Chapter 6
Finding Rachel Burke takes me eleven minutes.
Real estate agents are the easiest people to find on the internet.
Their faces are on bus benches and grocery carts and every listing within a fifty-mile radius.
I search "Rachel Burke real estate" and there she is — third result.
Rachel Burke, Coldwell Banker, specializing in residential properties in the greater Portland metro area.
Portland. Three hours from here.
Her professional headshot shows a woman with dark hair, angular jaw, a confident smile. The kind of face you'd trust to find you a house. Her website has a contact form, an email, a phone number. She's visible by design — real estate agents have to be. It's their job to be findable.
I draft an email six times. Delete each one. What do you say? Hi, I think the same woman who seduced your husband also seduced mine — want to compare notes?
No. Too much. Too soon. She might think I'm crazy. She might not even know about Megan. Except she does — Kate's notes said she discovered via Venmo. She knows.
I try again:
Hi Rachel — I'm reaching out because I think we might have someone in common. Not a mutual friend — something else. A woman who went by "Megan" when you knew her. She goes by a different name now. I have information I think you'd want to see. I'm not selling anything. I'm just another wife.
— Danielle
I include my phone number. I hit send before I can delete it again.
* * *
Lauren is harder to find. Marketing VP, no kids, married to James Thornton, attorney.
Kate's alias: Jess. Last name not in the notes.
I search "Lauren Thornton marketing VP" — too many results.
"Lauren marketing VP James Thornton attorney" — one hit.
A LinkedIn profile. Lauren Castellano-Thornton.
VP of Marketing at a pharmaceutical company. Based in Charlotte.
Charlotte. Ten hours from here. Different state.
Her LinkedIn is professional — headshot, career history, endorsements. No personal details. No email visible. I can't message her without a LinkedIn account, and I don't have one — pastry chefs don't need them.
I create one. Bare minimum — my name, "pastry chef," a photo of one of my cakes instead of my face.
I send a connection request with a note: Hi Lauren — this is going to sound strange.
I'm reaching out about a woman who called herself Jess when she knew you.
She's been in my life for 3 years under a different name.
I have documentation. Please call me if you're willing to talk.
It feels too vague. But I can't put what I really mean in a LinkedIn message. I hit send.
* * *
Cara Kline, graphic designer. Husband: Marcus. Kate's alias: Hannah. Notes said she never suspected.
A woman who never suspected might not want to hear from me.
I search anyway. "Cara Kline graphic designer" — a portfolio website comes up immediately.
Clean, modern design. She does branding — logos, packaging, visual identity systems. She's in Denver.
Her portfolio is beautiful. She has a Contact page with an email and a note that says "Open to freelance inquiries. "
I don't email her yet. If she never found out about Hannah, my message might be the worst thing she's ever received. I might be about to destroy her marriage the way mine is being destroyed. And unlike me, she won't have five weeks of processed grief behind her — she'll be starting from zero.
I flag her profile and move on.
Amy Whitfield, landscape architect. Husband: David. Kate's notes said Amy suspected — she suspected, moved too fast, left the area June 2024. Amy knows something. She might not know everything, but she felt it.
"Amy Whitfield landscape architect" — a firm website.
Whitfield & Associates, residential landscape design.
Based in Asheville, North Carolina. Her About page shows a photo of a woman in her mid-thirties, auburn hair pulled back, kneeling beside a garden bed with soil on her hands.
She looks strong. The kind of woman who suspects things and pays attention.
I email her: Hi Amy — I know this is unexpected.
I'm contacting you about a woman who befriended you in 2024.
I don't know what name she used with you.
I have evidence that she targeted your husband David, and that she's done the same thing to at least four other couples, including mine.
I'm not looking to cause pain — I'm looking for answers.
If you're open to talking, here's my number.
Send.
* * *
Three messages out. One woman I haven't contacted.
I sit in my studio and I wait and I think about Cara in Denver, designing logos, not knowing.
Or maybe knowing. Kate's notes aren't always right — she wrote that Lauren's husband told her "it was nothing" and she believed him, but that doesn't mean she did.
People carry suspicions for years without acting on them.
I did — not suspicion exactly, but something.
A feeling. A half-second of wrongness that I swallowed and never examined.
The feeling I got when Kate and Liam were in the same room and I caught her looking at him a beat too long. The feeling I dismissed as flattery — my friend thinks my husband is attractive, that's nice, that means I chose well.
Not flattery. Hunger. A specific, practiced hunger that I read as warmth.
* * *
My phone rings at 2:17 PM. Unknown number, Portland area code.
"Danielle?" A woman's voice. Low, careful. "This is Rachel Burke."
I stand up from my workbench. Knock a piping tip off the counter — it clinks on the floor and rolls under the cabinet. I don't pick it up.
"Rachel. Thank you for calling."
"Your email." A pause. "You said Megan."
"Yes."
"How do you know that name?"
"She's been in my life for three years. She goes by Kate now. She was my maid of honor." I hear the breath Rachel takes. Sharp. Quick. "I found her files. On a hard drive. She keeps records — photos, notes, aliases. Your name was there. Ryan's."
Silence. Long enough that I check the phone to make sure the call hasn't dropped.
"Records," Rachel says finally. "She keeps records."
"Organized by initials. Your folder is labeled R.B. She noted how she met you — an open house. She said she told you she was house-hunting."
"She toured six houses with me." Rachel's voice is flat now. Controlled. "Over three months. She came to my open houses. She brought wine to my office once. I thought she was my client who became my friend."
"She said her name was Megan."
"Megan Torres. She had business cards."
Business cards. Of course she did.
"Rachel — there are five folders on this drive. Five couples. You're one. I'm one. There are three others."
Another silence. Then: "I know."
"You know?"
"I've been looking for her for two years, Danielle. I've been looking since the day I found a Venmo payment from my husband's account to someone who didn't exist anymore. I found one of the others — Sadie, a photographer in Minneapolis. We've been in contact for over a year."
Sadie. That name wasn't in Kate's notes. Or — wait. Was it? I think of the folders. R.B., J.T., M.K., D.W., L.P. Five folders. Five targets. But Rachel just named someone not on the drive.
"There are more?" I ask.
"There are more," Rachel says. "More than five. We think maybe eleven or twelve over the last six years. Different cities. Different names. The same woman."
Eleven or twelve.
I sink into my studio chair. The piping tip is still on the floor. A tray of sugar paste roses is drying on the rack behind me — I made them this morning without thinking about it. Little pink spirals. Perfect and pointless.
"Danielle," Rachel says. "Where are you located?"
"Connecticut. Outside Hartford."
"And she's still there? Still in your life? Still calling herself Kate?"
"Yes. She texted me yesterday about dinner plans."
Rachel exhales. "That's different. She never stayed before. She always left."
"I know. That's what scares me."
"Can you come to Portland? Or meet somewhere halfway? There's a group of us. Six women now — well, seven with you. We've been building a case. We know her real name."
Her real name. The thing I've been circling for days. The center of the knot.
"What is it?" I ask.
"Not on the phone. Come to us. Bring the hard drive. Bring everything you have." A pause. "And Danielle? Don't let her know you're looking. Don't change your behavior. She's good at reading people — she reads body language the way you read... what did you say you do?"
"Pastry chef."
"The way you read a recipe. She'll know something's off if you go cold on her. Keep texting. Keep making plans. Keep being her friend."
Her friend. Right.
"I can come Saturday," I say.
"Saturday works. I'll text you an address."
The call ends. I pick up the piping tip from the floor. Tip 104 — the rose petal tip. I squeeze it in my palm until the metal edge presses a line into my skin.
Seven women. Maybe twelve. And they've been looking for her. They already have a case.
I'm not alone in this.
That's the first thing since Tuesday that feels like relief.