It was hard to imagine a more perfect moment, but looking back, I knew that very day was when things had begun to fall apart for us. I could draw a line from our lunch in the dollhouse to her foolish affair with Scotty Ryan to the last speech she’d given me that weekend in the country.

If I’d been paying attention, I would have noticed that Karly was unusually quiet. She was off somewhere in her own world, and she never took time off in the middle of the day unless something was wrong. I should have looked behind her peaceful smile, but instead, I was blind. I poured wine, and we sat across from each other on the blanket, with the fire crackling beside us.

“Susannah talked to me,” Karly said, when we’d enjoyed our lunch quietly for a few minutes. She said it casually. No big deal.

“Oh?”

“She’s giving me the Vernon Hotel account.”

I put down my wine and realized this was a celebration. Except it didn’t feel like a celebration. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s like the biggest account in the firm.”

“Yeah. It is. She says I’m ready.”

“Well, of course you are.”

“Thank you.”

“This is huge,” I said, trying to fill this moment with excitement, because the excitement in her face was strangely missing.

“Yeah. Pretty huge. It’s way more money. That’s good, huh? But a lot more time. Long hours.”

“So neither one of us will ever be home,” I joked, but Karly didn’t laugh.

“Susannah thinks we should move. We should be up here in Highland Park or something. She says we need a place where we can entertain.”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know.”

The same flat monotone all the way through. So unlike her. So not Karly. Why didn’t I see it?

“Well, congratulations,” I said, leaning over to kiss her. “You’re a star. I mean it.”

Karly smiled at me, but her smile was hollow, like one of her dolls on the shelves. Then, just like that, she changed the subject.

“I bumped into a friend at Starbucks this morning,” she went on. “A girl I knew in college. Sarah. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned her.”

“I don’t think so.”

“She’s got four kids now. They were all with her. Her youngest is almost two. A Down syndrome girl. So, so sweet. While Sarah was chasing the others, her little girl sat in my lap. I fell in love.”

“Of course you did.”

Karly delicately brushed something from the corner of her eye, and then she closed her eyes altogether. “Anyway . . . ,” she murmured.