Chapter 2 - HIS FIRST WIFE KNEW MY SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER
My name is Claire Bennett.
Not Keller anymore.
I would make that change later.
That night, though, I sat at my kitchen table with Natalie while two officers photographed documents from the bedroom.
Neither of us knew what to say.
What exactly do you offer the woman whose husband is also your husband?
Coffee?
Wine?
An apology?
Natalie solved it.
“Do you have tea?”
I almost laughed.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Ten minutes later we were sitting across from one another with mugs between us.
She was thirty-nine.
I was thirty-five.
Ryan had told me Natalie was his “unstable ex-wife” from a short marriage that ended years before we met.
He had told Natalie I was an accountant helping him with one of his businesses.
She stared at me.
“Accountant?”
“I’m a dental-office administrator.”
She closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
“What?”
“He told me you handled payroll.”
“For who?”
“His construction company.”
Ryan did not own a construction company.
At least not one I knew about.
My stomach tightened.
“What company?”
“Keller Residential Services.”
I stared.
“That’s the name on our mortgage paperwork.”
Natalie went still.
“Our?”
I brought out the folder from the hall cabinet.
Mortgage statements.
Property insurance.
Home-equity documents.
Natalie looked through them.
Her face drained.
“This address…”
“What?”
“He told me this was a rental property.”
I stopped breathing.
I had bought the house with Ryan three years earlier.
Or thought I had.
He told me he contributed $180,000 from the sale of an old investment property.
My savings covered another $90,000.
The rest was financed.
Natalie whispered:
“He told me he used money from our retirement account to buy an investment property.”
Our retirement account.
Same money.
Two stories.
One house.
Then she looked at one of the loan applications.
“Claire.”
“What?”
“That’s my phone number.”
I looked.
Under alternate contact:
Natalie Keller.
Relationship:
Bookkeeper.
She looked sick.
“He used my number?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Then she found something worse.
A tax document.
Borrower financial statement.
It listed:
Claire Bennett Keller — annual income $124,000.
I had never earned $124,000.
Closer to $68,000.
Then:
Natalie Keller — consulting income $96,000.
Natalie stared.
“I haven’t worked full-time in three years.”
“What do you do?”
“I teach piano.”
Part-time.
Ryan had inflated both our incomes to qualify for credit.
Then Natalie asked:
“Do you know my Social Security number?”
“No.”
She slid another page toward me.
There it was.
Partially masked.
Last four digits.
I looked at her.
“How would I—”
“I’m not asking because I think you did it.”
Her voice shook.
“I’m asking because Ryan gave you access to a file with mine in it.”
I checked the folder.
She was right.
Tax records.
Old joint return.
Natalie’s birth date.
Employer history.
Enough information to create accounts.
My skin went cold.
Then one officer entered.
“Ms. Bennett?”
“Yes?”
“We found another set of documents in the garage office.”
He placed a plastic evidence sleeve on the table.
Inside:
Two powers of attorney.
One bearing my name.
One Natalie’s.
Both notarized.
Neither of us had signed them.
Natalie looked at me.
I looked at her.
The bigamy was suddenly only one piece of a larger machine.
Ryan had not simply wanted two wives.
May you like
He wanted two identities he could financially operate through.
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