“Thank you.”
I nodded once and carried Cooper upstairs to bed.
At the time, I thought I was doing the right thing.
I had no idea what I would hear a few hours later.
The Sound That Woke Me Up
Sometime after midnight, I woke suddenly.
At first, I didn’t know why.
Then I heard it.
Voices.
Quiet.
Urgent.
Coming from downstairs.
I sat up immediately.
My first thought was that Diane was on the phone. But something about the tone in her voice made my stomach tighten.
She sounded nervous.
Scared.
I slipped quietly out of bed and moved toward the staircase, careful not to make noise.
That’s when I heard a man’s voice.
Low.
Angry.
My entire body froze.
“…you said he wouldn’t be here,” the man whispered harshly.
I stopped breathing.
Every instinct in my body screamed that something was wrong.
And then Diane answered with words that changed everything I thought I knew about my ex-wife.
“I didn’t have a choice,” she said. “Just give me until morning.”
