I did not want to return to the apartment.
That surprised me.
For years, it had been the place I went whenever the rest of my life became noisy.
I knew which floorboard near the bedroom clicked in winter.
I knew the radiator in the study needed two turns before it stopped knocking.
I knew exactly how the city sounded from the terrace after midnight.
That night, the thought of unlocking my own door made my hands cold.
Officer Grant suggested I stay elsewhere until investigators finished.
I refused.
Not because I felt brave.
Because I needed to see what Jason had done.
My mother objected.
Dad didn’t.
“You’ll wonder all night if you don’t go,” he said.
He was right.
We left the ruined reception shortly after midnight.
Natalie brought a coat to cover my wedding dress.
I had forgotten I was still wearing it.
At the hotel entrance, photographers had already gathered.
Someone had posted video.
Of course they had.
Two hundred guests and a public argument guaranteed that.
Natalie guided me toward the car.
“Don’t look.”
I looked anyway.
Phones were raised.
Voices shouted questions.
“Did your husband steal from you?”
“Was the marriage a fraud?”
“Is Eleanor being arrested?”
I got into the car without answering.
Mom sat beside me.
Dad rode with Mr. Henderson and the officers ahead.
Rebecca followed in another vehicle.
I asked her to come.
She understood the apartment in a way none of us did.
Not its rooms.
The pattern.
When we reached East Eighty-Second Street, two police vehicles were outside.
The doorman opened my door.
His face crumpled.
“Ms. Roberts, I’m so sorry.”
I had never been happier to hear my maiden name.
“It’s okay, Thomas.”
It wasn’t.
But none of this was his fault.
The lobby smelled of marble polish and lilies.
Everything looked unchanged.
That offended me.
We took the elevator upstairs.
Officer Grant stood beside me.
My mother held my bouquet because I had somehow carried it from the hotel.
I stared at the flowers.
White roses.
Jason had chosen them.
When the elevator doors opened, two officers were standing outside my apartment.
Yellow evidence markers dotted the hallway near the lock.
A technician photographed the door.
My key suddenly felt unfamiliar.
“Do you want me to open it?” Grant asked.
“No.”
I did it myself.
The lock turned.
The apartment was dark.
Nothing obvious had been disturbed.
For one impossible second, relief flooded me.
Then I remembered they had been stopped quickly.
Officer Grant entered first.
We waited.
Several minutes later, he returned.
“You can come in. Don’t touch anything we haven’t cleared.”
I stepped across the threshold.
My wedding dress brushed the floor.
The living room looked exactly as I had left it.
Jason’s jacket hung over a chair.
His shoes sat near the entry console.
A half-empty coffee cup from that morning remained beside the sink.
Evidence of ordinary life.
That hurt more than chaos would have.
Rebecca entered behind me.
She stood still.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Good answer.”
I almost smiled.
Mr. Henderson showed Officer Grant where Marissa and the two men had been stopped.
“They got approximately ten feet inside.”
“Did they open anything?”
“Security reached them quickly.”
One officer called from the hallway.
“Grant.”
We followed.
He stood beside the small console table.
One drawer was partially open.
I rarely used it.
“What’s in there?” Grant asked.
“Mail. Spare chargers.”
He pointed.
“There are fresh glove marks on the interior.”
I stared.
“Why would they search that?”
Rebecca answered.
“Keys.”
I looked at her.
“That’s where I kept my spare car keys,” she said.
I felt sick again.
Grant made a note.
We moved deeper into the apartment.
The study was untouched.
At least visibly.
I stopped at the door.
The closet stood closed.
The safe was behind it.
Grant noticed my face.
“That where the safe is?”
“Yes.”
He examined the closet before opening it.
The safe door was closed.
No scratches.
No obvious tampering.
I exhaled.
“Do you want to verify the contents?”
“Yes.”
After photographs were taken, I opened it.
Passport.
Jewelry.
Property folder.
Everything remained.
I took out the folder.
Mom touched my arm.
“Don’t remove anything yet.”
I nodded.
Officer Grant checked the papers.
The old deed was there.
The recent transfer copies were not.
Mom had those with Mr. Kaplan.
For the first time, I appreciated her secrecy completely.
If Jason had known where the new documents were, would he have sent people somewhere else?
The thought frightened me.
Grant examined the old deed.
“Would this still be useful?”
Mom answered.
“Not for a legitimate transfer after the recent changes.”
“Illegitimate?”
“That depends on what someone was willing to falsify.”
He nodded.
“Then we’ll photograph everything.”
Rebecca wandered carefully toward the bookshelf.
Suddenly she stopped.
“What?”
She pointed to a framed photograph.
Jason and me at our engagement dinner.
“What about it?”
“Behind it.”
I frowned.
“There’s nothing behind it.”
“Look.”
Grant moved the frame.
A small black object was attached to the back.
My heart stopped.
“What is that?”
The technician approached.
“Could be a tracker or recorder.”
My skin prickled.
“A recorder?”
He photographed it before removing it.
“It has a microphone opening.”
Mom looked at me.
“How long has that picture been there?”
“Since the engagement dinner.”
“Who placed it?”
“Jason.”
The room became unbearably quiet.
I remembered the night.
He had printed the photo himself.
Placed it on the shelf.
Moved two books because he said it looked better there.
Rebecca covered her mouth.
“I had one too.”
Everyone turned.
“What?”
“A clock.”
Her voice was barely audible.
“Jason gave me a desk clock during our marriage. After the divorce, my lawyer found a recording device inside.”
Officer Grant looked sharply at her.
“Was that reported?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing. We couldn’t prove who installed it.”
I stared at the tiny object in the evidence bag.
All the private conversations held in that room.
Calls with my parents.
Meetings with clients.
Conversations about money.
My mother had been there six weeks earlier.
She had asked whether I trusted Jason.
I had defended him.
Had he heard?
Grant asked the technician to sweep the apartment.
We waited in the kitchen.
I changed out of my wedding dress.
Natalie had brought clothes from her car.
When I returned in jeans and a sweater, I felt more like myself.
The dress remained draped over the bedroom chair.
I couldn’t look at it.
The technician found another device forty minutes later.
Under my desk.
Then another in the bedroom.
A tiny camera facing the closet.
I sat down.
Mom swore.
I had heard her swear perhaps five times in my life.
This deserved one.
Officer Grant crouched near me.
“Do you know who had regular access to this apartment?”
“Jason.”
“Anyone else?”
“Cleaning service. Building staff. Natalie occasionally. My parents.”
“Eleanor?”
“Not officially.”
Claire had come with Dad later.
She answered from the doorway.
“She had copies.”
I looked at her.
“Copies of what?”
“She showed me a key months ago.”
My pulse rose.
“The one tonight?”
“I think so.”
“When?”
“After your engagement party.”
Mom looked at Claire.
“What did Eleanor say?”
“That Jason had finally stopped making stupid choices.”
Claire’s face twisted.
“I thought she meant emotionally.”
Rebecca gave a hollow laugh.
“We all translated them into better people than they were.”
The sentence hurt because it was true.
Another officer entered carrying a laptop bag.
“This belong to you?”
I recognized it.
“Jason’s.”
It had been under the bed.
Officer Grant asked whether they could take it.
“Yes.”
“Do you know the password?”
“No.”
Claire spoke.
“I might.”
Everyone looked at her.
She shrugged.
“He uses the same one.”
Grant did not ask her to say it aloud.
He wrote her information down for investigators.
Dad entered with coffee.
He handed me one.
I took it but didn’t drink.
Then Natalie called from the living room.
“Sophia.”
Something in her voice brought me to my feet.
She stood beside an open cabinet.
Inside were several binders.
One belonged to me.
The others did not.
“Were these here before?”
I frowned.
“I don’t know.”
One binder was labeled MONTES CAPITAL.
Another had no label.
Officer Grant opened it carefully.
The first pages were spreadsheets.
Names.
Addresses.
Property values.
Income estimates.
I moved closer.
“What is this?”
Arthur, who had come from the station after giving a statement, looked over Grant’s shoulder.
His face changed.
“That’s a prospect list.”
“A what?”
“People Jason was considering approaching for money.”
I looked at the names.
Some were crossed out.
Some highlighted.
Then I saw mine.
SOPHIA ROBERTS.
Beside my name were handwritten notes.
Owns apt outright.
Parents comfortable.
Only child.
Emotionally attached to property.
Marriage simplifies access.
I stopped breathing.
Rebecca turned away.
Mom covered her mouth.
There were dates beside my name.
The earliest was six weeks before Jason and I had met.
I looked at Arthur.
“What does that mean?”
He did not answer.
I grabbed his sleeve.
“Arthur.”
His voice came slowly.
“It means Jason may have known who you were before you thought you met him.”
A memory surfaced.
The gallery opening where Jason and I first spoke.
He had claimed a colleague invited him.
He had wandered over after hearing me discuss a renovation project.
We joked about terrible lighting.
I thought it was accidental.
I looked back at the binder.
Six weeks before that night, Jason had already written my name beside the value of my apartment.
Rebecca came beside me.
Her face showed no surprise.
Only recognition.
“That’s what I meant when I said the property was the reason.”
I turned toward her.
“You think he targeted me.”
She nodded.
“I think he researched you.”
My phone vibrated.
A number I did not recognize.
I ignored it.
It rang again.
Officer Grant looked at the screen.
“Answer on speaker.”
I did.
“Hello?”
For a second, silence.
Then Jason’s voice.
“Sophia.”
My entire body went cold.
Grant gestured for me to continue.
“How are you calling me?”
“They released me pending further questioning.”
My stomach dropped.
He continued before I could respond.
“You’re making a mistake.”
I looked at the binder on my table.
“My name was in your files before we met.”
Silence.
Then a breath.
“Sophia, listen carefully.”
“No.”
“You don’t know what you found.”
“I know my apartment value is written beside my name.”
“That file isn’t what it looks like.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
I almost laughed.
The same phrase.
Again.
“What is it, then?”
Jason paused.
When he answered, the soft voice was gone.
“Put my things together.”
Officer Grant shook his head.
“No.”
Jason continued.
“I’m coming home.”
I stared at the phone.
“This isn’t your home.”
“It is my marital residence.”
Mom stepped closer.
Grant raised one hand, signaling silence.
Jason’s voice lowered.
“You cannot lock me out of my own home.”
I looked at the listening device in the evidence bag.
The prospect list.
The notes beside my name.
The wedding dress in the bedroom.
Then I answered.
“You should speak to your lawyer.”
Jason was silent.
I ended the call.
Officer Grant looked toward Mr. Henderson.
“Change every access code tonight.”
Mr. Henderson nodded.
My phone immediately lit with a text.
Jason.
One sentence.
You have no idea what you just started.
I showed Grant.
He photographed it.
Rebecca read it over my shoulder.
Her face tightened.
“He sent me the same sentence.”
“When?”
“The night I refused to sell my house.”
I looked at her.
“What happened after?”
She swallowed.
“Three days later, every private financial document I had disappeared.”
I looked toward the safe.
The binder.
The hidden cameras.
Jason’s laptop.
And for the first time, I understood that protecting the apartment had not ended his plan.
It had only forced him to change it.
Click here to continue reading: PART 8: Jason Came Back for His Belongings With a Lawyer, but One Forgotten Envelope Made His Entire Story Collapse
Two Weeks Before My Wedding, My Mother Demanded My Apartment Deed and Refused to Tell Me What She Knew
Part 7 of 50
