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It wasn’t exactly Garrett’s apartment. Not as it was now. It had the same layout, but the space pictured in the glossy pages had different furniture and decorations. Either Garrett had done a dramatic redecoration or the magazine spread was from before his time.
A neighbor stepped out of the elevator. The elegant octogenarian slowed, rubbernecking the train wreck in progress. But one hard look from Folsom and she hurried along.
“Well, Ms. Mendez?”
Emma was sweating now. “I told you, it’s not mine. I’m just a guest.”
Folsom flipped the magazine shut. “Like I said, so long as you live here, the veracity of your claim will be in question. My report will reflect that. Your insurance coverage and benefits will be suspended starting Monday.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
EMMA
She could barely process the words over the ringing in her ears.
“Monday?” she echoed.
“Yes, for the duration of the investigation. You are welcome to appeal, of course.” Folsom gave her a derisive once-over and sniffed. “Good luck with that.”
“Wait, you can’t do that!” Emma staggered, trying to follow, but the man had already turned his back. Nearly wheezing in panic, she tried to follow him, her heart pounding so fast it was making her vision tunnel and her head pound. “Ineedmy insurance.”
The investigator wasn’t listening. By the time she made it out the lobby doors, he had melted into the dense pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk.
Where had he gone?
Emma picked a direction, running to the right. She changed directions, sprinting until she had a stitch in her side. But Folsom had disappeared.
Still struggling to breathe, Emma stepped out of the busy flow of foot traffic. It was that or get trampled.
What was she going to do? Feeling numb and on the edge of tears,she wandered until she ended up at the coffee kiosk over an hour early for her shift.
Kyle was there with Bethany. He took one look at her face and guided her to sit on the upturned bucket they used as a chair, coaxing her until she was able to explain what had happened.
“Damn, that sucks,” Bethany said, preparing a pumpkin spice soy latte for their sole customer.
“I just don’t understand how they can suspend all my benefits,” Emma mumbled. “They have no proof I’m hiding income. Shouldn’t they have proof?”
“It might be standard procedure,” Kyle said. “My cousin used to get food stamps. When she moved to another county for a new job, she told them she didn’t need the help anymore, but another payment went through anyway.”
His chin dipped down, wrinkling. “She thought it was procedure, a sort of buffer payment. But it turned out to be a clerical error. They were late stopping her payments. And even though it wasn’t her mistake, they made her pay all the money back.”
Emma could feel the blood draining from her face. She wasn’t on food stamps. Her aid helped subsidize her rent, but the bulk went toward her medical expenses. And those were insanely high without insurance.
“How do they even know I moved?”
Emma hadn’t been at Garrett’s that long. Her mail still went to Pedro’s, but Garrett must have had someone pick it up because it showed up at his place with the old address printed on it.
Emma would have had her mail forwarded by the post office, but she hadn’t believed she’d be staying at Garrett’s that long, so she’d put it off.
Bethany popped the gum she seemed to be addicted to. “Someone must have reported you.”
Emma’s head snapped up.
Kyle nodded. “It was the only way they could have found out so soon.”
He was right. Emma didn’t care how many gung ho investigatorsthe state employed. Bureaucracy at the state level would have taken a lot longer to investigate a claim. Unless someone lit a fire under them.
“Who would hate me that much?”