“You did at first.”
I look down.
“Yes.”
“You said you set it aside and then looked again in the morning. They likely worked to give you those other articles. They wanted to plant more seeds of doubt. Distance you from me.”
My mouth goes dry. “How could they know I would contact someone like Cindy Sullivan?”
“You are an attorney, and they knew that you would not accept information without a verifiable source,” he says. “Simply put: they studied you, predicted your behavior, and took a chance.”
“And I walked right into it,” I say, near tears again.
“They used your real feelings, real articles in Italy, real speculation. Real questions a woman in your position might have, then they gave you false answers in the direction they wanted you to walk. You had no reason to suspect.”
I pull the blanket closer.
“They made me think you killed her.”
His face changes at that. It's small, but I see it.
“I know.”
“I did not want to think it.”
“I know that too.”
“No, you don’t.” My voice cracks. “I hated myself for it. I kept telling myself I was being ridiculous. Then I kept searching because I needed to make the ridiculous thought go away, and it only got worse. Every search made me feel like I was being smartfor asking, and awful for asking, and terrified that I had waited too long to ask.”
He lowers himself onto the edge of the bed, not close enough to crowd me, but close enough that I can feel the heat of him.
“I should have come to you,” I say.
“Yes.”
The answer cuts, but not cruelly.
“I should have asked.”
“Yes.”
My throat works.
“Are you angry?”
“Yes.”
I flinch.
“At them,” he says.
I look up.
“And at myself.”
“Why?”
“Because you did not believe you could ask me.”
