a variety of reasons: the sex was astonishing, the rush of emotion overwhelmed her, she hated to leave him, it hurt, physically, to rip herself away. And, too, there was guilt—about Jason, about Daphne, about the kids—and there was fear, fear of getting caught, fear of going to hell. Nearly every time they were together, they talked about stopping, about walking away in the name of a righteous life. But neither of them ever followed through. It was cathartic to talk about but impossible to execute, leaving each other. They felt ecstatic, elated, anxious, guilt-ridden, despicable—but mostly, they felt alive. Each day was spring-loaded and tense with possibility—to see each other, to talk, to touch—and it was this emotion that was too intoxicating to give up.
The actual vacation, although parts of it were pleasant—the hot sun, the cool, clear blue water, the delicious food and drinks, the luxurious room, the attentive service—felt to Lock like a vacuum. It was an eight-day, seven-night tunnel of no Claire; it was something to be survived. He had promised Claire he would e-mail, and in fact, the resort had a business center he could have used at any time, but he felt that communicating with her—trying to put words to his emptiness and then subjecting himself to the added torture of awaiting a response—would be infinitely more painful than just putting his head down and enduring. He and Daphne spent long, silent hours by the pool, each of them reading, and while Daphne napped, Lock took walks on the beach, thinking not of Claire (always of Claire) but of what topics he could bring up at dinner that would not incite a verbal attack from Daphne. She did seem marginally better at the resort, though she found ways to insult the other guests (who were primarily British and therefore reserved and inclined to keep to themselves, especially when they heard Daphne lapse into her clucking). There were two evenings of intimacy and these were, perhaps, the most trying times for Lock. Sexually, Daphne was both aggressive and impossible to please. Lock, helped along by three rum punches, strove to remember Daphne as she used to be, before she took to assaulting his manhood at the same time that she was trying to excite him. It was during these intimate moments that Lock thought to himself, I cannot stay married to this woman. He would not be able to stand a lifetime of such sexual encounters, but he also knew he would never be able to cut Daphne loose, no matter how bad things got. There wasn’t another man alive who would be willing to take Daphne on, and her parents had passed away, so what this meant was that if Lock abandoned her, she would become Heather’s lot, and Lock could not, would not, burden his daughter that way. He would stay with Daphne.
The best moments of the vacation were when Daphne would look up from her book, take a sip of her rum punch, and say, “Thanks, babe”—this, the pet name that the two of them had used with each other, and with Heather, before the accident—“for bringing me here. I’m having fun!”
The worst moment came at dinner on the final night. It was no surprise that Daphne had saved her poison spear for the final night; that was part of the torture: allowing Lock to believe that they’d made it—a whole week without overt hostility—and then sticking him in the final hour. Daphne was smarter, cleverer, and more cunning now than she had been before the accident.
Over a glass of very fine, pale, bubbling champagne, she said, “I have a question for you.”
“Shoot.”
“Do you find Isabelle French attractive?”
Lock laughed, inadvertently spritzing some of his drink across the tablecloth. “No,” he said.
“You’re lying.”
“I am not lying.”
“Isabelle French is a beautiful woman. Anyone you asked would say so.”
“She’s fine, nothing special. Other people may find her beautiful, but I don’t particularly. I’ve known her a long time. Maybe I’m just used to how she looks. I don’t notice it.”
“She’s after you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Daphne.”
“You heard what she did with Henry McGarvey at the Waldorf?”
“Of course.”
“If you touch her, I’ll kill you.”
“I’m not going to touch her.”
“I mean it. I’ll murder you in your sleep. Then I’ll find a female judge who will let me off the hook.”
“Nothing is going on between me and Isabelle.”
“Really?” Daphne said. She tilted her head. Her eyes held a look of unusual clarity. “Because I’ve noticed a change in