Once, when our son broke his arm and Carl was out of town, David even drove us to the hospital because my car wouldn’t start.
So when the company announced an end-of-quarter party at a restaurant outside town, I expected the usual.
Bad speeches.
Too much wine.
Carl complaining about accounting.
Nothing unusual.
A few days before the party, Carl told me he needed to arrive early.
“I’m meeting Sheila there.”
“Sheila?”
“From my department.”
I knew who she was.
Twenty-eight or twenty-nine.
Tall.
Dark-haired.
Always perfectly put together.
“We’re going over some client handover stuff before everyone gets there,” he explained.
“Handover?”
“Just work stuff.”
“What exactly are you handing over?”
Carl sighed.
“Laura, please. Do we really have to turn every boring work conversation into an interrogation?”
His tone bothered me.
But then again, Carl had been impatient with me for months.
Not openly cruel.
Just distant.
Our
