Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN IN TRIBECASabrina Cole called me herself.
Three days after Dominic tried deleting company files, my phone rang from an unknown number.
I almost ignored it.
Something made me answer.
“Hello?”
“Is this Audrey?”
The woman's voice was young.
Nervous.
“Yes.”
A pause.
“My name is Sabrina Cole.”
My entire body went cold.
I stood from Dad's dining table and walked toward the bedroom so Leo wouldn't be disturbed.
“I know who you are.”
“I assumed you might.”
Neither of us spoke for several seconds.
Then Sabrina said, “I'm sorry.”
I hated those words.
“You're sorry about what?”
“Dominic.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“How long?”
“Almost two years.”
The answer hit with surprising softness.
Maybe because some part of me had already known.
“Did you know he was married?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know I was pregnant?”
Another pause.
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
There are forms of betrayal that create anger.
Others produce clarity.
This was clarity.
“You continued seeing him.”
“Yes.”
“Why are you calling me?”
“Because he lied to me too.”
Despite myself, I laughed.
Sabrina didn't become defensive.
“I know how that sounds.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
She took a breath.
“He told me you were separated.”
“We weren't.”
“I know that now.”
“You said you knew he was married.”
“He said legally married. Separate bedrooms. Separate lives. He said you stayed together because of family assets and appearances.”
I nearly admired Dominic's efficiency.
He had invented a marriage where I was simultaneously unstable, wealthy, distant and financially useful.
“What changed?”
“He came to my apartment two nights ago.”
“What did he want?”
“For me to leave New York.”
I straightened.
“Why?”
“He said there was going to be an investigation and people might misunderstand payments he'd made to me.”
“Payments from his company.”
“Yes.”
“Eighty-four thousand dollars.”
She went silent.
“So you know.”
“I know some.”
“He told me those were bonuses.”
“For what?”
“I handled marketing campaigns for him.”
“After you stopped working there?”
Silence.
I didn't need the answer.
“What did he ask you to do?”
“He gave me twenty thousand dollars.”
My stomach tightened.
“For what?”
“To go to Toronto for a few months.”
“Why Toronto?”
“My sister lives there.”
“And?”
“He asked me to delete our messages.”
I sat down.
“Did you?”
“No.”
That changed everything.
Sabrina had messages.
Photos.
Emails.
And according to her, voice recordings.
“Why did you record him?”
“I didn't at first.”
“What changed?”
“He scared me.”
I looked toward the living room where Dad and Rebecca were talking.
“How?”
“When I told him I wasn't deleting anything, he grabbed my arm.”
My anger shifted.
Whatever I thought of Sabrina, that sentence mattered.
“Are you safe?”
“Yes. I'm staying with a friend.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“Bruised me.”
“Have you spoken to police?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I didn't want—”
“Listen to me.”
I surprised myself with the firmness in my voice.
“If someone physically hurt you, do not protect him because you're ashamed of how you got into the situation.”
She started crying.
Quietly.
“I thought you'd hate me.”
“I don't know you well enough to hate you.”
The words came from Dad.
I almost smiled.
“I'm not saying we're friends, Sabrina.”
“I understand.”
“But if Dominic hurt you, that's separate from what happened between us.”
She exhaled shakily.
Then she said the sentence that changed the investigation.
“He told me he was going to take Leo.”
My blood went cold.
“What?”
“Two nights ago. He was angry. He said your father had poisoned you against him and that once he had custody of the baby, you'd come crawling back.”
I couldn't breathe for a second.
“Exactly what did he say?”
“I have it recorded.”
“Send it to my attorney.”
“You have a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Can I talk to her?”
“Yes.”
Within an hour, Sabrina was in Rebecca's office.
I didn't attend.
Rebecca told me not to.
“You are postpartum and exhausted. Let me do my job.”
Dad supported that decision.
I hated both of them for approximately five minutes.
Then Leo spit up on my shirt, and real life reasserted itself.
By evening, Rebecca returned.
Her expression was grim.
“Sabrina has substantial evidence.”
“Of the affair?”
“Yes. But that's not the important part.”
“What is?”
“Dominic discussed company finances with her.”
Dad put down his newspaper.
“What kind of discussion?”
“He told her he needed Audrey's assets to keep investors from calling loans.”
My mouth went dry.
Rebecca continued.
“He said once Leo was born, Audrey wouldn't leave because no woman wants to be a single mother with a newborn.”
Dad's jaw tightened.
“He said that?”
“Recorded.”
I stared at the floor.
There it was.
The final answer to every question I'd been asking myself.
Did Dominic love me?
Perhaps once.
Had he knowingly trapped me?
Yes.
“He planned the timing.”
Rebecca nodded.
“At least in his own words, he viewed the baby as making you less likely to challenge him.”
Dad stood and walked toward the window.
I knew he needed distance from us before he said something he'd regret.
“What else?” I asked.
“There's a recording from three months ago where he jokes that you don't understand your own trust.”
“My trust?”
“Yes.”
“He doesn't have access to it.”
“Apparently he's been trying.”
Now Dad turned.
“What?”
Rebecca looked at him.
“Dominic asked Sabrina whether she knew anyone who could prepare altered beneficiary documentation.”
For the first time, my father looked genuinely shocked.
“Why?”
“We don't know that anything happened. But we need to check.”
My trust had been created by my maternal grandparents.
It held several long-term investments and a Virginia property.
Dominic had complained about it for years because its structure limited his access.
He called it “old-money paranoia.”
I called the trustee immediately.
Nothing had been changed.
No unauthorized distributions.
But there had been repeated requests for information from someone claiming to act as my financial adviser.
The adviser didn't exist.
All inquiries traced back to an email domain registered by a Marchetti Strategic Ventures employee.
My husband's company.
Rebecca immediately added the information to her case file.
The next morning, formal separation papers were delivered to Dominic.
I had not yet filed for divorce.
That distinction mattered to me.
I wanted one final conversation.
Not alone.
Not in person.
Through attorneys.
Rebecca thought it unnecessary.
Dad thought it dangerous emotionally.
But I needed to hear Dominic explain himself when he could no longer rewrite the facts.
A video meeting was arranged.
Dominic appeared from his attorney's office wearing a navy suit.
Perfect hair.
Perfect tie.
He looked exactly like the man I'd married.
That hurt.
“Hi, Audrey.”
“Dominic.”
He smiled sadly.
“You look tired.”
Rebecca shifted beside me.
I ignored the insult disguised as concern.
“You've seen the separation filing.”
“Yes.”
“You understand why.”
“No, actually.”
I almost laughed.
“You forged my authorization for loans.”
“I dispute that.”
“You transferred marital money to your mother's company.”
“Those were investments.”
“In her condo?”
“My mother intended to repay—”
“You pledged my SUV.”
“It's a car.”
“It was mine.”
“We're married.”
There it was again.
The magic phrase Dominic believed transformed ownership into entitlement.
I continued.
“You had an affair.”
His expression changed.
Barely.
But enough.
“Sabrina contacted you.”
“Yes.”
“She is unstable.”
I leaned toward the screen.
“She's unstable because she refused twenty thousand dollars to leave the country?”
His attorney turned sharply toward Dominic.
That was satisfying.
Dominic recovered.
“I gave Sabrina severance.”
“After she stopped working for you a year earlier?”
No answer.
“And you told her you expected me to stay because I had a newborn.”
“That was taken out of context.”
“What context makes it better?”
Silence.
I looked at him.
Really looked.
Seven years.
Our first trip to Italy.
Dancing barefoot in our kitchen.
The night he held me while I cried after Mom died.
The positive pregnancy test.
His hand on my stomach the first time Leo kicked.
Human beings are terrible at reconciling contradictions.
We want villains to have always been villains.
It makes leaving easier.
But Dominic had also been tender.
Funny.
Generous.
Maybe even sincere.
That was what made betrayal cruel.
The good memories weren't necessarily fake.
They simply weren't enough.
“I have one question,” I said.
His face softened.
“Anything.”
“The hospital.”
He swallowed.
“What about it?”
“Why?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why did you leave us there?”
He looked away.
“Mom had the reservation.”
Tears filled my eyes, but I didn't let them fall.
“You knew I could barely walk.”
“Yes.”
“You knew Leo was five days old.”
“Yes.”
“You had my car.”
“It was just lunch.”
“Exactly.”
He frowned.
“What?”
“It was just lunch.”
I finally understood.
“You didn't abandon me because of an emergency. You didn't panic. You didn't make a terrible decision under pressure.”
“Audrey—”
“You looked at your recovering wife and newborn son and decided lunch mattered more.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“I thought you'd take a car.”
“You gave me twelve dollars.”
“I wasn't thinking.”
“That is the problem.”
His face hardened.
“You are destroying a marriage over one bad afternoon.”
“No, Dominic.”
I shook my head.
“That afternoon just made me finally look at the marriage.”
His attorney lowered his eyes.
Dominic stared at me.
Then his voice became quiet.
“If you leave, I'll fight for Leo.”
“I know.”
“I'll fight hard.”
“I know.”
“You think your father can help you?”
“No.”
That answer surprised him.
“I don't need my father's rank.”
I looked directly into the camera.
“I need my records.”
Then I disconnected.
That afternoon I told Rebecca to file for divorce.
And Dominic, realizing apologies had failed, finally stopped pretending he wanted peace.
He wanted leverage.
Within forty-eight hours, he filed an emergency petition accusing me of kidnapping our newborn.
The comfortable little world he'd built was collapsing.
So he decided to drag his five-day-old son into the rubble.
May you like
He was about to discover that judges care far less about dramatic accusations than they do about evidence.
And I had twelve dollars' worth of evidence sitting in my father's desk.
Related Stories
