He pulled his hands back into his lap and rubbed his palms back and forth against his knees, his knuckles white.

“And after you call Alan,” I said, “you will dial your mother.”

Ethan swallowed hard, his throat working against his shirt collar.

“Sylvia?”

“You will call Sylvia on speakerphone,” I said.

“You will tell her that her financial interventions in our marriage are finished.

You will tell her that she is never to step between us again, and that if she comes to this house uninvited, you will not open the door.”

He stared at the black leather strap of his bag, his lower lip trembling slightly.