It had never once occurred to her, in five years, that he might be lying on purpose.

This is perhaps the cruelest mechanism of a betrayal by someone close: that the very trust which makes the betrayal possible also makes it invisible.

Elena had not suspected Richard because Elena trusted Richard, as family, as the brother of the man she had married and lost.

When he took the stand and described an argument that had never happened, her mind had reached for every explanation except the true one, precisely because the true one was unthinkable.

She had assumed he was mistaken, or confused under the pressure of grief, because those were the things that could happen to a person you trusted.