“Do you inherit? Or has he cut you out of his will? Willed it to your kids or his mistress or your dogs or the Committee to Sanctify Donald Trump?”

“I inherit. I do. At least half. Half, I think, in trust for the children.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure. It’s part of the prenup.”

“If we do this, we do it my way, every step.”

“I guess. Sure. Can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“Why are we here? At this house?”

“Your car, your phone, your everything, tracks you. And leaves that trail. Let’s say you husband dies. In a suspicious way. You’re carefully somewhere else and you can prove it. Oh, boy, you have an ironclad alibi. But the spouse is always the first and primary suspect and, you being a well-off, well-bred, upper-crust woman, nobody expects you to soil your hands. Not directly. You’d find help. Like for everything else, your gardener, housekeeper, nanny, whatever. The cops start looking at your car. At your phone. Also, there’s already a sheriff’s deputy, Rollie Robidoux, who’s seen you drive up to my house. Well, what the fuck are you doing at my house? Talking to me? Are we friends? Not that anyone remembers. Lovers? I’m what, forty years older than you. But if I were, that wouldn’t make it better, it would make it worse. Everyone knows the plot of Body Heat even if they haven’t seen it. It’s your basic noir story. A little hot sex, man gets besotted, woman gets besotted man to kill for her.

“So, what the hell are we going to do about all this information that you’ve already created that—should we do this insanity—that will lead to a connection between us that has no acceptable explanation?”

She shook her head. She didn’t know.

“I do know. Which is why you’re going to do things my way.