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His mouth is open. One of his socks has come halfway off. Her other hand has fallen off the edge of the cushion, fingers loose, still holding the remote. A plaid throw blanket from the back of the couch has slid down over both of them, tangled around their legs.

The paper chains are draped over the mantel. The three stockings hang beneath them.

The Christmas tree glows behind them.

It’s huge. Bigger than the one the decorator usually brings. It looks real, the branches uneven and a little lopsided, and it’s covered in colored lights and mismatched ornaments. Some of them are glass. Some are made of construction paper and glue.

My tree. My couch. My son.

And my wife.

It looks like a family.

The thought doesn’t land so much as settle. Quietly. Like snow.

I save the photograph.

Then I set my phone face down on the table.

Next to the cold steak and the unopened butter and the legal pad full of numbers that don’t add up.

Friday.

I’m going home Friday.

For the first time in three weeks, I’m not thinking about the project waiting for me there.

I’m thinking about her.

chapter

nine

Maverick

There are candy canes lining my driveway.

I stop the SUV. Not because I need to. Because I need a moment to process what I’m seeing.

Six-foot plastic candy canes are planted in the ground at regular intervals on either side of the drive leading up to my house. They light up in broad daylight.

Red, white, red, white. Blinking.

Against the bare winter trees and the gray December sky, they look like something that escaped from a mall. Or maybe even the damned North Pole.

I stare through the windshield.

What the actual fuck?

I pull out my phone. For three solid seconds, I consider texting Noelle.

I don’t.

I’m almost home. I can ask her in person what the hell she’s done to the property.

My wife.

Something tightens low in my stomach.