But I did not.

I could not get out of that bed and into my underwear and Donald’s discarded T-shirt fast enough.

In my mind, at the time, you see, I wasn’t doing anything wrong.

I wasn’t doing anything inappropriate.

I was simply curious. And, like any other normal woman curious about her new boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend, I felt entitled to engage in a bit of innocent information gathering.

Innocent information gathering. That’s really how I saw it then.

Standing there in the dark, on the threshold of the bedroom doorway, feeling so entitled, I looked back, literally, and figuratively, only once: to make sure Donald was sleeping deeply enough for my escape to go undetected.

He was.

I crept into the hallway and down the stairs, and headed to his study off the living room.

Never having been alone in his house (an adorable wood bungalow with a wraparound front porch to which he’d added on and renovated the year before) for any length of time until that night, I scanned the room: his desk, bookshelves, file cabinets; his laptop computer, briefcase, address book, date book.

So much to discover; so little time.

But first things first: the basics had to be established. I didn’t even know Adrienne’s last name.

I sat down in Donald’s swivel desk chair, pushed forward, settled in. But then, a noise: Lucy, panting, staring at me from the doorway.

Adrienne’s dog, here to maul me, preserve and protect the memory of her former mistress, I thought. At the very least, she’ll bark, wake Donald, nail me.

I waited for disaster to strike. But Lucy, a twelve-year-old shaggy black Portuguese water dog, didn’t lunge or pounce or defend; instead she sniffed, ambled in, collapsed in a heap at my feet. Maybe this would be easier than I’d thought. Maybe she wasn’t as big a fan of her former mistress as I’d assumed. Maybe she could tell me where in the room to look for Donald’s secret Adrienne-stash.

If only dogs could talk.

I returned to the business at hand: Adrienne’s last name. I opened Donald’s address book and figured I’d start at the beginning, with “A.” And right there, on the first page, was the entry I was looking for:

Adrienne.

I should have known. Men always put their friends in their address books under their first names, not their last names. Despite the lack of a last name for her, there was a home address (52 East 68th Street) and a home phone number, as well as a work phone number.

I checked the desk clock: 12:30 a.m. Too late at night to chicken-call her at home; too risky to call from Donald’s phone in case she had Caller ID (didn’t everyone now have Caller ID?). I eyed her work number and picked up the phone: now was the perfect time to call. I’d get her voicemail, hear her outgoing message, which, with any luck, would include her last name.

I picked up the phone, dialed the number; glanced down at Lucy (asleep). On the third ring I heard this: