And then I was supposed to tell Sam everything. About Zach and Amanda and the call out of the blue. About my trip to Rikers, and how I’d backed myself into a corner by saying I’d ask Young & Crane. On the way home, I’d been puzzling over my impulse to blurt that out to Zach, but I had no interest in looking under that particular rock. And so I also decided to say nothing to Sam. To keep it all a secret. After all, what was one more?
“That’s like a …” Sam reached and spun his fingers through my hair, his voice dropping sleepily as he fumbled to calculate. “A twelve-, no, fifteen-, sixteen-hour workday.” He exhaled loudly. “I’m sorry, Lizzie.”
I shrugged. “You don’t assign the cases.”
“But it is my fault you’re working there in the first place,” he said, and he sounded so sad. The way he always did whenever he apologized, which was often. Still, I believed he meant every word.
“It’s okay,” I lied. Because nothing good would come from more of Sam’s guilt.
I closed my eyes, lost in the warm feel of Sam’s strong fingers in my hair, in the memory of how he’d done the same thing on our second date and in our second year and last week. And in the end, wasn’t that the key to marriage? Learning to pretend that a few unspoiled things could make up for all the broken ones.
I remembered back to the first weekend Sam and I spent together in New York City. When I’d traveled nearly three hours from Philadelphia, first on the SEPTA train and then New Jersey Transit and then the subway, all just to get to him and that electric pulse he’d sent through my bones the night we met. We’d had sex three times, thenslept on Sam’s pullout couch, the only piece of furniture that would fit in his postage stamp of an Upper West Side studio, our heads pressed up against the stupidly oversize refrigerator. Before we went to brunch the next morning, we’d stopped at a nearby homeless shelter so Sam could drop off some notebooks and pencils he’d bought for the kids staying there. Maybe it had been planned for my benefit, but he was wrapping up work on a piece about the need for city-subsidized school supplies. And the way his eyes shone was real. Afterward, he said: “It’s not much, but it’s the best I can do.”
What if this, now, was Sam’s best?
“Let’s go to bed, Sam,” I said as he reached forward to pull me on top of him. “People will see. We need those stupid curtains.”
“Let’s stay here,” he murmured as he unbuttoned my blouse, slid the fingers of one hand inside my bra as the other hand lifted up my skirt. “Let’s not go anywhere.”
“Okay,” I whispered.
And then I closed my eyes. Because Sam wanted me. Because, despite myself, I wanted him, too.
KRELL INDUSTRIES
CONFIDENTIAL MEMORANDUM NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION
Attorney-Client Work Product
Privileged & Confidential
June 24
To:Brooklyn Country Day Board of Directors
From:Krell Industries
Subject:Data Breach & Cyber Incident—Introductory Report
This memorandum shall serve to confirm the retention of Krell Industries by Brooklyn Country Day’s Board of Directors to evaluate a potential data breach compromising certain personal information of students and their families. All information contained in this memorandum and all future communications are to be considered Privileged and Confidential Attorney Work Product, not intended for distribution.
Krell Industries’ investigation shall include, but not be limited to, the following:
System Review:A detailed review of all available data systems to identify internal failures and external intrusions that led to the breach.
Witness Interviews:Interviews with all relevant parties. Interview subjects shall be informed that confidentiality is critical to investigatory success. Confidentiality forms will be executed.
Weekly Progress Reports:Will be distributed to summarize progress on the investigation.
Critical Event Reports:Will be distributed on an as-needed basis to highlight information requiring a more urgent response.
Suspect Identification:Potential subjects for civil and criminal action will be identified.
Amanda
SIX DAYS BEFORE THE PARTY
When Amanda arrived at Sarah’s already crowded brownstone, Kerry was standing near the door, pressed up against the wall like he was trying to dissolve into it.
