But I couldn’t hit send. Instead I deleted it, placed my phone in the center console, and started the car. As I shifted into drive and slowly pulled away from the curb, a shadow dashed through the beam of my headlights, and I slammed on the brake. A second later, a distorted face surfaced on the other side of my rain-streaked window. I yelped and lurched sideways, clutching my chest. When recognition dawned, I hit the power window switch.

“Geez, Cody, are you trying to give me a heart attack?” I wheezed.

“Are you trying to hit me with your car? Because I know I deserve it.”

I smiled instant relief. “Yeah, you really do.”

“I’m sorry, you know. For all the problems I’m causing you.”

“It’s not just you. I’m so…sorry and angry and sad. I’m screwing up my marriage, letting my kids down, my business is falling apart… I don’t know how to pick up the pieces and put them back together. Is there even enough glue to fix it all?”

Cody crossed his arms and leaned on the ledge of the door, our noses nearly touching. “With family there’s always enough glue, Felicity.”

“Yeah, I don’t know about that.” I felt his beer-scented breath pass over my skin. “Now I have to live with the weight of another secret for the rest of my life…and I can’t even make things right, because making things right means telling the truth, and telling the truth means losing Ollie. I just don’t know what to do anymore.”

“There’s nothing you can do. Just focus on one problem at a time. Like why you’re here. In front of my house. In the dark.”

I had been asking myself the same question, and came up with only one answer. “I guess I just needed to talk to someone I could trust. But I shouldn’t have come. In fact, I was just leaving.”

“You don’t have to leave, you know. You can come inside. I’m always up for company.”

It was an awful idea. I couldn’t, not after the fight Oliver and I just had. Especially since Cody smelled like he’d been drinking. And yet it tugged on me like a loose string…a string that if I pulled it would unravel my whole marriage.

“No, I really can’t. Besides, I was thinking about stopping by Austin Miller’s house.”

“Are you serious? Felicity, please just let the cops deal with him.”

“I will…after I speak with him first. I deserve to meet the guy my daughter had been dating. I just want to meet him. He’s a teenage boy. How nefarious could he be?”

Cody shook his head and straightened upright. “Are you sure you should do that?” His voice hardened. “I mean, it’s getting late and he doesn’t live in a safe neighborhood.”