We met an hour later at a coffee shop two towns over, somewhere neither of us would run into anyone we knew.

Patricia had a folder with her, and she kept both hands flat on top of it while she talked, as though it might blow away.

She explained, as carefully and as plainly as she could, that Julian had set up an off-book shell company, RZ Consulting, tied to a silent partner, and that he had been using it to move money out of our family-allocated assets and into accounts she believed were private to him.

She was careful about her words.