She opened a new tab on her browser and researched each one of those young women. She found the first one, Shelly, on Facebook right away. After some digging, Cece uncovered that Shelly still lived at home with parents. Her father was on disability due to a work accident and her mother had emphysema. Shelly lived at home to help take care of them.
Didn’t mean she wasn’t capable of cheating, but Cece moved her to the bottom of the list.
The next one, Lisa, didn’t show up on Facebook. A quick Google search found her on LinkedIn. Cece fired up a VPN to hide her IP address so LinkedIn wouldn’t recognize her and show Lisa who had looked at her profile.
Lisa Covey was thirty-six, had an MBA from Boston University, and wore a surprisingly low-cut top in her profile photo, along with more makeup than what was generally considered office appropriate.
That didn’t mean anything, other than the woman didn’t know how to dress professionally, but Cece didn’t like it. To her, it signified that Lisa thought her physical assets were a feature worth sharing.
The final woman, Angie, was prettier than Lisa but dressed more professionally. Cece found her on Facebook. Angie was involved in her church and Cece found a photo of her from last Christmas singing carols with a volunteer group at a retirement home. She lived alone and had adopted a dog from the shelter just a month ago.
Cece’s gut said Angie wasn’t going to be interested in a married man, no matter what he could do for her career.
She went back to Lisa and was about to start seriously investigating the woman when her phone vibrated.
She grabbed it to see a group text from Maude.I’m good to stay longer. Lester is awake and I’m enjoying reading to him. He didn’t like lunch, though. He wants a Whopper and fries from Burger King. I told him I’m not in charge of that. Can someone ask Althea?
Cece grinned. Lester sounded like he was doing all right.
Paige immediately answered.I’ll see what Althea has to say about that, but I doubt that’s what the doctors want him eating.
Still smiling, Cece went back to her searching, this time on Instagram. There was no immediate hit on Lisa Covey, but Cece couldn’t believe that a woman of her age, who obviously considered herself worthy of attention, wasn’t on social media somewhere.
She went back to LinkedIn and did a more thorough search of Lisa there. She found a link that took her to Lisa’s Twitter account, now X. Cece immediately clicked through. She had an X account, but thankfully, X didn’t show people who’d viewed their profile the way LinkedIn did. Although, she supposed her VPN would protect her identity anyway.
Lisa wasn’t the most prolific poster, but all Cece needed was another small nugget of information. Something that would give her another venue in which to find out more about Lisa.
She was still scrolling and reading posts and replies when her phone rang. Natalie calling. She answered right away. “Hey, there.”
“Hey, Mom. Listen, everything’s fine. I was just overthinking everything. Jim’s not cheating.”
Cece sat back, frowning. “How do you know?”
Nat let out a long sigh that held a slight hint of amusement. “I couldn’t get ahold of him earlier and I wanted to tell him about Tyler’s science project and I got really frustrated and sent him a text that if he didn’t call me back I was going to have the conference page him.” She groaned. “I don’t know what I was thinking. Anyway, he called me right away, which was good, but I was still worked up and I asked him flat out if he was really at a conference or having an affair.”
“Wow.” Cece blinked. Natalie definitely had a boiling point and apparently, she’d reached it. “What did he say?”
“Well, he was speechless for a moment. Then he told me that he was up for another promotion and had been working extremely hard to get it but hadn’t wanted to say anything in case it didn’t come through. He said there are three other candidates in the running, and he’s got the least seniority. We had a good talk. He said he was sorry for not being present enough for me and Tyler and that he’d work on that, but I told him to do what he needs to do. We’re fine. This promotion will mean a hefty bump in pay. Enough that we’ll be able to cover any college Tyler wants to go to.”
“That’s good,” Cece said, relieved.
Natalie exhaled. “It would be great. I just need to stop overthinking and chill out. I feel bad for even accusing Jim of such a thing.”
“In your defense, you lived through the experience of watching your father’s infidelity destroy your parents’ marriage. It’s not like you didn’t have a reason for thinking such a thing.”
“Jim said the same thing. He said he totally understood and I had nothing to apologize for. I still feel bad.”
Cece closed her laptop. “I’m glad you worked it all out. Maybe you two need to talk to each other more.”
“Or maybe I just need to trust the man I married, who’s never once given me a reasonnotto trust him.”
Cece smiled. “What were you going to tell Jim about Tyler’s science project?”
“Oh! He texted me from school. He and Blake’s project scored in the top ten, which means they’re going on to the county competition.”
“That’s fantastic! I’m going to text him my congratulations as soon as he’s out of school.”
“He’ll love that.” Natalie’s voice held so much happiness that Cece almost laughed. “Thanks again for listening to me yesterday. I’m really glad I have you to talk to.”
