Jealousy consumed her face: her lip was curling, her molars grinding.

Look my way, Dabney thought. She would be okay if Clen made eye contact.

But he was engaged in conversation; he was making a point to Elizabeth and another couple whom Dabney didn’t recognize. She heard his voice but not exactly what he was saying. She had forgotten how lively he could be in public. He was handling himself brilliantly now, so well that Dabney hated him a little. The group was hanging on his every word.

This was her punishment, she supposed, for what she was doing to Box.

The fireworks began and everyone turned to watch them explode over the harbor. Enjoy them, she thought. But no, she couldn’t, not without Clen. She had half a mind to yank Clen away from Elizabeth. Scandal would ripple through the party, but what did Dabney care? She would be able to watch the fireworks with the safe, heavy weight of Clen’s arm around her.

Love was awful. She hated love.

And to make matters worse, the congressman seemed suddenly to realize that he was standing next to a living, breathing woman.

“Dabney?” he said. “Are you all right?”

Dabney raised her face to the sky just as a giant white chrysanthemum of fire burst open above them. Dabney hoped her face was illuminated in such a way that her excruciating heartache looked like rapture.

Agnes

She found her engagement ring sitting in the pool of icy water at the bottom of the drinks cooler.

Not lost. Here in her palm. Not gone.

Not gone! Not lost!

There weren’t words for her relief.

But there was another emotion shadowing the relief, an emotion without a name, which felt like an escape hatch closing.

Dabney

On July 5, she was too sick to rise from bed. She’d called in to work, leaving Nina a message on voice mail, saying that the flu had returned with a vengeance and, if she was lucky, she would be in at noon. But even by nine she knew there would be no way. She could barely make it to the bathroom. Agnes was at work and Box was downstairs in his study. She heard him early in the afternoon, banging around in the kitchen making lunch, but he didn’t come up to check on her. She needed ice water and Advil. She had to wait until five thirty for Agnes. She also asked Agnes for her cell phone, and Agnes gave her a confused look. The landline was right next to Dabney’s bed.

But Agnes brought the water and the medicine and Dabney’s cell phone—and a piece of buttered toast, which Dabney couldn’t eat.

“Thank you,” Dabney whispered.

“Oh, Mommy,” Agnes said.

That night, Box did not come up to bed, and Dabney supposed he was either angry or ashamed, but she couldn’t predict which. She had a dream that Clendenin and Elizabeth Jennings were playing mah-jongg on a wooden raft at Steps Beach, and the raft was engulfed in a miasma of rosy pink. Clen and Elizabeth Jennings a perfect match?

She woke up and thought, No!

July 6, sick. Dabney heard classical music downstairs, but Box did not appear.

Her cell phone remained silent. She wanted Clen to text, but maybe he was angry with her, too, or he was ashamed, or he was besotted with Elizabeth Jennings. Maybe both Box and Clen would forsake her. They would abandon her, as her mother had.

Dabney’s father had done a wonderful job in raising her, but it was fair to say that there had always been a part of Dabney that had felt unloved.

July 7, sick. Agnes stayed home from work; Dabney tried to protest but forming the sentence was too difficult. Then Agnes explained, “It’s raining, Mom. Pouring rain. Camp is canceled today.”

The sound of the rain against the window was comforting.

Dabney heard Agnes’s voice from downstairs. “Daddy, she’s really bad. Should we take her to the hospital?”

Box said, “Give her one more day.”

One more day, Dabney thought.

How was he getting clean clothes? she wondered. And what were he and Agnes eating?

At midnight, a text from Clen: Tell me when I can see you.

On the morning of July 8, Dabney woke up feeling like a flat, empty version of herself, but she was well enough to shower and go downstairs for a bowl of shredded wheat.

Box was at the table with his black coffee and the Wall Street Journal. He looked at her over the top of the paper. “You feel better?”

She nodded.

He nodded. He said, “I have to go to Washington tomorrow. I’ll be back on Friday.”

Dabney thought, Washington. Back Friday.

Dabney made it to work by noon.

Agnes

Riley left a message on her voice mail that said, “Your mother signed out on the log at three o’clock and I followed her. She drove out the Polpis Road to number 436. She turned in the driveway.”

Agnes listened to the message twice. Riley had followed Dabney? That was an audacious maneuver. He had done it for Agnes. Or because he was naturally curious, or he was intrigued that Dabney was keeping a secret.

Agnes googled 436 Polpis Road and found that it was owned by Trevor and Anna Jones, people Agnes had never heard of.

That evening, Dabney was back in the kitchen, making dinner—grilled lamb, fresh succotash, baby lettuces. Box was still in his study, but Agnes assumed he would soon be lured out by the aroma of the roasting meat, garlic, and rosemary. The last three nights, they had ordered in Thai food.

Agnes said, “Mom, do you know anyone named Trevor or Anna Jones?”

Dabney was tossing the salad. Agnes sensed the slightest hesitation with the utensils.

“No,” Dabney said.

“Really?” Agnes said. “You know everyone. Trevor and Anna Jones? They live on the Polpis Road?”