I Took My Wife To A Party. She Left With Another Man Because He’s Rich. He Threw A Dollar Bill On…

“Everyone knew but me, apparently,” I said, feeling stupid and angry at the same time. “I just got a letter from her lawyer. She wants spousal support and half my business. The business she always said was beneath her.”

Jack laughed, but it wasn’t a nice laugh. It was the laugh of a lawyer who’d just been handed ammunition.

“Oh, Darren, my friend. You’re about to have fun. Legally sanctioned fun.”

“I don’t want fun. I want to not lose everything I’ve built.”

“Same thing in this case,” Jack said. “Come by my office tomorrow morning. Nine sharp. Bring any financial documents you’ve got: bank statements, business records, that letter from her lawyer. And Darren?”

“Yeah?”

“Stop talking to her. Don’t answer her calls, don’t respond to texts, don’t engage at all. Everything goes through me now. Understand?”

“Understood.”

“Good. And Darren? We’re going to destroy her. Legally and ethically, of course, but thoroughly.”

I hung up feeling something close to hope for the first time in days. Maybe I was screwed, maybe she’d get half of everything and I’d spend the next decade rebuilding, but at least I had Jack Freeman in my corner. And that man loved winning almost as much as he loved billing hours.

Noah stuck his head into the kitchen.

“Good news or bad news?”

“Potentially good news disguised as expensive news.”

“That’s the lawyer spirit!” Noah said. “Want me to make pancakes? Spite pancakes taste better than sad pancakes.”

“Make a lot,” I said. “We’re going to need the energy.”

We ate pancakes and planned for war. Jack Freeman’s office was in one of those downtown buildings that tried really hard to look important—all glass and steel and modern art that nobody understood but everyone pretended to appreciate. His suite was on the seventh floor, decorated in that expensive minimalist style where everything cost a fortune but looked like it came from IKEA’s corporate line.

There were leather chairs, a massive desk made of some endangered tree species, and framed diplomas on the wall that reminded you he went to fancy schools where they taught you how to financially eviscerate people within the boundaries of the law. I showed up at 9:00 with a cardboard box full of documents that represented my entire financial life: bank statements, business records, tax returns from the last five years, credit card bills, mortgage papers, and that damn letter from Miranda’s lawyer that I’d read so many times I could practically recite it.

Jack was already there with coffee that smelled way better than anything I made at home, and sitting next to him was a woman I’d never met before.

“Darren Holt, meet Clara Woo,” Jack said, gesturing to the Asian woman in her 30s who looked like she could calculate your net worth just by looking at your shoes.

She wore a sharp gray suit, rectangular glasses, and had the kind of expression that suggested she’d seen every financial crime humanity could dream up and wasn’t impressed by any of them.

“Clara is a forensic accountant. Best in the business. She’s going to dig through your finances and make sure we know exactly what we’re dealing with.”

Clara stood up and shook my hand with a grip that was surprisingly strong for someone who spent their days staring at spreadsheets.

“Mr. Holt, Jack’s told me about your situation. I’m sorry you’re going through this, but I’m very good at finding where money goes when people think nobody’s looking.”

“Call me Darren. And I appreciate that, because I have a feeling my wife’s been creative with our finances lately.”

We sat down around Jack’s conference table and I started unpacking my box of financial shame. Clara’s eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas morning, which I guess makes sense when your job is following money trails. She immediately started organizing everything into piles with a system that probably made sense to her but looked like chaos to me.

“Okay,” Jack said, opening his legal pad to a fresh page. “Let’s start with the basics. Community property state. Married 23 years. Four kids. She’s claiming she needs spousal support and half the business. What assets are we looking at total?”

I ran through the numbers. The house was worth about 450,000. My business brought in roughly 300,000 a year in profit. Then there were retirement accounts, savings—the usual accumulation of a life spent not being completely irresponsible with money.

Clara took notes on her laptop, her fingers flying across the keyboard like she was playing a piano concerto.

“And she’s claiming what grounds for divorce?” Clara asked, not looking up from her screen.

“Irreconcilable differences, according to her lawyer, which is code for ‘I got caught cheating and need to make it sound mutual.'”

Jack leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers in that way lawyers do when they’re about to say something they think is clever.

“Here’s what we’re going to do. Clara is going to audit your joint accounts, credit cards, any financial activity over the last year. We need to know if she’s been hiding money, spending inappropriately, anything we can use to counter her narrative.”

“How long does that take?” I asked, already dreading the answer.

“For someone good, a week,” Clara said, finally looking up from her laptop. “For me, three days. I’m very motivated by spite, and cheating spouses offend my sense of order.”

She smiled, and it was the smile of someone who enjoyed ruining people’s days. Jack mentioned,

“You think she’s been staying in hotels?”

“I know she has. I’ve got the credit card charge from last Friday. $387 at the Belgrave Grand.”

Clara’s fingers flew across her keyboard.

“What card?”

“Our joint Amex. The one linked to the business account for legitimate expenses.”

Her eyes narrowed behind her glasses.

“Your business account? She’s been using business funds for personal expenses?”