That’s why I’ve decided to do it. I have the summer to find employment—three months to land a decent job, one that pays more than what I was making at PKA. And if I’m still unemployed come September, then I’m going to move forward with the Big Plan. I’m going to do it for my family.

Wish me luck, journal, universe, cosmos, whatever it is that you are. I’ll need it. It’s not the first time in two decades I’ll be applying for new jobs—PKA never paid well, and I tried hard to go elsewhere. I didn’t stay at the company for twenty years out of loyalty or because I loved what I did. I stayed because I was lucky to be there in the first place. When you get yourself into a mess like I did in ’97, no one will hire you.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Heather

Dear Dr. K,

I know what you think. I saw the way you looked at my husband when we came in for counseling. You think he’s the good guy and I’m the villain. But you need to know the truth about him—as his therapist, you deserve to know the truth. So let me tell you what really happened.

One freezing cold morning in January, when I was sixth months pregnant with Hope, I was woken by pounding on the front door.

Burke has always slept like a rock and he didn’t even stir. It was barely six A.M. as I waddled toward the foyer, bleary-eyed but anxious. I opened the door slowly. Two men in blue jackets stood with their arms crossed. They announced themselves as FBI and told me they’d come to arrest my husband.

Panic seized every inch of me as I watched them storm into my home, helpless as they marched into our bedroom and roused Burke from half sleep.

“What the fuck is going on?” I yelled as Burke dressed, the agents watching from the doorway.

“Your husband has been arrested for insider trading, ma’am,” one of FBI men said. “He’ll get a call later today. We suggest waiting by the phone.”

“This has to be a mistake,” I said desperately, grabbing Burke’s arm. From his bedroom, Garrett started wailing.

“Just stay by the phone, Heather.” Burke’s eyes landed on mine. I’d never seen him look so terrified. “I love you and Garrett more than anything.”

The day stretched on forever while I sat on the couch, panicked, waiting for the phone to ring. Garrett was fussy—I knew he needed a walk in his stroller—but I refused to leave the apartment. Finally, at a quarter past four, Burke called. The sound of his familiar voice instantly settled me, like a glass of warm milk. He said to come down to the courthouse and sign him out. As long as I’d be a suretor on his bond, he could come home.

“For now,” he added, and I felt the panic inside me spread.

I stuffed Garrett into his down suit and winter hat and barreled down to the lobby. I waited impatiently while the doorman called us a cab. It was rush hour and took nearly forty minutes to get to the downtown address Burke had given me.

At the courthouse I was directed to sign several forms, which I did without thinking, my signature a quick, illegible line.

Burke looked paler than I’d ever seen as the guards led him out of the holding cell, dark circles ringing his eyes. As soon as they’d uncuffed him, he kissed me, and for the first time in six years I smelled alcohol on him, its pungent, lingering scent. I hadn’t noticed it the night before, but he’d gotten home late from the office, after I was already asleep.

Burke took Garrett from my arms, cradling his son close. Tears stained Burke’s cheeks and beaded the ends of his thick, dark lashes, and I realized I hadn’t seen my husband cry like this since Gus died.

I made every effort to stay even-keeled on the way back to the apartment—I didn’t want to discuss any of this in front of Garrett. Orange light glowed through the taxi windows as we sped uptown, the sun a neon sliver between the buildings to the west. Burke leaned his head against my shoulder. The stink of the booze on him made me want to scream. How had I not noticed it this morning?

At home, I put Garrett in his crib, praying he’d fall asleep. Burke headed straight to our room and climbed into bed, but I yanked the covers back.

“What the fuck, Burke?” I yelled. “Is that really alcohol on your breath? Since when the fuck have you been drinking? And why the hell did two FBI agents come to our apartment this morning? Why did I just bail you out of jail?”

He looked truly terrible as he sat up straighter, rubbing his nose and propping himself against the pillows. His normally clean-shaven face was coated in a layer of dark stubble.

“Oh, Bones.” Fresh tears gathered in his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

“Just tell me what’s going on, Burke.” I forced my tone to soften. “Tell me this is some kind of misunderstanding.”

“I—it’s not, Bones.” Burke’s voice was gravelly.

“What? How?”

Burke sighed, and I listened to him explain how it had started a couple of months ago, during the height of the merger he’d been working on all fall.

“At first it was just a line or two at the office. Everyone does it.”

“Everyone does cocaine at the office?”

“A lot of people do, Heather. You don’t understand. You have no idea what it’s like. We’re all drowning in work and exhausted and … I watched the other analysts and associates do it for months. I couldn’t pull such late hours and I was falling behind—”

“So you turned to drugs?” I scowled. “Back to fucking drugs? After all these years? Jesus Christ.”

“I made a mistake.” Burke bowed his head, rubbing his eyes again. He reminded me of Garrett when he did that. “I fucked up. And then—soon after that I—I started drinking. I was out with a colleague one night—Doug Kemp, I’m sure you’ve heard me mention him before. He’s in Global Markets but sits on my floor, and he always makes an effort to say hi to me, even though most of these guys all know each other from their college lacrosse teams and don’t give a shit about trying to be buddies with me. Anyway, I’d had a particularly awful day. Just tense and long and horrible. Doug saw me heading for the vending machine around dinnertime and suggested we grab a burger. It felt so nice to just hang out with a guy who gets it, you know? Then Doug ordered a Scotch, and I had all this coke in my system and I just—I just couldn’t not order one, too. That’s the best way I can explain it. I just couldn’t not order one.”

“Because you’re an addict, Burke.” I dropped to my knees on the floor, feeling cold and numb. “That’s why you committed to getting clean in the first place.”

“I know.” Burke nodded solemnly. “I’m an addict.”

I exhaled. “So then what happened? What does this have to do with you getting arrested for insider trading?”

I listened to Burke explain that a couple of nights later—a night he told me he was working late—he and Doug went out drinking again, and Doug presented him with an idea. Doug had a close friend, Julian Martell, looking to invest a substantial amount of money in the market. Apparently, Julian’s last remaining grandparent had died, and Julian was looking to grow his inheritance (what is it with these trust-fund babies?), and Doug was thinking of giving him a heads-up about the impending merger. It was illegal, tipping someone off, but Doug said if done correctly, sharing the information would be simple and the returns astronomical.

But Doug couldn’t do it alone. Doug and Julian had gone to UVA together—they were in the same fraternity for Christ’s sake—the connection would’ve been obvious to anyone who noticed Julian’s gains from the potential investment. That’s where Burke came in. Burke—a stranger to Julian—would provide Julian with the information he needed to profit. Doug, Burke, and Julian would then split the return—Doug promised at least half a million in total—and no one would know a thing. And if anyone ever did look into Doug, there’d be nothing to find. The plan was bulletproof.

Well, the plan was bulletproof to my idiotic husband, who’d begun numbing himself with Johnnie Walker and coke after six and a half years of sobriety. And nothing is what it seems when you’re on a two-month-long bender and putting the fate of your job in the hands of a guy named Doug Kemp, a sleazy opportunist who sees that you’re vulnerable and doesn’t think twice about using you as a human shield.

The SEC noticed Julian’s gargantuan stock purchases. They informed the FBI, who linked Julian to his lifelong friend and college-fraternity brother Doug Kemp of Credit Suisse. And the FBI didn’t stop at Doug; they plowed deeper into the system and discovered Julian’s multiple phone calls with Doug’s colleague Burke Michaels, only twenty-four hours before the order was placed.

For the life of me I couldn’t fathom why Burke had done it, why he had risked the job he’d worked so hard to get for an amount of money that could’ve been his annual salary a few years down the line.