The house was so quiet I could hear the ice maker kick on in the kitchen. That stupid domestic sound almost undid me. We had bought that refrigerator after arguing for three weekends because Grant wanted paneling and I wanted efficiency. We had spent years building a life out of those kinds of choices. Tile, insurance, dinner reservations, whose family got Thanksgiving. All the ordinary bricks of a marriage. And underneath it, apparently, rot.
He rubbed a hand over his face. “I was going to tell you.”
“Since when?”
His silence answered.
“Was it before or after you started drafting plans for ‘timing after James’?” I asked.
His head snapped up. “What?”
I pulled the email from the file and held it where he could see the subject line.
For the first time all day, Grant looked genuinely cornered. Not exposed. Cornered. There’s a difference. Exposure makes liars cry. Corners make them dangerous.
“That’s not what you think,” he said.
“What do I think, Grant?”
“That email is about work.”
I laughed again, softer this time. “Of course it is.”
“It is.”
“Then why are there blank medical authorization forms in the same folder?”
He took one step toward the desk. “Let me see that.”
“No.”