Chapter Ten—Julie
SUNDAY MORNING, I WAKE in a hotel room and remember I left my wedding ring at home.
I didn’t forget it. I took it off Saturday before packing the last of my clothes because I was sorting through fabric samples and didn’t want to snag anything.
Then I stood in front of my jewelry case with the ring in my palm for almost a minute before putting it in the ceramic dish. Leaving it there was a decision.
I roll onto my back and stare at the ceiling. The hotel has good blackout curtains, a comfortable mattress, and a shower with enough water pressure to remove skin. None of that makes it less depressing to wake here.
My phone says eight-nineteen. Dalen hasn’t texted since yesterday. He said he’d give me time, and apparently, he’s going to keep his word.
I hate that I miss him anyway.
I get out of bed and start coffee in the little machine near the window.
My suitcase is open on the luggage rack, and half my clothes are hanging in the closet because living from a suitcase started irritating me on the second day.
I’ve been here three nights. That’s long enough to know I don’t want to stay another week.
The room is safe. It’s also beige. Nobody should have this much beige in one place.
I carry my coffee to the desk and open my laptop. Yesterday, I emailed Mara Dempsey, a realtor I’ve worked with for years, and asked if she knew of a furnished rental I could take for a month or two. She handles relocations for several companies and usually has access to properties between tenants.
Her reply came in at seven-thirty.
I have a furnished house in Westover through the end of next month. Owners are overseas. It’s one of Claudia’s staging jobs, so it doesn’t look like a sad corporate apartment. Call me.
I smile despite myself and call her. Mara answers on the third ring.
“Please tell me you’re finally leaving Dalen for me.”
I chuckle. “I’ve seen your kitchen. Absolutely not.”
She laughs. “Good morning to you too.”
I tuck one leg beneath me in the desk chair. “Is the Westover place still available?”
“Yep. Two bedrooms, furnished, alarm, attached garage.” Mara starts giving me details while I open my calendar. “It’s an older house, but Claudia redid the inside before the owners listed it last year. They decided not to sell, then took an assignment in London.”
“How old?”
“Nineteen-thirties.”
I straighten. “Original trim?”
“You’re homeless, and you’re asking about trim.”
“I’m temporarily displaced.”
Her tone is still teasing. “Does Dalen know that?”
My smile disappears. Mara must hear something in my silence because her tone changes immediately. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” I look toward the hotel window. “I need somewhere for a little while.”
“Then you have somewhere.” She pauses before adding, “I can meet you at eleven.”
“Thank you.”
“Julie?” Mara waits until I answer, then says, “You don’t have to tell me anything. I just need to know if you’re safe.”
The question hurts more than it should. I swallow before answering. “I am.”
“Okay. I’ll see you at eleven.”
I close the laptop after we hang up and sit there with both hands around my coffee.
Safe has become complicated.
I’m safe from whoever has been getting into my house because I’m not there. I’m safe from Dalen making decisions about me because he finally stopped. I’m apparently safe from my sister discussing my mental health with my husband because Meg promised to stop doing that too.
I have successfully achieved safety by removing myself from my own life.
Fantastic.
My phone vibrates on the desk. For one stupid second, I hope it’s Dalen.
It’s an email from a company called Northstar Credit Services with the subject line PAYMENT REMINDER—ACCOUNT ENDING 4418.
I almost delete it. Then the name catches somewhere in my memory.
Northstar.
I’ve seen it before.
I search my inbox and find an email from them three weeks ago. I opened that one because I didn’t recognize the company, read enough to decide it was probably spam, then forgot about it because Patricia Salish called five minutes later about her kitchen.
The older message has my full name at the top.
Dear Julie Dorsey,
I read the rest more carefully this time. There’s a payment due on a personal line of credit.
I don’t have a personal line of credit.
My first thought is identity theft in the generic way people think about it before it happens to them.
Some stranger bought my information. A data breach.
One of the endless companies that sends apologetic emails explaining that criminals now have everything except your childhood nickname and favorite breakfast cereal.
Then I see the balance.
Twenty-three thousand, four hundred and twelve dollars.
“Whoa.”
I open my banking app. Nothing is missing from our accounts. I check my credit-card apps next, although that makes no sense either. Northstar isn’t there.
The email has a customer-service number, but I don’t use it. I search the company separately and call the number listed on its website. A woman answers after I spend several minutes proving to an automated system that I’m a human being.
I give her my name and explain that I received a payment notice for an account I don’t recognize. She asks for the last four digits of my Social Security number.
They match.
My stomach drops.
“I need to know when this account was opened.”
The representative asks me to hold. I stand and start pacing between the desk and the bed while hotel music plays in my ear. When she returns, she gives me a date from four months ago.
Four months? “Where was the application submitted?”
“Online.”
I stop beside the bed. “Can you tell me what bank account received the funds?”
“I can’t provide full banking information over the phone, but I can tell you the account was verified in your name.”
“It wasn’t my account.”
The representative takes a moment before answering. “Ms. Dorsey, if you’re disputing the account as fraudulent, I can transfer you to our fraud department.”
“Yes. Please do.”
I move to the window while she transfers me. Traffic passes below on an ordinary Sunday morning. People are probably going to brunch, church, or anywhere else people go when their lives haven’t turned into this.
The fraud representative asks more questions. I give her my address, date of birth, former address, and employer.
She reads the employer back to me.
“Dorsey Capital?” I grip the edge of the desk. “I don’t work there.”
“Have you ever worked there?”
“No. My husband owns it.”
She explains what information they can release and how to dispute the account. I grab hotel stationery because I don’t have a notebook within reach, then fill both sides while she talks.
The application used our home address, my Social Security number, my birth date, and my husband’s company as my employer.
This doesn’t look like information bought in a random breach. “Can you send me the application?”
She gives me the process for requesting it. By the time I end the call, I’ve written down a case number, two phone numbers, and enough instructions to ruin the rest of my Sunday. I sit on the edge of the bed and look at the date again.
Four months ago. Before the bedroom. Before the back door. Before the necklace, text, or photograph. Before Dalen started wondering whether I could trust my own memory.
My stomach twists.
I pick up my phone to call him, but my thumb stops over his name.
Dalen would know what to do. He’d have an attorney on the phone before I finished the first sentence. Somebody from Dorsey Capital would pull my credit report. By noon, there would probably be three people working on it and a fourth person asking me to sign something.
A week ago, that would have comforted me. Today, I need to know what happened before anybody takes it away from me and turns it into a problem they’re solving. Or uses it against me, assuming I forgot I applied. I’d consider that a paranoid thought, but it’s hard to after this week.
I open my credit app instead. The free report takes several minutes to load. I scroll past accounts I recognize, then stop at one I don’t.
Northstar.
Below it is another account opened two months later.
My mouth dries as I click it.
Nine thousand dollars for a credit card from Wells Fargo. I’ve never banked with them.
I sit on the edge of the bed while the air conditioner runs beneath the window.
Two accounts, and both mine according to the report. Neither one belongs to me.
I download the report and send it to myself, then search my email for the second creditor. Nothing obvious comes up.
My phone rings as I’m searching. Meg is calling. I stare at her name until the third ring, then answer. “Hi.”
“Hey.” Her voice has none of its usual brightness. “Are you still mad at me?”
I rub my forehead. “That’s a complicated question.”
“Okay.” She sounds miserable. I hear movement on her end before a door shuts. “I was going to see if you wanted breakfast.”
“I already ate.” The lie comes easily. Coffee isn’t breakfast, but I don’t want company.
Meg accepts the answer without arguing. “Okay. Are you still at the hotel?”
My hand stops against my forehead. “I never told you I was at a hotel.”
Several seconds pass before she laughs lightly. “Where else would you be?”
“I could be with a friend.”
“You hate staying with people.”
That’s true, but the answer doesn’t settle the uneasiness crawling over me. I get up and walk toward the desk. “Did Dalen tell you?”
“No.”
“He hasn’t told you anything?”
She gives a muffled laugh. “Not since you yelled at both of us.”
I turn toward the window. “I didn’t yell at Dalen about talking to you until after you already knew something was wrong.”
Meg releases an exasperated breath. “Julie, I know you. You weren’t going to stay in that house after whatever happened Thursday.”
My fingers curl around the back of the desk chair. I did tell Meg Dalen was in Chicago. She called that night, and I told her I was fine. I never told her what happened afterward. “Who told you something happened Thursday?”