The notes beside the bank transaction looked familiar.

I was not a handwriting examiner.

Familiarity did not prove who had signed an authorization I had not yet seen.

But it gave me another reason to stop accepting reassurance in place of records.

I photographed the receipt and the ledger pages.

When the floorboards creaked upstairs, I slipped the originals beneath the bills on the counter.

In bed, I lay with my back to Ronald.

His phone lit on the nightstand.