The Stranger

“So what did the guy say to you at the American Legion Hall? This stranger?”

“He told me that my wife faked a pregnancy.”

Joha

Adam told her the story. Once he opened his mouth, it all just spilled out of him. When he was finished, Joha

“Do you think it’s true? Do you think she faked the pregnancy?”

“Yes.”

Just like that. No hesitation. Not anymore. He had probably known the truth from the start—right from the moment the stranger first told him—but he’d needed the pieces to come together before he could voice it.

“Why?” Joha

“Why do I think it’s true?”

“No, why do you think she’d do something like that?”

“Because I made her feel insecure.”

She nodded. “That Sally Perryman woman?”

“Mostly, I guess. Cori

“Actually, it might.”

“How?”

“Humor me,” Joha

Adam couldn’t see the point, but he also saw no reason not to tell her. “Like I said, we were growing apart. It’s an old story, isn’t it? We became all about the boys and the family logistics—who was going to do the food shopping, who was going to do the dishes, who was going to pay the bills. I mean, this is all such normal shit. Really. I was also going through a midlife crisis, I guess.”

“You felt unappreciated?”

“I felt, I don’t know, I felt like I wasn’t a real man anymore. I know how that sounds. I was a provider and a father. . . .”

Joha

“Not suddenly, but yeah, I start working on this great case with Sally, and she’s beautiful and passionate and she looks at me the way Cori

“Normal,” Joha

Adam wondered whether she meant that or whether she was humoring him. “Anyway, I think Cori

“The one that showed you she was in Pittsburgh?”

“Right.”

“And you didn’t know about it?”

He shook his head. “Not until Thomas showed me.”

“Wow.” Joha

“I don’t know, maybe. That’s what I think happened. I told her I was working late a bunch of times. Maybe she checked that tracker app and saw I was at Sally’s more than I should have been.”

“You didn’t tell her where you were?”

He shook his head. “It was just work.”

“So why not tell her?”

“Because, ironically enough, I didn’t want her to worry. I knew how she’d react. Or maybe I knew on some level that it was wrong. We could have stayed in the office, but I liked being at her house.”

“And Cori

“Yes.”

“But nothing happened between you and Sally Perryman?”

“Right.” Then thinking about it: “But maybe something was close to happening.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did you get physical? Second base? Third base?”

“What? No.”

“You didn’t kiss her?”

“No.”

“So why the guilt?”

“Because I wanted to.”

“Hell, I want to give Hugh Jackman a sponge bath. So what? You can’t help what you want. You’re human. Let it go.”

He said nothing.

“So then your wife confronted Sally Perryman.”

“She called her. I don’t know if she confronted her.”

“And Cori

“Right.”

“She asked Sally what was going on, but she never did you that courtesy. That about right?”

“I guess.”

“So then what?”

“Then, well, then Cori

“You mean, faked being pregnant.”

“Right, whatever.”

Joha

“It’s not what you think.”

“No, it’s exactly what I think.”

“The pregnancy startled me, you know? But in a good way. It brought me back. It reminded me of what was important. That’s the other irony here. It worked. Cori

“No, Adam, she wasn’t right.”

“It brought me back to reality.”

“No, it didn’t. She manipulated you. You’d probably have gotten back to reality anyway. And if you didn’t, then maybe you weren’t meant to. Sorry, but what Cori

“I think maybe she felt desperate.”

“That’s not an excuse.”

“This is her world. Her family. Her entire life. She fought so hard to build it, and it was being threatened.”

Joha

“I’m guilty too.”

“It isn’t about guilt. You had a doubt. You had your head turned. You wondered about the what-if. You’re not the first person to feel these things. You either find your way through it or you don’t. But in the end, Cori

“Maybe I needed that.”

Joha

He thought about it. “I love Cori

“But you’ll never know.”

“Not true,” Adam said. “I’ve thought about this a lot.”

“And you’re certain you would have stayed?”

“Yes.”

“For the kids?”

“In part.”

“What else?”

Adam leaned forward and stared at the floor for a moment. It was a blue-and-yellow Oriental carpet he and Cori

“Because whatever crap Cori

Joha

They sat there for a moment, letting the feelings settle.

Then Joha

“No clue.”

“He didn’t extort money?”

“No. He said he was doing it for me. He acted as though he was on a holy crusade. How about your friend Heidi? Did she fake a pregnancy too?”

“No.”

“So I don’t get it. What did the stranger tell her?”

“I don’t know,” Joha

“You have any thoughts?”

“No,” Joha

Chapter 45

HE KNOWS

Chris Taylor read the message and wondered yet again how and where this had all gone wrong. The Price job had been for hire. That might have been the mistake, though in most ways, the jobs for hire—and there had been only a handful—were the safest. The payments came from an emotionless third party, a top-level investigation firm. In a sense, it was more on the up-and-up, because there wasn’t—and yes, Chris wasn’t afraid to use the word—blackmail involved.

The normal protocol was simple: You know a terrible secret about a certain person via the web. That person has two options. He or she can pay to have the secret kept or he can choose not to pay and have the secret revealed. Chris felt satisfied either way. The end result was either a profit (the person paid the blackmail) or cathartic (the person came clean). In a sense, they needed people to choose both. They needed the money to keep the operation going. They needed the truth to come out because that was what it was all about, what made their enterprise just and good.