I look at her, surprised.

“Yes, I heard about what you were up to,” Dee says. “I know what you were.”

“So, you kept up with all the gossip about me, just not with me personally?” I smile though it takes some effort. To hell with her and her precious sanctimony. “I’m ashamed of nothing. I earned an honest living, though not an entirely legal one, and it paid the bills. If I wasn’t out there working my butt off, exposing my tits and ass”—I carry on speaking as she flinches—“then you wouldn’t even have this farm to come back to. It would have been repossessed years ago. So, how about thanking me instead of judging me?”

“I’m still seeing my lawyer.”

“Be my guest. I’ll see mine too.” I may not have that much money left but I know people in high places. They’re almost as helpful as those in low ones.

She slams the door on her way out and I wait ten minutes before getting up and propping it open again to get a breeze through the lounge. It’s hot and I’m sweaty, and silk probably isn’t the most practical fabric to do manual labor in. Also, quite honestly, the packing is boring. I’ve been doing it more to get on Dee’s nerves than to get anything productive done.

I’m so desperate for distraction that I almost consider actually talking to Vince when he calls for the second time in a week. I regret giving him the number. Clean breaks are so much easier than protracted ones. Besides, it hurts to hear his voice.

“Ruth, can you talk this time?” I’d told him I was on my way out the last time he called. “You didn’t phone me back.”

“If you want your car, you can come and get it yourself.” I might have stolen his convertible BMW M3 just to rankle him since I know it’s his pride and joy.

He laughs. “You haven’t taken a baseball bat to it, have you?”

“Don’t give me ideas, buster.” God, I miss these wry back-and-forths.

“I don’t care about the car, Ruth. You can keep the bloody thing for all I care.” It’s disappointing to hear him say that. I was hoping that his wanting to retrieve the car would make him come after me. What happened to good old-fashioned materialism? “I just wanted to see how you’re doing and to ask you to give Bill a call sometime this week, please.”

Bill is his lawyer. “Filing for divorce this soon? Jesus, you don’t waste any time, do you?” I feel such a stab of pain I wonder if I might be having a heart attack.

“No. Nothing like that. I just want to make sure that we get the maintenance sorted out while we’re . . . separated . . . and figuring things out.”