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“You think I don't know her after ten years? I don't want to shock you, but I'm sure Kate told you we lived together for two years.”

“As a matter of fact, she did, although it's somewhat indelicate of you to put it that way. I believe she was living at a hotel at the time.”

“If that's what she said,” Joe said noncommittally, but Kate had told Andy the truth. He just didn't like hearing it from Joe.

“And what were your conclusions after ‘living’ with her? I gather that you weren't anxious to marry her then. Why now?”

“Because I was a fool, as all three of us know. I was building my business, I had a lot on my mind. I didn't feel ready to take on a wife. That was three years ago. I didn't have time for her then. I do now.”

“Was that the only reason you didn't marry her? Or were there things about her that worried you, Joe? Was she too needy, too demanding, did you feel trapped? Did you want to run?” Kate had told him all of it when she and Andy met again, but Joe couldn't know that as he listened to him. He felt a vaguely familiar sense of what it had been like then, and they weren't pleasant memories for him. He had felt everything that Andy had described. It wasn't that Kate he wanted, it was the one she had become now. The one who appeared to understand what had gone wrong. “She's the same woman, Joe. She looks panicked every time I leave the house. She calls me everywhere I go. If I go out to lunch, she has my secretary track me down. When she was pregnant, she nearly drove me insane. I had to go home to see her in the middle of the day. Is that what you want? Is that the kind of time you have available, Joe? You must be a very successful man indeed to have that kind of time on your hands. You'll have to be with her night and day. How will you take her with you when you travel? She won't leave Reed. And she wants to get pregnant again. She wants more babies. And she'll get them with whatever ruse she has to use to see to it that that happens. I know Kate. She did it to me with Reed. I didn't mind. You will.” They were lies, all of them, but Kate had long since given him a map of all of Joe's terrors, and Andy was systematically playing each one of them. And he was winning. He could see it in Joe's eyes, although he felt some obligation to defend Kate. But he was scared. Andy could sense his terror heavy in the air.

“She's not in love with you,” Joe said firmly. “She'll be different when she's with me.” But he didn't sound quite as sure."

"“Really?” Andy asked, as he finished his scotch. “How different was she in New Jersey?” He knew all about the fights that had brought them down, her panic over feeling abandoned, his terror of being engulfed. Kate had explained it all, in retrospect, to him. And Andy was using it all now. For a good cause, he thought.

“That was three years ago. She was a kid then,” but he no longer sounded quite as convinced. He wouldn't have admitted it to anyone, but he was beginning to wonder if Andy was right. He could feel a feather of terror tracing its way down his spine. Just listening to Andy describe her painted a picture of everything he didn't want, no matter how much in love with her he was.

“She's still a kid,” Andy said smugly, longing for another scotch, but he wouldn't have dared. The one had been just right to give him courage. But he didn't want to get sloppy now. He could see the worry in Joe's eyes. His demons had been reborn. “She'll always be a kid, Joe. You know what happened to her as a child. So do I.”

For once, Joe looked surprised. He was the better fighter of the pair, but this time Andy had him on the ropes. He was the small speedy devil who was going to bring down the champion, and he could already taste the prize. He didn't care what he had to do to keep her, but he wasn't going to lose her to Joe this time. No matter what. And he knew that if he played it right, Joe would never even tell her he'd been there. It was the perfect crime, and the only way to keep from losing her. He had to make Joe want to run.

“Did she tell you about her father?” Joe asked. There was a trace of hurt in his voice. Kate had never admitted it to him in ten years. All he knew he had heard from Clarke, that day in Cape Cod. But once again, Andy didn't hesitate to lie to him. She hadn't told Andy either, and he had learned it from Clarke too, shortly before they were married.

“She told me when we were in college. I've always known. We were good friends.” Joe nodded, and said nothing. “Do you know what that must have been like for her? How terrified she is of losing the people she loves? She couldn't survive without us. She couldn't live through a day on her own. She is the most dependent woman I've ever met, and you know it too. Do you realize that she wrote to me twice a day while I was in Europe?” Even that was a lie. She had written him hastily scribbled notes that only mentioned their son.