Hush Little Baby by Suzanne Redfearn Page B

two decades, we’ve found the other eight, along with three duplicates my dad keeps at his house. The last, the seventh in the set, has been elusive, and each day, my dad and I discuss where our search should travel next. I almost hope we never find it, that our quest never ends.
    My eyes slit open, and the clock beside me blurs into focus. And though the world only barely glows with the promise of morning, I’ve used up my time for dreaming. I push to my feet, say good morning to the fifty-seven Chinese revelers, and move to the bathroom to get ready for the day.

15
    C onnor’s office is like mine, except he prefers color and I like silver and black. No clutter, sharp oranges, kiwi greens, and lots of glass.
    I sink into a retro velvet wing chair and swivel on its chrome base to face him.
    “Did you kiss and make up with Jeffrey?” he asks with a Cheshire grin.
    “He’s reviewing the information Kelly gave him, and he’ll get back to us.”
    His smile widens. “But did you kiss?”
    Connor is the only one who knows about my marital misstep with Jeffrey, and he loves to bring it up, though I trust he’ll never tell.
    I sneer at him, and his smile turns into a mocking frown. “So he’s not firing us?”
    “Not yet.”
    “Good, because these beauties come in an amazing gray suede.” He holds out his foot again for me to admire. My laugh is lost somewhere beneath the weight of the world, and when I don’t respond, Connor drops the banter, and in his lawyer voice, which is both serious and soothing, says, “What’s up?”
    It takes several seconds for the words to find their way to my mouth, and when they do, they’re strangled. “I think I need a divorce.”
    Last night, as I lay beside Gordon, his arm draped around my waist, my beautiful bracelet on the nightstand beside me, three things became clear. The first is I’m not crazy. The second is Gordon is crazy. The last is, and here’s the surprise, I realized that if I leave him during a calm, not during a storm, it might work.
    There’s always a period after the violence when a precarious balance lingers between us, an aftermath of restraint, a time when we’re both trying to do better. If I’m good, if I don’t rock the boat, I might be able to take control.
    This morning, when I got to work, I called the bank to get an accounting of our finances, and now, calmly, rationally, while things are stable, I’m going to find out the best way to go about getting a divorce.
    Connor nods. “Okay, why?”
    “Does there have to be a reason?”
    “There doesn’t, but usually the ending of a nine-year marriage that’s resulted in two kids has some basis. Did he find out about Jeffrey?”
    The words slap me with apoplectic terror at the thought of Gordon finding out about me being unfaithful.
    Connor shakes his head at my reaction. “I’ll take that as a no. He doesn’t know about Jeffrey.”
    I shake my head.
    “But he knows about the divorce?”
    This new thought is as horrifying as the first, exploding my synapses or neurons or whatever it is that connects in your brain to create logical thought.
    He will kill me. He will kill me. He will kill me.
    My throat constricts, throttling itself in anticipation of Gordon’s reaction.
    What was I thinking? That blurred state between sleep and awakeness can do that to you, enable you to believe things are better than they are, make you think you’re more capable.
    As sure as I’m alive, I will be dead—it will be an accident, but it is certain.
    “Jinks…”
    I hold up my hand and swallow hard to regain my composure. “Connor, forget it. Never mind. I don’t know what I was thinking. Forget I ever came in here.”
    His face is as serious as I’ve ever seen it. So serious, he almost looks straight.
    “What’s going on?”
    I shake my head and manage to stand.
    “Talk to me,” he says.
    “I can’t.”

16
    I leave the building and drive ten miles to the beach. Work is piled on my desk, and I have a