Free The Widower's Wife: A Thriller by Cate Holahan

unfaithful strayed with a coworker.
    The secretary strode through the security turnstile. Ryan caught the questioning glance of the guards.
    She scanned the crowd exiting into the gray scene outside the building’s glass doors and then headed to a corner obscured by a display of orange lilies. “I don’t really want to talk here,” she whispered as he approached. “And if you tell anyone I said any of this, I’ll deny it. This job pays three times what I made for my old accounting firm.”
    “But their relationship seemed about more than just work?”
    “All I know is that Michael was upset and she’s his type.” She gestured to her half-buttoned shirt. “Busty.”
    “When I spoke with him, he implied that Mrs. Bacon had been flirtatious,” Ryan said. “He seemed uncomfortable with it.”
    The admin rolled her eyes. “If she was, I’m one hundred percent sure that he reciprocated. Michael’s a pig. He told me that part of my job was to make people want to wait for him outside his office. But the clients don’t care. It’s for him. When I’m not dressed sexy, he says I’m ‘lacking initiative.’”
    The back of Ryan’s neck got hot. If he’d been at his old job, he would have tried to make Smith pay for his sexual harassment. “You don’t have to put up with that, you know. You can report him.”
    She shook her head like a petulant teenager. “No way. He’ll just deny it and I’ll be out the best paycheck of my life.” She again lowered her voice to a whisper. “But I do think that he should be held accountable if he did anything to drive some woman to . . . Well, you know.”
    “Suicide?”
    Her eyes darted around the room as she nodded. “I saw on the news that she was pregnant. He could have knocked her up and then refused to cop to it or something. Divorce would not be cheap for Michael.”
    Ryan flipped through his mental files. In the United States, more than four hundred thousand paternity tests were taken each year. That meant there were roughly half a million guys who doubted they had fathered their child. Could Ana have feared what Tom would do to her and Sophia if he discovered that he was not the father? Was that why she’d killed herself?
    Three men came in through the revolving door. The woman nearly jumped backward. They must have worked in her office. She waited until they had passed through security to resume speaking.
    “Anyway,” she whispered. “I thought you should know. And I bet if you look into it, Mr.  Initiative will at least have to stop being such a lech.”
    The revolving glass door turned again. Ryan sensed the woman was about to hurry through it. He touched her arm. “How can I contact you?”
    She dug into her purse and withdrew a business card. “My cell’s on this.” She slipped the linen stock into his hand and then hurried through the human centrifuge before it stopped rotating. Ryan watched her escape out to the street, knowing he’d never catch her without yelling and drawing unwanted attention. He read the name on the card: Fernanda Alvarez. Administrative Assistant to Michael Smith .
    He mentally erased his neat little theory. Ana sleeping with her married boss changed everything.

10
    August 12
    A series of steady beeps drowned out the television. The house security system was warning me about an open door. I shut off the reality-show repeat that I’d half-watched while waiting up for Tom and then stared at the keypad blinking beside my bedroom door. A code, known only to Tom and me, needed to be entered within fifteen seconds. The correct numbers would disarm the system with a doorbell’s ding. The wrong numbers would set off screeching alarms—not only in my house, but in police headquarters eight blocks away.
    The police would come then, but they hadn’t for a missing thirty-four-year-old man. When I’d called headquarters, the desk sergeant had told me to send an e-mail with a recent photo of Tom and the Maserati’s license