“Everything is great!” Her jowls jiggle as she smiles. “I took your advice and sat down with my son, and we had a wonderful talk. It made me realize how right you were about the stupid paranoid thoughts I was having about everyone. It completely turned things around.” She beams at me. “You really helped me.”

She looks much better. She sometimes used to show up at our appointments slightly disheveled with the scent of alcohol emanating from her—a fact that I gently tried to bring up a few times and she always laughed it off and changed the subject. But today, she just smells like perfume. Lilacs, I think.

“I’m so glad you’re doing well.” My phone buzzes inside my purse. A text message. “It was my pleasure.”

Gail turns her attention to Luke. “Your friend here is a wonderful doctor. She has such a brilliant mind.”

He grins at me. “I know it.”

While Gail goes on and on, extolling my virtues, I rifle around in my handbag to retrieve my phone, to make sure I’m not being texted about any emergencies on my patients. I glance down at the screen and see a message from an unfamiliar number.

It’s a video.

I don’t need to click on it to know what it is. I recognize my own image right outside that red Jetta. I have seen this video so many times, I see it in my sleep. But I had thought it was gone forever.

I sent Luke to get rid of that video on EJ’s computer. But it seems like he had another copy tucked away somewhere.

I glance up at Luke and Gail, who are still talking. I type into my phone with trembling fingers:

What do you want?

I stare at the screen, waiting for his response. Three bubbles appear, and I imagine his finger tapping out letters on his phone. Finally, two words appear on the screen:

Talk tonight.

I have just made things so much worse.

Chapter 39

ADRIENNE

After we unpack the groceries, I send Luke back to his apartment, feigning a headache. I don’t tell him about the video. If I do, he’ll be furious with me. He didn’t want to do it in the first place, and he warned me there could be other copies floating around.

And I definitely don’t want him to know that EJ wants to meet me tonight. He would want to be there. And even though on some level, I desperately want him to be there, this is my mess. I need to figure it out on my own.