“Good girl,” he whispered, and patted my hand, and left.

I lay still and counted to thirty after the door closed, because I did not trust him not to come back for something he had forgotten.

Then I asked the nurse if I could use a hospital phone.

She brought me one, and I dialed, from memory, a number my husband had never known I kept — a number I had memorized years before precisely because I hoped I would never have a reason to call it, and had made sure I could call it in the dark, from a hospital bed, with a broken leg and a shattered phone, if I ever did.

It rang twice.

Chapter 6 — The Vance Contingency Plan