Chapter 2 - Welcome to Palm Springs
The flight to California took a little over two hours.
For Lucas, it must have felt like a victory lap.
I imagined him sitting in first class, sipping champagne, believing he had successfully pulled off the greatest deception of his life.
He thought he had manipulated a grieving, devoted wife who would blindly wait in Denver.
He thought he was arriving to a sun-drenched paradise, a beautiful mistress, and a bank account overflowing with stolen wealth.
I tracked his flight using the airline app on his iPad, which he had foolishly left synced to our home network.
Flight 482 landed at Palm Springs International Airport exactly on time.
At 3:15 PM, my phone buzzed with an automated credit card alert.
Lucas was trying to rent a luxury SUV.
The transaction for $1,200 was declined.
I watched the notification pop up on my screen, a genuine laugh escaping my lips for the first time in days.
He must have assumed it was a simple fraud alert.
He probably handed the agent a different card.
Three minutes later, another alert.
Declined.
He was trying to use the joint debit card now.
The one tied to the account I had just emptied.
I could picture the scene perfectly.
Lucas, standing at the rental counter in his tailored suit, growing increasingly frustrated and embarrassed.
He was a man who hated looking foolish in public.
Ten minutes passed before my phone rang.
It was him.
I let it go to voicemail.
He called again.
And again.
I silenced the phone, walked into our kitchen, and poured myself a glass of wine.
I wasn't ready to talk to him.
I wanted him to sweat.
I wanted the reality of his situation to slowly close in on him like a vice.
An hour later, the voicemail notification chimed.
I pressed play, placing the phone on the granite countertop.
"Elena, honey, it's me," his voice echoed through the quiet kitchen. He sounded breathless, trying to mask his rising panic. "I landed in Zurich, but there's some issue with the cards. The bank must have frozen them for international travel. Can you call them? Or transfer some funds to my backup account? Call me back immediately. Love you."
He was still lying.
Still playing the devoted husband in Switzerland.
He had no idea that I knew he was standing in the desert heat of California.
I didn't call the bank.
I didn't call him back.
Instead, I opened the smart home security app on my tablet.
Over the past three days, while pretending to be shattered by his departure, I had been busy.
I had changed the access codes to the front door, the garage, and the security gates.
I had scheduled movers to arrive the following morning to pack up all of his belongings.
His clothes, his golf clubs, his expensive watches.
They were all going into a cheap storage unit on the edge of town.
By the time he realized what was happening, his life in Denver would be completely erased.
My phone rang again.
This time, the caller ID showed an unknown California number.
He was using a payphone or borrowing someone else's phone.
May you like
Desperation was setting in.
I smiled, took a sip of my wine, and hit ignore.
