Phần I
Ellie did not confront Julian.
She lay beside him until the alarm went off, and she made coffee, and she let him kiss her goodbye on the porch, and she said love you back in a voice so normal it frightened her.
In court, she had watched a hundred people get caught in a lie. It almost never happened because someone shouted liar. It happened because someone patiently collected every version of the story and laid them side by side until the gaps showed.
So she would collect. She would keep the record. She was good at that.
At the security desk of the Judicial Center, Marcus the guard waved her over before she'd cleared the metal detector.
"Delivery for the bride," he said, and grinned, and lifted a white box from under the counter. Silver satin ribbon. A perfect bow. "Somebody dropped it off first thing. Fancy."
"Who?"
"Didn't see. It was sitting on the counter when I came on at seven." He winked. "Secret admirer. Don't tell the groom."
Ellie carried the box to the fourth-floor stairwell, where nobody ever went, and sat down on the concrete steps and pulled the ribbon.
The card said SOMETHING NEW.
Inside, still in its plastic sleeve, was a cheap new phone. It was charged. It had no contacts, no messages, no photos. One app on the home screen. Voice Memos.
One file.
03-09-2011 · 9:41 PM · 1:12
Under the phone was a yellow sticky note in the same neat block capitals as the back of the photograph.
THIS WAS ON HIS OLD PHONE. HE NEVER DELETED IT.