacations.
Thrift-store jeans.
Customers who sent back perfectly good dresses after wearing them once.
I'd been saving for a storefront.
Now all that work was sitting in Harper Lane's company account.
I called my best friend, Tasha Brooks.
She answered on the second ring.
"Hey, girl. How'd the delivery go?"
I couldn't speak.
"Mia?"
"Can you come over?"
Her voice changed immediately.
"What happened?"
"Derek."
That was all I managed.
"I'm on my way."
Tasha arrived with two coffees and the expression of a woman prepared to commit several crimes but hoping to avoid paperwork.
She found me on the living room floor surrounded by bank statements.
I told her everything.
The lace nightgown.
The towel.
The dress.
The transfer.
When I finished, she sat beside me without speaking.
Then she picked up Derek's framed photograph from the coffee table.
"Can I throw this away?"
"Please."
She dropped it into the trash.
"Thank you. I've wanted to do that for two years."
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
Tasha worked as a hairstylist and had never been shy about her opinion of Derek.
She'd watched me pay his speeding tickets. She'd seen him flirt with a waitress at my birthday dinner.
Once, when I told her he was simply struggling to find his direction, she'd said, "Mia, the only direction that man knows is toward a bar."
I hadn't listened.
Tasha squeezed my hand.
"Listen carefully. We can talk about that cheating garbage later. Right now, we protect your business."
She was right.
I opened my laptop.
My store dashboard looked normal at first.
Forty-four orders from that morning's livestream.
Several shipping labels waiting to be printed.
Then I noticed something strange.
Someone had changed my account recovery phone number.
It now ended in 7721.
Derek's number.
I checked the login history.
There had been seven logins from another device over the past month.
All of them after midnight.
All of them while I was sleeping.
"Oh my God."
Tasha leaned closer.
"What?"
I showed her.
She went pale.
"That wasn't a drunk boyfriend borrowing your laptop."
I opened my inventory spreadsheet.
The quantities were wrong.
Thirty-two dresses missing.
Eighteen blouses.
Nine cardigans.
The ivory wrap dress wasn't the only thing Derek had been carrying to Harper's apartment.
He had been stealing from my shelves for weeks.
I remembered waking up one night and finding him in the spare bedroom.
He'd said he was looking for his old sneakers.
Now I knew why the storage boxes had been moved.
I began taking screenshots.
Every login.
Every missing item.
Every bank transaction I could still access.
Tasha recorded a video of the inventory shelves while I counted everything twice.
I didn't know exactly what had happened yet.
But I knew I needed a record of what was still mine.
Derek came home at 6:17 p.m.
I remember the exact time because I'd been sitting beside the door, staring at the clock.
He walked in wearing jeans and a wrinkled black T-shirt.
No flowers.
No apology.
Just the faint smell of expensive perfume.
"Hey."
I didn't answer.
He noticed Tasha on the couch.
"Oh, great. You brought backup."
Tasha stood.
"You're lucky I only brought myself."
He rolled his eyes.
"Mia, can we talk like adults?"
I held up the bank statement.
"Where's my money?"
He sighed.
"It's an investment."
"In what?"
"Harper's boutique. She's expanding. We were going to make a lot of money."
I stared at him.
"We?"
"Yes. Us."
"Us?"
He gestured helplessly.
"Look, I was planning to surprise you once it started paying off."
Tasha laughed.
"You surprised her all right."
I stood.
"You took eighteen thousand dollars from our savings account to invest in the woman you're sleeping with?"
"It's not like that."
"You were naked in her apartment!"
"I had just showered!"
"After what? A very sweaty job interview?"
His jaw tightened.
"Stop talking to me like I'm stupid."
I looked at him for a long moment.
"You know what, Derek? You're right."
He blinked.
I continued.
"You're not stupid. You knew exactly what you were doing."
Something changed in his expression.
The pleading disappeared.
"That money wasn't just yours."
I felt as though he'd punched me.
"What?"
"We've been together three years. I helped you build this business."
"You carried boxes twice!"
"I gave you ideas."
"You told me to sell cheaper dresses because you wanted more beer money!"
He stepped closer.
"Watch your mouth."
Tasha immediately moved between us.
"Back up."
Derek looked at her with disgust.
"This is none of your business."
"It became my business when you started talking to my best friend like that."
I picked up a cardboard box I'd placed by the door.
Inside were his clothes, game controller, razor, and the ridiculous collection of bottle openers he'd bought on vacation with my money.
"You're leaving."
He stared at the box.
"This is my apartment."
"Our names are both on the lease," I said. "You can arrange to collect the rest of your things with Tasha here. But you're not staying with me tonight."
His face darkened.
"You're making a mistake."
"No. I made a mistake three years ago. I'm correcting it."
He grabbed the box.
At the door, he turned around.
"Harper understands business. You don't."
I swallowed hard.
"Then enjoy your business partner."
He smiled.
It was the ugliest smile I'd ever seen.
"Good luck keeping that little internet shop alive without me."
The door slammed.
Tasha locked it.
Then she hugged me.
And finally, I cried.
At nine that evening, I began contacting my customers.
I explained that I was dealing with a temporary inventory problem and would provide accurate delivery updates or refunds.
I didn't mention Derek.
I didn't mention Harper.
My customers didn't deserve to be dragged into a personal disaster.
At 9:43, a woman named Linda sent me a screenshot.
Honey, is this your new website? I ordered three dresses, but the confirmation looks strange.
I opened the image.
The website displayed my photograph.
My logo.
My dresses.
Even the picture of my mother standing beside her sewing machine.
But the web address wasn't mine.
It was a nearly identical copy.
And underneath the order confirmation was a payment company I'd never used.
I called Linda.
"How much did you spend?"
"Two hundred and sixty dollars, sweetheart. Did I do something wrong?"
"No," I whispered. "You didn't."
She hesitated.
"Are you okay?"
I looked at my mother's picture on that fake website.
"I don't know yet."
After we hung up, I examined the copied storefront.
It had been taking orders for nineteen days.
The contact number belonged to Derek.
The return address was Harper's apartment building.
And a banner across the top announced something that made my blood run cold.
SECOND STITCH BY MIA IS NOW PART OF HARLOW HOUSE. ALL FUTURE ORDERS WILL BE FULFILLED THROUGH OUR NEW PARTNERSHIP.
I had never agreed to a partnership.
I had never seen the website.
May you like
But apparently, my boyfriend had already sold my business.
And my customers were paying for it.
