I met Adam at the Goldfinch in the Four Seasons a second time. The place was crawling with out-of-towners, and that’s why it was such a great place for what we had in mind. Everyone was too busy one-upping the person across from them to pay us any mind. That was good. We had a lot to get done. Memorial Day weekend was ten days away, and we needed to be in sync. Completely so.

I slid a packet of GHB across the table. “The kids call it cherry meth.”

He put it in his coat pocket. “Sounds yummy.”

We ordered drinks—whiskey and wine—and after they arrived, we got down to business. I studied Adam as we talked. He was all in. That was not only good, it was necessary. He had more to risk here. She was his wife.

“The old man has to see a struggle on the lawn above the beach,” I told him.

“Right,” he said. “So you’ll dress in Sophie’s clothes, and you’ll make a scene. The old dog walker will see you fighting off someone, and then you’ll vanish from view.”

Adam isn’t a detail person. That was obvious from the start.

“That won’t work,” I said after swallowing some wine. “I can’t just pretend to fight someone. The old man’s not blind. Just near-sighted.”

“Can’t you zombie up Connor and make him struggle with you?”

It was intended as a joke, but there was a nugget of a genuine idea wrapped in his stupid idea.

“He’s going to be completely zonked out so that he won’t know what he’s done,” I told him. “I’ll set him up, and you don’t have to worry about that. He’ll go down for it. I’m going to let nature take its course. No need to call the police on him. I know Connor Moss. He’s always been about doing the right thing.”

“I almost feel sorry for the guy,” Adam said.

“Don’t,” I said, meaning it. “He fucked your wife. He made a baby! He ruined our lives.”

Adam gulped his drink. He was nervous. I wondered if he was cut out for this.

“I won’t ever forget that,” he said.

Good, I thought.

“Now, about that zombie idea,” I went on. “What about a mannequin?”

“I don’t follow,” he said.

Adam may have been good-looking, but he most definitely was not a quick study. He’d always be the weak link in what we were going to do. I made a mental note of that.

“What if we dress a mannequin up as Sophie, and I dress up as Connor?” I asked. “Wear his jacket. Hat, maybe. I struggle with the mannequin.”

He put down his empty glass and indicated to the waiter he wanted a second drink.

“I like it,” he said. “But we don’t have a mannequin. Do we?”