“You fell in love with the state computer guy,” Jason stated. He withdrew his hands, fisted them on his lap. Maybe that wasn’t fair of him, but he could only give as much as he could give.

“I became infatuated.”

“You slept with him.”

She immediately shook her head, then hesitated. “But sometimes, on the spa nights …”

“I know about the spa nights,” Jason said curtly.

“Then why did you let me go?”

He inhaled, exhaled. “I didn’t think it was fair to punish you for my failings.”

“You can’t have sex.”

“We did have sex.”

“Did you like it?” she asked curiously.

He managed a crooked grin. “I’d be willing to try it again.”

That made her smile, eased some of the tension. But then her expression grew somber again, and he leaned closer, so he could study her eyes in the dark.

“After our family vacation,” she said, “when I realized that the photo I saw wasn’t something you’d done, but something that had been done to you, I tried to break it off with Wayne. Except he didn’t take it so well. He thought you were coercing me, that I didn’t know what I was doing. He threatened to turn you in to the police if I didn’t keep seeing him.”

“He wanted you for himself.”

“I found out I was pregnant,” Sandra whispered. “I took the test last Friday. And I realized then that I really did need to end things with Wayne. I’d been stupid, reckless. But … I wanted you, Jason. I swear, I just wanted to be with you and Ree and whatever little life we’ve made together. So I e-mailed Wayne again, told him that I’d made a mistake, and that I was sorry, but I’d decided to save my marriage.

“He called me immediately. Agitated, angry. He kept trying to tell me that I wasn’t thinking straight. He seemed to think that you had some kind of hold over me, maybe you were beating me into submission, I don’t know. But the more I tried to tell him everything was okay, the more he became convinced he had to save me.

“I broke off all contact. Stopped answering his calls, his text messages, his e-mails. I purged accounts. I did everything I could think of. I just wanted him to go away. And then, Wednesday night …”

She looked away. Jason caught her chin in his hand and brought her gaze back to him. “Just tell me, Sandy. Let’s just get it all out, then we can determine where to go from here.”

“Wayne appeared. Right here. In our bedroom. Apparently, he’d made an impression of my house key the last time I’d met with him. His face was red, angry. He was holding a baseball bat.”