“We stopped in time.”

Myron thought about that. “Who stopped it?”

“Mutual.”

“It’s never mutual, Chick.”

“We both eased into it,” he said. “And then we both eased out of it.”

“When?”

“What?”

“When did you both ease out of it?”

“I don’t know.”

“How long before your son disappeared?”

“I told you. It had nothing to do with that.”

“How long?”

“I told you. I don’t know.”

“And why were you so afraid to tell anyone?”

“I didn’t want Brooke to find out.”

“Really? Even back then? Your kid is missing and you’re worried about that? I mean, you lied to the police over a flirtation.”

“There wasn’t just me and my family to consider.”

“There was Nancy Moore’s too?”

“See it from our perspective, okay? Suppose we told the police. Okay? Suppose we told the police all about it. What would have happened?”

Myron did not bother replying.

“You get why we didn’t say anything. Who’d believe us? They find these texts and we say, ‘Oh yeah, we almost hooked up,’ you think the cops are going to look at this right? We were already getting hard questions. We admit to almost having an affair, and that’s all they’d look at. And now, if Brooke finds out . . .” Chick started tearing up again. “It would kill us, okay? Please. It’s all I got left.”

Myron tried to ignore the pain on his face. “So Brooke never found out?”

“No.”

“And Hunter?”

“Same. Don’t you see? If we copped to this thing back then, when everyone was so weak, when all the relationships were already so strained, it would have destroyed us all. We’d have never made it.”

“But Hunter and Nancy didn’t make it anyway, did they?”

He shook his head. “That had nothing to do with this.”

“How do you know, Chick? How do you know for sure?”

Chapter 28

Myron opened the apartment door, trying to nudge himself back in the mood, though he wasn’t really worried. At the end of the day, sexist or not, he was a guy. Guys are remarkably consistent about this part of their lives. Ladies, here’s a little seduction tip: It doesn’t take a lot to get your man in the mood. You know this already. You see all those articles in women’s magazines about how to seduce your man, how to use massage oils or candles or music to get him in the mood. Men, for better or worse, aren’t that complicated. Here are two short articles on how to seduce your man: “Ask him if he wants to have sex.” And: “Say, ‘Yes, that would be nice.’”

He smiled at the thought, already returning to form, when he entered the apartment and saw that they had company.

Esperanza was there.

“Sorry for the cock block,” she said.

Myron ignored her for the moment and swept Terese into his arms. They just held each other in a tight embrace. That was all. A simple, deep hug. Myron closed his eyes. Terese pulled him even closer.