and rhythm of Simon’s breathing while he slept wasn’t as strange to her as it once had been, but she wasn’t fully accustomed to it either. Years of marriage to Glen had carved a familiarity that was impossible to duplicate.
The contrasts between Simon and Glen were both subtle and profound. Simon slept on his right side; Glen his left. Simon’s calf muscles were more developed than Glen’s, but his arms were less so. Simon folded his tees and polo shirts with the precision of a clothing retailer, rinsed with mouthwash before using toothpaste, and so on. In so many ways he wasn’t Glen, and yet there were similarities, too: the way he smelled no matter what cologne she bought, the things he said, the truck he drove, gifts he purchased—all reminded Nina of the last man to share her bed.
Was it because she missed Glen, couldn’t get him out of her mind? Or was she looking for patterns instead of seeing simple coincidences? More important, were there darker connections between her two great loves, reasons to doubt, signs she was missing just as she had missed them before?
When Nina closed her eyes, it was Hugh’s face she saw, the one from the mug shot—a disheveled, broken man, who could have been minutes from his last fix when his picture was taken. How on earth could she trust that person—a drug addict extorting her for money—over the man sleeping beside her?
You’re not safe.
Hugh’s words, like Maggie’s warnings, hissed at her from the dark. So what to do?
Nina listened to Simon’s breathing, felt his arm, which was warm to the touch. Warm because he was warm. He was warm, kind, and good to them. They were safe, she thought. Safe in a new home, in their new life together, safe from the betrayals and heartaches she’d suffered, and safe financially, too. It wasn’t like he was a stranger. They’d been together for almost two years, not a few weeks. This wasn’t some random hookup, Nina reminded herself. They were in a committed relationship. They owned a place together. If something were direly wrong with him, surely the questionable behavior would have surfaced by now.
But there were changes, she realized. Not with Simon, but with her. Her appearance had changed, with a new hairstyle. Her relationship with her daughter had changed. The frequency with which she saw her friends had changed.
You’re not safe.
In the quiet dark, Nina’s subconscious began to guide her, urging her out of bed and downstairs to do a little more digging on her own. She still had not fixed up the first-floor office in the way she had envisioned on move-in day. Pictures she had planned to hang on the walls remained on the floor, sitting next to the unopened cans of the Manchester Tan paint she had yet to apply to the walls. The room held a desk, a chair, and not much else. But at least it was a private space where she could conduct her inquiry away from prying eyes—not that any of those eyes were open at the moment.
Nina powered up her laptop. It’s natural curiosity, she told herself while navigating to the Google homepage. She typed the name “Hugh Dolan” into the search field, thinking perhaps there’d be a link to some exculpatory evidence that would make it possible to trust him, but no such luck. It was the same information as before: links to his arrest records and mug shots that the police routinely put online as a public service.
She thought again about Simon’s parents—what were their names? Strange how she didn’t know off the top of her head, but then again, they weren’t coming over every Thanksgiving to carve the turkey. Still, it was something she thought she should know.
Nina heard a creak and froze. She listened for the sound of footsteps but heard none. Probably it was the house settling, whatever that meant. It was something Glen would tell Maggie whenever she heard noises in the night. The tender memory put a little crimp in Nina’s heart. Why did Glen have to blow up all their lives? What awful thing had he done to make it necessary for him to kill himself or run away?
Nina compartmentalized those thoughts to focus on the names of Simon’s parents. Eventually, she remembered: David and Elizabeth Fitch. She searched for the father’s name first. After David’s military career he went to work for a defense contractor, but his background wasn’t distinguished enough to earn him