Chapter 5: Forty-One Pieces

Quentin's POV

I taped the check back together at midnight with the lights off in my office.

There were forty-one pieces.

I had picked them off the boardroom carpet myself after everyone left, on my knees, because I could not stand to think of a cleaner sweeping them up.

I laid them out on the desk and fit them like a puzzle.

Five million dollars, in my own signature, in the shape of my wife's refusal.

I told myself I was keeping evidence.

Evidence of what, I could not have said.

At eight in the morning, Gretchen came in with my schedule and a coffee.

"Hollis Club luncheon at noon," she said. "I'll go ahead and make sure the room is set."

She put a single envelope on top of my mail and left.

I opened it because it was marked insurance.

It was an explanation of benefits from the health plan I had never taken Claire off.

Under her name, the line item read, Obstetric ultrasound.

The date was two days ago.

I read it three times.

I stood up, and then I sat down, because my legs were wrong.

My wife had been pregnant when I slid her that check.

She had not said a word.

She had stood in my boardroom, with my signature in her hand, and she had torn it in half.

Gilbert knocked and came in without waiting.

He took one look at my face and shut the door behind him.

"What is it, son?"

I handed him the paper.

He read it, and he took off his glasses slowly.

"Well," he said. "That explains the clinic."

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