But I was getting better. I remember the turning point was waking up with the ability to open my eyelids without manual help. Slits of light came through, and I was actually able to recognize things without the room spinning. I could cock my head and see hospital monitors. I could turn my neck to see a body from the shoulders down, sitting on a chair with a laptop. If I craned upward, I could see a face in intense concentration, eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses fixed on the screen, hair playing peekaboo with high cheekbones. There was a wide mouth, a prominent chin, and thick light eyebrows arched over what I knew were brilliant blue eyes. White hair that still held streaks of the blond that once was.

He was as gorgeous as ever. Probably as charming as well. How else do you get women to whore for you? Once, I had been deeply in love with him, the only boy—well, man now—I had ever passionately loved. That had faded but wasn’t completely gone. What hadn’t faded were the memories of why I’d left him—twice. In today’s vocabulary, he’d be designated as a toxic male, which really was a nothing label. It certainly didn’t explain the scope of what Christopher Donatti was capable of doing. He was a violent man, abused as a child and abusive as an adult. I had stuck it out with him for a long time. Then a serene man and an unplanned pregnancy convinced me to make a hasty retreat. Devek had been kind, especially in the beginning, a quiet lover but not a particularly good one. I thought I had wanted calm and tranquility, but sometimes you needed a little wind to make the boat sail.

I wasn’t sure what crises had turned Devek into a gambler once again. His family had told me that chapter had passed. It could have been pressure from his stressful job as a cardiac surgeon. It could have been his desire to keep up with his older brother, who controlled the family fortune. Or it could have been the addictive rush that was missing in his life. It played havoc on the family. He lost everything. He started to owe money. Lots of it.

He was looking for insane ways to get out of debt. Some of his half-baked ideas included me, others included Juleen. Of course I wouldn’t agree to anything. So I left with my children.