I Caught My Daughter-In-law Using My Late Wife’s Sanctuary For Her Affair. She Didn’t Know I Was A Retired Attorney Watching From The Woods. How Do I Tell My Son She Also Stole $40,000?

Tom Mitchell. He was at the lake house and wondering where I was.

I quickly texted back that I had been delayed and asked if he could come back in an hour. He agreed.

Good, that gave me time. I continued watching.

The man and Victoria moved toward the back door. For a moment, I thought they were going to come outside, and I pressed myself against the wall of the shed.

But they stopped at the door and just stood there, looking out at the lake. He wrapped his arms around her from behind.

She leaned back against him. They looked comfortable, natural, like a real couple.

This wasn’t some impulsive fling. This was a relationship, an ongoing affair.

After a few more minutes, they moved away from the door and disappeared from my view. I waited.

About fifteen minutes later, I heard the front door open and close. I crept around the side of the shed until I could see the driveway.

The man was walking toward the silver BMW. He was maybe forty years old, tall, dark hair, wearing expensive-looking clothes, a sport coat and designer jeans.

He looked successful, confident. He got into the BMW and started the engine.

I raised my camera one more time and photographed the license plate. After he drove away, I stayed hidden for another ten minutes.

I wanted to see what Victoria would do. Eventually, she came out the front door carrying her purse.

She locked the house with a key. A key to my house.

I had given David a spare key years ago, and apparently, he had given it to her. She got into her car, a white Lexus SUV, and drove away in the opposite direction from the BMW.

Smart; they weren’t leaving together. They weren’t taking any chances.

I waited until both cars had been gone for at least fifteen minutes before I walked back to the lake house. I let myself in with my own key and looked around.

The wine glasses were washed and put away. The couch cushions were straightened.

If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I never would have known anyone had been here. She was careful, meticulous.

How long had this been going on? I walked through the house, looking for any other signs.

In the master bedroom, the bed was made, but not quite the way I remembered leaving it. The pillows were in different positions.

There was a slight indentation in the comforter. I stood in the doorway of that bedroom, the bedroom where Helen and I had slept for forty years.

And I felt a rage building inside me that I had never experienced before. Not just for the betrayal of my son, but for the violation of my home, my memories, my wife’s memory.

Victoria had brought her lover here to this sacred place, and she had used it like some cheap motel. I took a deep breath and forced myself to calm down.

Rage wouldn’t help David; only evidence would, only a plan. I called Tom Mitchell and asked him to come back.

I met with him about the dock, discussed materials and timelines and costs. The whole time, my mind was somewhere else, but I needed to maintain appearances.

I needed everything to seem normal. After Tom left, I sat down at the kitchen table with a legal pad and started making notes.

This was what I did best: building a case, analyzing the facts, planning a strategy. First question: who was the man?

I had his license plate number. I still had contacts from my legal career who could help me with that.

A friend who ran a private investigation firm. We had worked together on dozens of cases over the years.

I picked up my phone and called Frank Peterson. Frank and I went way back.

He had helped me with corporate investigations, asset searches, background checks. He was discreet, professional, and thorough: exactly what I needed.

I told him I needed information on a license plate. I gave him the number.

I asked him to find out everything he could about the owner. He didn’t ask why.

That’s what I always appreciated about Frank; he understood that some things needed to be handled quietly. He called me back two hours later.

The BMW was registered to a man named Bradley Thornton, age 42. Home address in Upper Arlington, one of the wealthiest suburbs of Columbus.

Married with two children. He worked as a financial adviser at a prestigious firm downtown.

Married. He was married, too.

The betrayal had layers. Frank continued with his report.

Bradley Thornton had been with his firm for fifteen years. He managed portfolios for high-net-worth clients.

His wife’s name was Jennifer. They had been married for fourteen years.

I asked Frank how long he thought this affair might have been going on. He said he would need to do more digging to find out.

Phone records, credit card statements, things like that. It would take time and resources.

I told him to do whatever was necessary. Money was not an issue; my son’s future was at stake.

Over the next two weeks, Frank compiled a comprehensive file on Bradley Thornton and his relationship with my daughter-in-law. What he found was worse than I had imagined.

The affair had been going on for at least eighteen months. Frank found hotel receipts, restaurant charges, even a weekend trip to Chicago that Victoria had told David was a girl’s getaway with her college friends.

She had been with Bradley Thornton the entire time. But that wasn’t the worst part.

Frank discovered something else during his investigation, something that made my blood run cold. Victoria had been making withdrawals from the joint checking account she shared with David.

Small amounts at first, a few hundred here and there, but over the past year, the amounts had increased: 2,000, 3,000, 5,000. Always in cash.

Always when David was traveling for work. The total was over $40,000.

Frank couldn’t prove where the money was going, but he had a theory. Bradley Thornton had recently taken out a second mortgage on his house.

His firm was under investigation for some questionable investment practices. He was in financial trouble.

Victoria wasn’t just cheating on my son; she was stealing from him to support her lover. I sat with this information for three days.

I didn’t sleep much. I couldn’t eat.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Victoria’s face, that innocent smile she always gave David. The way she called him honey and told him she loved him.

All of it was lies, every single word. I wanted to tell David immediately.

I wanted to drive to his house and show him everything. But I knew that would be a mistake.

David loved Victoria. He would want to believe there was some explanation.

He might even be angry at me for investigating his wife. No, I needed to be strategic about this.

I needed professional advice. I called my old colleague, Patricia Mendes.

She was one of the best family law attorneys in Ohio. We had worked on the opposite sides of many corporate cases over the years, and I respected her judgment completely.

I drove to Columbus and met with her in her office. I laid out everything: the photographs from the lake house, the license plate, Frank’s investigation, the bank records, all of it.

Patricia listened without interrupting. When I finished, she was quiet for a long moment.

Then she spoke.

“This is bad,”

she said.

“But it’s also an opportunity. If your son wants to divorce her, he has grounds for fault. More importantly, the financial fraud gives him leverage for the custody and property settlement.”

She explained the legal strategy. In Ohio, adultery itself doesn’t affect divorce proceedings much anymore.

But the financial misconduct was different. If Victoria had been systematically stealing from the marital assets to give to her lover, that was dissipation of marital funds.

It could significantly impact how property was divided. And the custody situation was even more important.

Victoria had been lying to David for at least eighteen months. She had been stealing money.

She had been making decisions that put her affair above her children’s welfare. All of this could be used to argue that David should have primary custody of Emma and Michael.

But Patricia warned me: timing was critical. We needed to make sure David was prepared.

We needed to have all the documentation in order. And we needed to act before Victoria had any chance to hide assets or destroy evidence.

I asked Patricia what the first step should be. She said I needed to talk to David.

That was the hardest conversation of my life. I called David and asked him to come to my house in Cincinnati.

I told him it was important and that I needed to discuss something with him in person. He sounded concerned but agreed to drive down that Saturday.

When he arrived, I sat him down in my study, the room where I had spent countless hours working on cases over the years. The room where I had always felt most in control.