Page 10 of Cruel Lies

"Exactly," he crows. "Hit her before she knows what's happening. By the time she lawyers up, it's already done. She's got no money for a good lawyer anyway, not once I freeze everything. She'll be stuck with whatever ambulance chaser she can find."

There aren't enough words in English or Russian or any of the other languages I speak to convey my disgust for this man. How does someone become this… this… thispig?This woman gave you children. She gave you her devotion and trust. I cannot imagine once loving someone enough to marry them… and then hating them enough to rip her beating heart out of her chest.

A man needs a code. Lines he will not cross.

I have those lines, even if Todd Bradshaw doesn't. And if there's no one else to do it but me, I'll wrap those lines around his fucking throat and strangle him with them.

"May I ask you something?" I say. "Why this? Why not? People fall out of love, but this is more than that."

He shrugs. Nonchalant and careless.

"She let herself go," he says simply. "I'm moving on."

I wait for the rest. But there isn't any. That's it.

She let herself go.

I'm moving on.

"She let herself go," I repeat, in awe that anyone could be so simple-minded and vicious.

"Big time." He spreads his hands like it's obvious. "Look, you marry a woman, you've got expectations, right? She was a knockout when we met. Tiny little thing. And then, you know. Two kids. She stopped trying, stopped caring about herself. That just won't work, you know? I'm out there with clients, and I've got to bring a wife who looks like…" He stops. "It's not fair to me. I held up my end."

"And her end was being thin?"

He laughs, uncomfortable now, because something in my voice has changed and even a man as dense as Todd Bradshaw can feel it.

"You're making it sound bad," he accuses.

"I'm just repeating what you told me."

"Look, it's more than that. We grew apart. There's stuff. There's always stuff. But yeah. At the end of the day. She let herself go, and I'm not gonna spend the rest of my life with somebody I'mnot attracted to. That's just being honest. Most guys won't say it out loud, but they're all thinking it."

"And the kids," I say. "What did they do wrong?"

He wrinkles his nose. "Huh?"

"You want to take your children from their mother. The woman who carried them, birthed them, and presumably, raised them, while you were out there 'holding up your end.'" I spin the pen again between my fingers. "What did they do to deserve that?"

He squirms in the torture chair, uncomfortable. He's getting frustrated now. He came in here for a victory lap with a presumed fellow brother-in-disgrace, but he's not getting one. "Look, are you gonna help me or not? Because if you're gonna sit here and lecture me, I can take my business somewhere else. There's a hundred lawyers in this city."

He's right about that. There are. I just told him as much myself. Without a doubt, one of them will take his money and do exactly what he's asking. Some slick associate downtown is going to take this exact stack of cash, or one just like it, and they're going to freeze the accounts and lock up the house and serve a woman with papers she never saw coming.

This isn't my fight. It's got fuck-all to do with me. And yet…

"Alright," I say suddenly.

Todd blinks, confused by my whiplash turnaround.

"Alright?" he repeats.

"Alright, I'll take your case." I take the cash off his desk and stick it in my drawer. I have good plans for what to do with it.

When he realizes what I'm saying, that sleazy smile oozes back across Todd's face. "That's what I'm talkin' about, my man. Now, we're in business!"

He leaps out of the chair and reaches out to shake my hand. I do it even though I'd rather break his hand than shake it, but for the time being, I intend to keep up appearances.

"Yes, we are," I tell him. "Let's give this wife of yours everything she deserves."