Chapter 7 - The Accountant Who Stopped Smiling
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Nora Ellis had handled my taxes for eight years.
She was fifty-three, brutally practical, and completely unimpressed by wealthy people.
When I called her Christmas afternoon, she answered on the fourth ring.
“Claire? Is everything okay?”
“I need you to review something.”
“Today?”
“Yes.”
She heard something in my voice.
“What happened?”
I briefly explained the Christmas dinner, the strange banking notification, and the fifty-one thousand dollars Walter claimed Daniel had given him.
Nora didn't interrupt.
When I finished, she asked one question.
“Do you have access to your personal financial records?”
“Yes.”
“Then send me what you have. And don't confront Daniel about any more numbers until we understand them.”
By the following morning, we were sitting in her home office.
I had brought six years of tax documents, bank statements, mortgage records, and copies of everything I could retrieve online.
Nora worked quietly.
Her glasses rested halfway down her nose.
Every so often, she wrote something on a yellow legal pad.
After forty minutes, she stopped.
“Claire, when Daniel lost his job, where did the severance money go?”
“He transferred it into savings.”
“Which account?”
“Our emergency savings.”
She turned her laptop toward me.
There it was.
A deposit of twenty-four thousand dollars.
Then, three days later, a transfer for exactly the same amount.
Recipient: R House Events LLC.
I recognized the business immediately.
Rebecca owned a boutique event-planning company.
She had opened it two years earlier with tremendous enthusiasm and very little experience.
“Why would Daniel send Rebecca twenty-four thousand dollars?”
Nora removed her glasses.
“That's what we need to find out.”
I felt my pulse quicken.
“Could it have been a loan?”
“Possibly.”
“Maybe she paid it back.”
Nora gave me a look.
“Claire, I've been through the statements you sent. There is no repayment.”
She scrolled farther.
Then stopped again.
“This is unusual.”
“What?”
“Your household checking account has been making interest-only payments to a lender I don't recognize.”
She pointed at the screen.
Small monthly withdrawals.
Different amounts.
Always labeled as loan interest.
I leaned forward.
“How long?”
“Since June.”
I stared at the dates.
June.
Three months after Daniel lost his job.
Three months after his severance disappeared into Rebecca's business.
Nora folded her hands.
“Do you remember signing an application for a home equity line of credit?”
“No.”
“Do you remember giving Daniel permission to use the house as collateral?”
“No.”
Her expression turned serious.
“Then I think we need to speak to the lender directly.”
I looked at the long list of withdrawals.
For ten months, I had worked to cover my family's expenses.
And during those same months, someone had been quietly paying interest on a debt I knew nothing about.
Nora touched my hand.
“Claire, don't panic yet.”
May you like
But I could see the concern in her eyes.
And Nora Ellis was not a woman who frightened easily.
