At 9:45 Cruz and Riley came in, and instantly I knew something had changed. Cruz didn’t look at me as he took his seat. His jaw was clenched tight, and he all but slammed his computer tablet down on the table. Riley looked like a wrung-out marathoner who’d finally spotted the finish line ahead. Something had happened. They’d found something incriminating. My mind raced through the possibilities.

Cruz switched on the recording equipment and went through all the preliminaries again—time and place, persons in the room, rights waiver acknowledged, and signature identified.

Then he looked at me. His eyes weren’t soft and liquid anymore. “When I first heard the name Shay Lambert,” he said, “I thought you came from money.”

“Yeah, and Shay Chance sounds like a snooty French restaurant,” Riley cracked.

This was new. No more help us out here. Now they were being snarky, needling me, trying to get under my skin.

“Then I heard Brown and Columbia and Wall Street,” Cruz said, “and I was sure of it. But that was all a big act, wasn’t it?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said slowly. “That’s all true.”

“But that’s not who you really are.”

“I told you I was raised by a single mother,” I said. “I told you I was deep in debt.”

“You didn’t tell us how deep,” Cruz said. “A million and a half?”

“You’re so far underwater you’re already drowned,” Riley said.

“I told you. That’s why I was so grateful to get this new job.”

“Grateful?” Cruz said. “Or desperate?” His tone made it clear he didn’t like me anymore.

“Extremely grateful,” I said.

He scoffed and changed gears. “You told us your husband works nights.”

“Yes—”

“I knew a girl once. Told me her dad worked nights. I pictured him stocking shelves at the corner bodega. Turned out he played the cello for the New York Philharmonic.”

I gave him a weak smile. “David doesn’t do that.”

“No? What does he do?”

“Odd jobs. Whatever he can get.”

“Funny. He told us he’s unemployed.”

“Oh.” I cleared my throat. “He was there?”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. No reason you should have known. It’s not like you’re speaking to each other or anything.”

I stared at him.

“Yeah, he told us. Your marriage is over. You’re just roomies now until one of you has enough money to move out.”

I couldn’t figure out the new hostility. Okay, so they knew how deep my debt was, they knew my marriage was in trouble, but why would they go on the attack this way? I wondered if this was simply an interrogation technique. Instead of good cop/bad cop, they did nice session/mean session.

Cruz touched the tablet, and the big screen on the wall lit up. “Your company has its own CCTV system set up in its internal space. Were you aware of that?”

“I guess I noticed some cameras. I never really thought about it.”

“Motion-activated, right?”

“Okay.”

“Watch.”

A video started to play on the screen. It was me, emerging from an office into the corridor. I watched myself close the door behind me. Then I put my hands over my face and collapsed against the wall. When I dropped my hands, tears were rolling down my cheeks. Then I took a deep breath, wiped my eyes, and hurried down the corridor.