"So she managed to find a way to blackmail Carl. I mean, he'd been so careful before, and it hurt him because I think he really fell in love with her. He trusted her. Can you believe that? His lover cheats on her husband without his knowledge for over a year, and he trusted her. I know, I know.

"Maybe you should get a gla.s.s of water."

I did. I got a gla.s.s of water. Halfway down, I threw it all back up into the sink. Alice, bless her, was sweet as could be, patting me on the back, asking if I needed anything. She said she would stay all night if I needed her to.

Yes, I was tempted. I'd always been curious about Alice, if she was all talk or actually had some moves to match, and now to know what Frances was really up to, the last year and a half. Wow. I was angry. I wanted to do something, anything, to get back at her. But not this. Not becoming another notch on Alice's belt. I realized the irony-me, the horndog professor, turning down s.e.x from a couple of women now. For me it was about the pursuit. The challenge. I was a poet, d.a.m.n it! It couldn't be just s.e.x for the sake of s.e.x. No, I wanted s.e.x with women who enthralled me. I wanted it to be a hard climb to the top of Mount Ecstasy. I wanted her to shiver at the touch of my hand. No drunken one-nighters, no "polyamory", no sad, lonely people doing it in order to feel anything other than the sadness and loneliness.

I told her, "Thanks, but no. I'll be fine. Thank you."

We stood at the kitchen sink together, me trying hard not to erupt again. Deep breaths, through the nose.

She stepped closer, touching me, and stood on her tiptoes. She kissed my cheek. "You're playing hard to get. I would love to conquer you."

Well...turnaround is fair play. Still, I wasn't on the menu.

Plus, she'd distracted me now. Almost made me forget about the receipt.

"Carl sent you here to get that paper, right?"

Alice rolled her eyes and smirked. "No, it was Frances. Someone told her something about you being gone last night. But I got the wrong paper. She sent me back today once we knew you had found another place to sleep." A sigh. "Listen, it's okay if you've already found someone else. All I'm asking for is a couple of hours. We could do it in the shower. Frances says you guys have the best shower-"

A nice bit of mental p.o.r.n for me to think about-sudsy, all the steam, so so wet. Alice smelled like sweat and scotch right then, so a good rinsing would be appropriate. But hey, how much of our s.e.x life did Frances blab about? Made me feel shy.

"Sorry, but I'm not so sure I wouldn't end up the star of one of your home movies. I'll pa.s.s."

"Suit yourself."

"Frances sent you here to get the receipt and that's all."

She looked at me for a long moment. "You already know."

"Try me."

She batted her lashes. "In case I got caught, I was going to seduce you, of course."

I grinned. "Some advice-maybe start poking around for a new job? Perhaps in the film business?"

Alice finished her liquor in one pull, rubbed the back of her hand across her mouth, and slinked out the door empty-handed.

On the phone, Octavia said, "Bring the receipt over, and we'll let Pamela take it from here. And while you're at it, tie that c.u.n.t secretary to the back of your car by her hair and bring her along."

"Hey, she was helping here. No need for that."

"If she really wanted to help, she would testify for you."

"But the position she's in-"

"Which one? Seems like she's in a lot of them quite often."

"Jesus. Look, I just want to keep my house. I'm not after worldwide vengeance."

"Would you settle for campuswide?"

I told her I would be there in an hour and hung up the phone. After that, I wandered around, trying to outsmart Frannie by guessing what she might come after next so I could take it with me. But I had a brainfart and kept re-remembering things Frances had told me during the year and half she'd been cheating. All the "I love yous", "You're my one and onlys", "My sweetnesses". The spontaneous s.e.x at three in the morning, sudden and pa.s.sionate, but she never had anything left for our waking hours-dinners ended early by headaches, too much grading to catch up on, preparing syllabi, trips to the gym. "We can't schedule s.e.x, Mick. It's just not romantic." Meanwhile, she was scheduling s.e.x all the time. Living for it.

So I stopped trying to be smart and just changed the alarm code to something she would never guess-the hour and minute Alice told me how in the dark I really was.

TWELVE.

Pamela held the receipt off to the side and leaned back in the chair before saying, "Seriously?"

Octavia nodded. We were in the "theater", which was really just where she kept the sixty-inch flat screen, Bose sound system, and latest Blu-Ray technology. On the screen at the moment was a frozen image of a severed head from Andy Warhol's Frankenstein. I don't know how she could watch stuff like this. Gave me the creeps, but before she'd installed this state-of-the-art screening room in her bas.e.m.e.nt, I had silently sat through hordes of horrific films with her in the past just to be a friend, usually at midnight showings full of freaks. She doesn't go anymore-hard to fit in the seats-but waits for everything on DVD. She watches these sorts of movies to relax.

The office would've been preferable, but I believe Octavia wanted us here at this specific point in the movie in order to drive a message home: Severed head = "Punish the b.i.t.c.h".

"So," Pamela continued. "I should find this Ron Moore guy and see if he has any connection or knowledge to a robot pen, and then subpoena his records."

"It would really help me out," I said.

That made her laugh, more like a rumble. It was deep and throaty. You could sense the German in her. A well-built woman who could take me in any fight, anytime, with one hand behind her back. She wore a light-gray power suit, crossed her legs, and below the hem of her trouser was revealed a perfectly chiseled ankle and size ten foot wearing a magnificent Jimmy Choo high-heeled leather sandal. I only knew that because Octavia had asked about them when she first sat down. They weren't Octavia's style, I knew, but once she heard the designer, the price clicked in her head, thus another piece of info to file away about one of her closest advisors. It occurred to me that here was a woman who, no matter how b.a.l.l.sy and comfortable she appeared, felt she couldn't come over in anything less than a very powerful power suit and seven hundred dollar heels.

"Something I said?"

Pamela waved the receipt. "You ready to proceed criminally, too? Because it's not just you versus your wife anymore. This man committed a crime. Why in the h.e.l.l would he want to own up to it?"

"If the proof is in his records, he's done anyway. I don't know, can't we threaten to turn him in unless he anonymously helps out?"

She dipped her chin. "What's a judge going to say to that? Really, think ahead, dear."

I smoothed my hair across my scalp, one two three times, trying not to raise my voice. "I just want to keep my house."

"I don't know if you can without putting a whole bunch of people in jail or on the front page."

I never knew if her folksiness was a put-on. You could certainly hear the dirt in her voice, from having been raised on a farm in South Dakota, and it carried a powerful punch.

And through all this, Octavia didn't say a word. Didn't even look at us.

"Pam, I'm not a lawyer-"

"Got that right."

"-but, listen, please, tell me there is some way to convince Frances to stop this without it becoming a thing."

She scrunched the paper in her fist. "This already is a thing!"

Octavia finally spoke up. "Okay, then, f.u.c.k it."

We both turned to her.

"f.u.c.k it. Let's tell her lawyer we're concerned about the legitimacy of the paperwork, especially the signature on the quit deed."

Pamela huffed. "That'll give them time to construct a narrative-"

"Then we go to court and tell a judge! Someone, anyone, who will blink when we stare some f.u.c.king truth at them."

She was pretty loud. Pamela mushed her lips around and waited for more. I smoothed my hair back again, palms getting greasier. I wiped them on my pants.

"Are you telling me," Octavia said, under control, "that even with evidence, it's unlikely Mick would win right now?"

"No, what I'm saying is that in order to do it, he needs to be prepared...sorry, Mick. You need to be prepared for a long legal battle. We're talking fraud, theft, and as for this orgy stuff..." She whistled. "If the secretary won't talk, then you have to find someone who will."

Octavia said, "Someone who hasn't already been warned not to cooperate with you."

We all thought about that for a moment.

Then Octavia said, "Or one who, even though warned, doesn't feel so good about f.u.c.king you in the a.s.s right now."

I was pretty sure I understood. Again, how she figured it out from the scant information I'd given her, I have no idea. And why I hadn't realized until that moment, again, color me stupid.

"Stephanie," I said.

Octavia winked at me.

Pamela looked back and forth between us. "Maybe I should do the talking. It seems as if you're just making it worse."

I was about to defend myself when Octavia said, "He'll do fine with this one. But see about tracing the guy on the receipt. Let's at least ma.s.s our troops on the border, even if we're not ready to fire yet."

After Pamela left, Octavia hit PLAY and the room was filled with deafening surround-sound Warhol, but after a minute of trying to take it, I stepped over to Octavia and took the remote, hit STOP.

She didn't grab for it, as I had expected her to. Instead she lifted her eyes, waiting for me to justify my rudeness.

"I don't know about this. I'm starting to think I won't be able to get anyone to help me. So what if they want to have s.e.x with each other and face the consequences of it? And so what about the house? Maybe I'm hanging on too long here." I paced in front of her couch. "If I just accept that it's over, and that I should move on, I haven't really lost all that much. We don't have kids. I still have my job, even if that means freshman comp. I'll survive. I'll fall in love again. I'll take it easy, write about all of this mess..."

Still pacing, very much in my own head. Octavia stood and stepped into my path.

I stopped, met her eyes. "I mean...is it worth hurting so many people? I should've never listened to you. No offense, but I'm talking from the heart here. You had nothing but good intentions, but look at where we are now."

She sighed, reached out with both hands and rubbed my arms. She then held out an outstretched palm. I placed the remote in it. She curled her fingers around it and popped me on the side of the head. I winced, grabbed my skull and stumbled back.

"You stopped my movie so I could listen to you turn into a girl? If I wanted to hear that sort of s.h.i.t, I'd head out tonight to the zombie bar and pick up a grad student."

She sat, hit PLAY. Then hit PAUSE again. "Actually, that's not so bad of an idea. Jennings!"

I ma.s.saged my temple, waiting, but an apology would never come. A thousand years I could stand there, but what was the use? I slipped out of the room as the thunderous Dolby erupted once again. And I was off to ruin another innocent person's life.

THIRTEEN.

I parked a block away from Ashton and Stephanie's home, which was in a modest neighborhood in Northwest Minneapolis, postage-stamp yards and modern homes, circa 1962. They still went for a couple of hundred grand, and they weren't bad at all. Just not quite interesting enough for Frances and me. I tried to imagine life here with my wife, a lot of extra money in our pocket from not having to bleed so much into the mortgage and upkeep of our home. Would we have gone out more? Traveled more? Enjoyed each others' company enough so that none of this would've have happened? No idea.

Anyway, I parked a block away and walked, thinking myself clever before realizing that someone could just as easily watch me walk to her front door and ring the bell. So all I've done is fool the improbable pa.s.sers-by. Good job, Professor. You'd make an ace private eye.

I didn't see anyone skulking about in cars with tinted windows or anything, so maybe we were blowing the whole thing out of proportion. This would be a nice visit. She would have no idea what I was talking about-s.e.x parties? Seriously?

I turned up her walkway, up concrete steps to the front door, and rang the bell. In about twenty seconds Stephanie was there, peering through the gla.s.s at me. She wasn't smiling. She even took a step back.

I leaned closer. "We need to talk."

She shook her head.

"It's important. I'm sure you know about it. Didn't Frannie-"

Stephanie yanked the door open before I could finish and put a shushing finger to her lips. So I shushed.

She looked over my shoulder, across the street, then she took my arm and dragged me inside. I would tell you about the house but I didn't have time to see it before she led me by the wrist through a small front sitting room, the kitchen, to the bas.e.m.e.nt steps, and down into the bas.e.m.e.nt. Along the way, we pa.s.sed an old dog sleeping on a pillow, barely lifting its head, while a smaller yipped and hopped at our feet.

The bas.e.m.e.nt was half finished, with thick carpet, a futon, and an entertainment center, an older square TV and a DVD player on top. The shelves beneath were full of boxes of TV shows: The West Wing, The Wire, Mad Men, Friends.

She saw me looking. "We don't have cable."

"Oh, right."

It was a strange quiet voice, not a whisper but not very bold. "So we watch TV shows on DVD."

"That's fine. When's Ashton getting back?"

"A few days." We nodded at each other. "Why are you here?"

"Why couldn't we talk at the door?"

She let out a deep breath and let go of me. She sat on the futon and settled her face into her hands. "Because...I just...can't."