The Adulterer's Confession by Sam Anthony

Author:Sam Anthony [Anthony, Sam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-10-07T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

01:10 Pacific Time (PT)

08:10 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), GMT - 1 hour

37000 feet above Kipisa, Baffin Island, Canada

Speed: 520 knots

“Sophia and I had been having an affair for several months …”

“I know. I could tell you the day it started,” Tamsin said.

“How? There’s no way you could have known that first day.”

“It was a Friday, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. But that’s just a lucky guess.”

“There’s no luck involved. I knew straight away.”

“Bollocks!”

“Lee, it was obvious. I could tell as soon as you came home from work. You’d had a shower in the last few hours. You’d stuffed the clothes you’d been wearing deep down in the laundry basket. You were struggling to look me in the eye. You kept trying to start pointless conversations in an effort to appear normal and casual. You had no idea what was going on in the TV programme we were watching. You checked your phone every two minutes. You swaggered around the house as if you were the only man on a desert island full of beautiful women. You were uncharacteristically affectionate. You kept sniffing your fingers … gross! And you were rock hard when we had sex that night.”

“Okay, but apart from all that …”

“I’m afraid you’re not very good at deception.”

“Unlike you?”

“Yes. Unlike me.”

“How did you know I’d had a shower?”

“Your hair. Straight after a shower, it’s all bouffant, but as the hours pass it gradually goes lank and lifeless, pretty much at a constant rate, like radioactive decay. I reckon it’s got a half-life of about five hours. As soon as I got home, I knew you’d had a shower and washed your hair around lunchtime.”

“Damn! You should have been a detective.”

“Yeah. I’m wasted as a primary school teacher. That, plus all your other unusual behaviour, made it obvious you were having an affair.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” I asked.

“Oh, I didn’t care. I knew you loved me. That’s all that really mattered. I didn’t want to rock the boat. Can you imagine what would have happened if I’d confronted you?”

“Yes. I’d have vociferously denied it. You’d have seen right through my protestations. I’d have begged for forgiveness and thrown myself on your mercy. You’d have had to pretend you were devastated. There would have been tears and recriminations. The kids would have got upset. It would have been a right mess.”

“Exactly. So I chose to ignore all your strange behaviour and just wait for your sordid affair to run its course. I knew you’d never leave me for that fat trollop.”

“Can you stop saying things like that?” I said. “You didn’t know Sophia at all. She was a warm, generous, loving person … at first.”

“I bet she was.”

“How did you know it was her?”

“I didn’t. I had no idea who it was until your office Christmas party.”

“What gave it away?”

“You couldn’t keep your eyes off one another. It was glaringly obvious. And when you introduced us to each other, the look she gave me was very unsubtle in its meaning.”

“She gave you a look?”

“Yes.

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