“Don’t be ridiculous. It would take you hours. Please. Just stay here with me. Just let it go. We’ll find another property.”

“Claudine, one way or another, I am going over there tonight.”

She could tell he meant it.

“Fine,” she said. “I’ll drive you. But I’m staying in the car. I don’t ever want to see that man again. Ever.”

“You won’t have to,” he said, grabbing the bottle and heading out the door.

Henry

He woke up having zero memory of climbing into bed the night before, but he was in bed. He smacked his lips. Cotton mouth. A familiar buzzing sound. The thankfulness he was flooded with when he saw the light blues of the duvet allowed him to sink in a little lower. His cocoon. The comforting cool of the pillowcase on his cheek. He turned to see if Claudine was lying beside him.

She was not.

Dragging himself from bed, he made his way to the kitchen. She was leaning against the sink, the newspaper open and covering her face.

“Morning,” he said in a gravelly voice. “Any coffee?”

She put the newspaper down and that’s when he saw it. Her face. The dried blood. The swelling. The black-and-blue eye. Her eyes were red. She had been clutching the paper, not reading it. Holding it tight. His mouth opened, but he had no voice. Nothing came out. She said his name. Or something that sounded like his name. Dread spread throughout him as he floated toward her. She laid the paper on the counter. A picture of Jonathan Miller. The headline:

ASPEN LOCAL SLAIN IN DOUBLE HOMICIDE

Longtime Aspen resident Jonathan Miller and Thomas James Cooke, who is believed to have been working for Mr. Miller, were found dead on the property early evening. The homicide investigation is ongoing. At this time, no further information is available, but the Aspen Police Department Tip Line is open if you have any information regarding the crime.

It wasn’t possible.

His thoughts raced, he was trying to remember.

They’d been driving?

Wait, before that… yes… Claudine coming home. So upset. Hurt. He’d hurt her. Miller. It was coming back in flashes. He had been in the passenger seat, Claudine driving. Yes, that was right. Up to the house. Yelling who in the fuck did Jonathan Miller think he was? He remembered being amped up. It felt good. Good to be angry at something new. Tired of the old target, the affair, how they’d almost lost each other. The cold air through the window waking him up, getting him angrier and angrier the longer they drove. He drank straight from the whiskey bottle he’d brought with him. Then… what happened? He searched his memory but couldn’t find it.

“Claudine?”

How she looked at him said it all. The horror. The compassion. A disbelief.