There had been an attempted personal loan application in my name.

Forty thousand dollars.

It had not been approved.

But someone had submitted my Social Security number, birth date, address, and income information.

Information Priscilla should never have possessed.

When I finally stepped back inside, Dean was standing in the kitchen.

Priscilla was gone.

“Where is she?”

“She left.”

“You let her leave?”

He turned toward me.

His eyes were red.

“What was I supposed to do, Mom? Lock the door?”

“No.”

I looked toward the driveway.

Her car was gone.

“Did she say where she was going?”

Dean shook his head.

Then he sat down.

He looked twenty years older.

“I gave her the card.”

I didn’t answer.

“Years ago,” he continued. “When Dad died and your furnace broke, remember? You gave it to me for emergencies. I put it in the safe at home.”

“And she found it.”

“I guess.”

“No, Dean.”

He looked up.

“Stop guessing.”

That silenced him.

“Your wife has spent tens of thousands of dollars in my name. Someone tried to borrow forty thousand dollars using my identity. This is no longer about a Christmas party.”

He covered his face.

“I know.”

“No. You don’t.”

I walked to my desk.

The folder containing my statements was exactly where I had left it.

I carried it to the kitchen.

For the next two hours, Dean and I went through every page.

Once I stopped assuming the unfamiliar purchases were mistakes, a pattern emerged.

The charges had begun small.

$89.

$140.

$212.

Then larger.

$600.

$900.

$1,500.

It was clever.

She had trained me gradually.

Not deliberately, perhaps.

But effectively.

Every time I saw something unfamiliar, I doubted myself instead of her.

That realization hurt almost more than the money.

I had spent months quietly wondering whether my memory was failing.

I had begun writing down purchases in a notebook.

I had even considered asking my doctor whether forgetfulness like mine was normal.

Priscilla had stolen something I couldn’t find on a statement.

My confidence in my own mind.

Dean picked up one page.

“Wait.”

“What?”

“This hotel.”

He pointed to a charge from September.

The Briarwood Hotel.

$684.

“I was in Dallas that week,” he said.

“So?”

“Priscilla told me she was staying with her sister.”

We looked at each other.

I saw the thought reach him.

“No,” he said immediately.

I hadn’t spoken.

“Don’t.”

“I’m not saying anything.”

“She wouldn’t.”

“Then don’t assume. Find out.”

He pulled out his phone.

Before he could dial, someone knocked on my front door.

Three hard knocks.

Dean stood.

I opened it.

A young man in a dark coat stood beneath my porch light holding a large white envelope.

“Sylvia Grant?”

“Yes.”

He handed it to me.