“I don’t control where an assigned investigator goes. I haven’t asked anyone to go anywhere.”
“You’re in that business.”
“That’s why I disclosed the conflict.”
He stared at me as though I were choosing technicalities over family. I asked whether he had known the charges were on my accounts.
“Nadine said you’d helped.”
“When?”
He hesitated. “Months ago. She said you didn’t want a fuss.”
There was another sentence under that one, the part he didn’t want to say. I waited.
“Your mother asked whether she should thank you. Nadine said not to embarrass you.”
I remembered Mom hugging me over a stack of invitations and saying I had always been the sensible one. I had thought she meant I was good at organizing envelopes.
“Did either of you ask me?”
“We didn’t think we needed to.”
“You did.”
He put the envelope back inside his jacket. At the door, he asked whether I was coming to the ceremony.
“No.”
He nodded once, disappointed. After he left, I sent Paul a message saying I would answer factual questions about any supposed contribution from me. I didn’t tell him what to do about his marriage.
He called ten minutes later.
“Was there ever a gift agreement?”
“I offered to pay for my own dress and the shower cake. That’s all.”
“Can you send me the messages?”
I found the exchange where Nadine asked me to handle those two things. I sent screenshots that included the dates and the surrounding conversation, then offered to forward the originals. He thanked me and said he had postponed the ceremony.
“She’s saying it will blow over by this afternoon.”
I watched a truck reverse into the loading space across my street.
“The cards are blocked,” I said. “It isn’t going to blow over.”
By noon, Mom was leaving messages about flowers, guests, and Nadine crying in a hotel suite. I answered with one text: I am safe. I will speak with you when you can discuss what happened to me as well.
Then I turned off notifications and began opening statements.
The numbers required care. Nadine’s grand total mixed paid charges, deposits, credits, and unpaid invoices. The amounts she had announced at dinner added to $108,000 before any honeymoon expense, but that did not mean every dollar had posted to my accounts. A venue deposit was not the entire venue bill. A catering quote could include a later adjustment. I marked confirmed transactions separately from claims.
The more useful discovery was a pattern. Several charges occurred shortly after Nadine visited my apartment. I remembered leaving my laptop open while we worked on seating charts. She had asked to use it to confirm a vendor. I had said yes. That gave her access to a browser, not permission to use my cards.
I changed my passwords, signed other sessions out, and checked recovery details. On one shopping account, the shipping address had been changed to hers. I saved the notice before correcting it. Then I froze my credit and obtained reports to look for accounts I hadn’t opened.
No new loans appeared. That was one good thing in a day when I needed something definite to hold.
