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"Where did I go the night I failed my first surgical exam? I was gone until four in the morning. Somebody found me. Who?"

"You don't know."

She sets the folder down and looks at the lens.

"What was the worst day of my life, Laszlo?” Her voice is so flat, it kills me. “You've got information on me. Reports. It's in there somewhere. You just can't tell which one it was."

I rub my hand down my face, fast losing my mind.

"I figured you out. You know what coffee I order. You know what day my period's due. You know which side of the bed I sleep on and how many books I own and what time I leave work." She starts putting the things back into the box, carefully, the way I'd put my instruments back. "You don't know me. You know my schedule."

She closes the box then stands, lifts it onto her hip, and leaves. I can see she's leaving, taking that box somewhere I can't follow. She stops at the door and turns.

"Seven years watching me." A small smile, the first one. "And when you watch this, you still won't know where I am."

The screen goes black.

I sit in the dark of my office with the smashed cup on the wall and my hands flat on the desk, and suddenly I understand that … I have spent this entire day exactly where she wanted me. Nine hours behind her in my own basement, four behind her in her house every clue already cold by the time I found it. She's been ahead of me since three o'clock this morning, and she's ahead of me now. For the first time in seven years, I have no idea where my wife is.

CHAPTER 18

Manon

I feel good when I walk through the door of my father's estate. Better than good. I stood barefoot in Laszlo Novak's basement at three in the morning and moved his tools around while he slept, then went to my old house—thank goodness I still have the keys. There, I asked him four questions about my own life that his reports couldn't answer. I filmed all of it. By now he'll have watched both feeds.

I don't get it. Did he really think I would let this go? The bastard stalked me for years. He has been inside my home more times than I can count, touched my things, looked in my closets and drawers, and he moved my books. My precious collection of books. Not even Charles had that privilege.

He killed Charles, too. But the bastard was attacking me so both of them can go to hell. Of course he didn't have to use that much force on him, but that's beside the point. I'm not exactly blameless because I had sex with Laszlo right next to the body. I’m sick. I should be really embarrassed about it, but I’m not.

Getting the code to his precious mortuary was the easy part. He punches it in with his left hand and doesn't cover the keypad, and the second evening in that house I was standing four feet behind him in the hall.

It was Denis who helped me with the rest. He spotted the gray Audi that has been parked outside the hospital all week with its engine running. So this morning I walked through the front doors in my scrubs, went up to my office, left my phone on my desk, told a colleague to cover for me for a few hours, that I wasn’t well and needed rest, and slipped out through the service entrance at the back. Denis was waiting in his sister's old Peugeot, already swept for trackers, and my phone spent the afternoon in my office. The burner stayed in my bra.

The videos were Denis too. He has a cousin who installs security systems for half the venues in this city, and pulling the footage off my husband's own basement camera and pushing it to his laptop took him less than an hour. I told him when. Not straight away. Not when Laszlo went downstairs and found his towels on the floor. Hours later, after he'd about gone insane, realizing something was out of his control.

The second one I filmed myself, on the floor of my house, with the box open in front of me. I still have the keys. He never asked for them back.

The last favor came from my father. Dinner tonight, in the garden, and I asked him to invite the Novaks: Laszlo's parents, Constantine, his men. Papa didn't ask why, thank goodness.

The long, carved teak table is in the conservatory, with a view of the garden out back. The Novaks arrived on time, minus one. Laszlo's mother came alone, with apologies from her husband: urgent business, he's very sorry, he sends his best. Nobody asked what kind of business. Now she's sitting at the far end talking with mine, and Constantine is wedged between Février and Denis, who keep switching to French every time he tries to join the conversation.

There is one empty chair beside mine, because my mother believes married couples should sit together. Nobody has mentioned why he's not here yet.

"Ma chérie." My mother takes my face in both hands as I go round the table and bend down to kiss her. As I lean in, I see a fleeting darkness in her eyes. Sadness, worry maybe. "You look well. Marriage agrees with you."

"Marriage is wonderful, Maman." Guess I can live the lie.

"And Laszlo?" my father asks, pouring the wine. "He's joining us?"

"He wouldn't miss it for the world." I take my seat and shake out my napkin. "He had a busy day. I'm told it was eventful."

Denis develops a sudden cough while pouring water two seats down.

The appetizers have just come out when footsteps announce him, and every head at the table lifts. My husband comes around into the conservatory in a custom suit, freshly shaved, not a hair out of place, carrying flowers for my mother and a bottle for my father. He looks like a man who has had a pleasant, uneventful day.

That is not what I was expecting.

On our wedding day I found the room already made for me, my books already on the shelves, like he'd known which ones. When I told him I meant to stay in it the whole year, every night, his face went hard and his jaw clenched tight, and it meant he'd made up his mind about something and I wasn't going to like it. That's the look I braced for now—the clenched jaw, the cold face. For hours he didn't know where I was, and I expected him to walk in furious. Instead, he kisses my mother's cheek, shakes my father's hand, and works his way down the table like a politician on the campaign trail. Rafe is here too, seated between Constantine and Julien. Again, I made sure my brother would be here. After all, Laszlo never denies me anything.