He slinked past me and I watched through the open nursery door as he knelt by William’s crib, looked at his little face through the slats in the soft strip of light from the hallway. I’d spent hardly any time with James at that point. I hadn’t really thought about him other than to worry what would happen if he found out about the affair. He was arguably more attractive than Carlow—his jaw and cheekbones cut more sharply, his hair thicker, his shoulders wider.

When he came back I was still standing there. I didn’t know where to go or what to do at this point. “Listen,” he said, a twinge of desperation in his voice. “We’re going to the Hamptons for a couple of weeks at the end of August. You have to come with us. I mean, you don’t have to but will you, please?”

I nodded. “Okay,” I said. Of course I would follow them anywhere they asked.

He put a warm hand on my shoulder. I noticed his lips were bruised with wine. “We’d be lost without you,” he said, an odd thing for someone who’d spoken to me only a handful of times to say.

“No,” I replied.

He shook me a little. “Yes,” he said. He pulled me in for a hug then, and kissed the top of my head, where my hair fell in a part. I don’t know why, but I leaned my head back, bringing my face up in front of his. I’d like to think I did it simply because he’d done something unexpected—kissing my head. It’s a natural reaction to look at someone when you question them, but in truth I probably did it so his lips could find mine in the dark, in case they wanted to, which they did without further hesitation. His skin smelled like cedar. His mouth tasted sweet, more like chocolate than wine. He whispered something to me, his voice deep and soft. It was an apology. Then he kissed me again. I kissed back so he wound his hands under my skirt, feeling the seams of my underwear. It was an old pair, full of little holes like everything I wore under my clothes, but he didn’t let on that it mattered. I pushed my hips into him, hoping to feel his erection against me.

He pulled away then, brought his hands up, and cradled my face between his palms. I probably looked like a deer in the middle of the road—that wide-eyed look of dumb shock; that look that people mistake for innocence and stupidity. Actually, the deer were there long before the roads, wending their way over the same corridors for generations. People don’t understand on those dark country roads, why they don’t get out of the way, but the deer probably just feel the same way.