I waited until my husband Mark left for work before checking the guest room closet. At first everything looked normal except for one thing: my jewelry box was gone from the top shelf where I always kept it behind the extra blankets.
My chest tightened so hard I had to sit on the edge of the bed.
I called Lorraine immediately. She answered on the second ring and said, almost too quickly, “Don’t start accusing people before you understand what’s happening.” Then she hung up.
By the time I reached her house, her garage door was already open. I walked inside without knocking and found my jewelry box sitting on her kitchen table beside a pile of papers and old photographs. Lorraine looked furious — but not surprised to see me.
Before I could speak, she shoved a photograph across the table.
It showed my husband standing beside another woman outside a courthouse downtown. The date stamp was from three years ago.
“I found out Mark was taking loans against your house to pay her debts,” Lorraine said quietly. “I moved your jewelry because he planned to pawn it next.”
I thought she was lying until she handed me the courthouse papers underneath the photo.
The woman wasn’t his mistress.
She was his ex-wife.
And according to the documents, their divorce had never actually been finalized.