Free The Secret Lives of Married Women by Elissa Wald

you do?”
    “I am going to put a stop to this.”
    “How?”
    “Do not worry about this,” Stas told me. “It is not any longer your concern. And do not speak about this to anyone.”
    “But Stas—”
    He hung up.
    * * *
    I went out without a word to Jack and got into the Pontiac. As Stas had ordered, I sat there waiting. The morning was very warm.
    I understood that whatever happened next, nothing would be the same. This phase of the game was over; no more pretense of neighborly ease would be required.
    It was very hot in the Pontiac, but I kept the engine off, the windows up. People passed the car: skateboarders, dog-walkers, women with strollers. It occurred to me that anyone who noticed me might wonder why I was sitting there. No one could know that the house I was watching was my own. During the brief time we’d been here, I’d met none of our neighbors.
    After about twenty minutes, my husband’s black Civic appeared in my rearview mirror. He was at the wheel and beside him was a man it took a moment for me to place. It was the man from the warehouse, the one who had cut the stone for Stas that day. The scar running the length of his face made him unmistakable. I hadn’t known they were in touch; Stas had not mentioned him since. He had short silver hair, a hard face, narrowed eyes. I had the impression that he was someone who seemed older than he truly was. That he might be in his late thirties while looking forty-five or even fifty: Russian men tended to age hard. Why was he here? To stand next to Stas and look intimidating? If that was the case, and I hoped it was, he would surely be very effective.
    Both men nodded to me as they climbed out of the car but neither of them came over. It was as if I were incidental to whatever was about to happen. The man from the warehouse put on a pair of shades. As they walked together toward the house, I put the key into the ignition, shifted into drive, and pulled into the street. It’s done, I thought then, and though I wasn’t sure just what these words might mean, they seemed weighted with finality and portent and peril. I drove away.

11
    There are things I haven’t told you. That was my opening line upon calling Stas earlier. And then I recounted Jack’s relentless overtures, his insinuation, his aggression. Even now, I wondered if I’d blown the whole thing out of proportion.
    Who was the man with the scar? Was he part of the Russian mob? And what was Stas doing with him?
    In a North Portland diner known for its blue cornmeal pancakes, I sat next to a window with a cup of decaf and stared at the white cherry tree across the street. By now, any confrontation in our home was likely over. Had Stas and the other man merely threatened Jack? Or could they possibly have hurt him?
    Sitting there, a memory came to me, of the day that an angry ex-employee named Fred came looking for Stas. Fred was the initial answer to Bryce’s ongoing conundrum: what meticulous, reliable person could stand to build the same computer hundreds or even thousands of times, forty to sixty hours a week, in a windowless room for minimum wage?
    “I need Rain Man,” he said. “No, seriously. And I think I found him. I talked to him on the phone this morning and I’m telling you he’s the one.” He slipped into a rendition of Fred’s high robotic whine:
    I built boxes for Compaq for five years and Hewlett Packard for eight years and Sony for six years and Dell for three years. I have my own T15 reversible torque screwdriver —
    (Here Bryce had interrupted him to say, “If you’re rocking back and forth right now, you’re hired.”)
    But while Fred did indeed prove to be fastidious and tireless, Stas couldn’t stand him. The ancient transistor radio he kept on his desk (despite Bryce’s offer to buy him a Walkman or iPod) was always on, always tuned to an opera station. He had overwhelming body odor, was always muttering under his breath and often burst into high-pitched laughter