“You’ve never loved me, have you? No, don’t answer that. There’s no need to. But, you know, Genevieve, no man has ever loved you as much as I have.”

She stared down into her drink.

“You’ve ripped out my heart and squeezed out all the juice—like it was an orange. There’s only the peel left and that’s no damn good to anyone.”

“Robert—”

“What did this guy have that I don’t? Was it the shoes? Didn’t I buy you enough shoes?”

“Of course you did. It wasn’t—”

“I hope he hurt you real bad.”

“He did.” She swirled the cognac, golden, around her glass.

“Good.”

He took out a cigar. She watched him light it. It was a fat cigar and he had to puff a lot to get it going. Oddly, he seemed in lighter spirits now, in spite of all this talk of oranges and peel and hurting real bad. The rage was no longer in evidence. He’d put it away in his jacket pocket, along with his lighter. She saw him as his business associates must see him—a confident man, rather suave. Capable. He’d shaved since this afternoon. He’d put on a crisp gray suit.

“You’ve behaved inexcusably,” said the new cool-and-composed Robert. “No man in his right mind would take you back after what you’ve done.”

Genevieve opened her mouth to start talking again about finding a hotel, but Robert held up his hand to silence her.

“Still, when all’s said and done, you come from a damn strange place. They’re a cold kind of people, your family. They didn’t bring you up the way they should have.”

She waited, watching the smoke from his cigar clouding across the room.

“Why did you tell me you were pregnant?”

“I don’t know.”

“It was a really stupid lie.”

“I know. But does it matter now? Our marriage is over anyway, we both know that.”

“There shouldn’t be secrets between man and wife.” He sipped from his bourbon. “That’s where the rot starts. You were building that ‘path of lies’ long before you took up with your cobbler.”

“It’s late, Robert. In the morning I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

“Will you?” He raised one eyebrow. His voice was cool. “Because there are things I want to know.”

“Please let me go to bed.”

“It’s not all your fault. Not all of it.” Robert gazed at the dead roses. “I had you followed, Genevieve. I had a man go snooping about in your past. In your school records.”

“You did what?”

“I’m not proud of myself. I handled it all the wrong way. But there is something you haven’t told me, isn’t there? Something happened to you when you were a girl. That ‘something’ turned our marriage sour.”

“Robert, don’t.”