My husband’s best friend drove our 16-year-old daughter to ballet three times a week — when I went to pick her up myself, her teacher asked, “Your daughter hasn’t told you anything, has she?”

Scott had gone quiet.

Later Rachel had asked what was wrong.

Nothing, Scott told her. Cash-flow timing.

She had let it go.

Then there had been Derek at their kitchen table one Sunday afternoon with Scott’s laptop open and a stack of company envelopes beside him. Rachel had asked why Scott’s bookkeeper needed Scott’s personal signature on a blank form.

Derek had laughed.

I’m not forging his will, Rach.

Scott had laughed too.

Rachel hadn’t.

She remembered that now.

She also remembered deciding not to make an issue of it because Scott had looked exhausted, and because Derek had been his best friend for twenty-seven years, and because Rachel knew what Scott heard whenever she questioned Derek: You don’t trust my judgment.

So she had swallowed the unease.

Keep the peace, she had told herself.

Now her daughter had missed eleven ballet classes.

Rachel gripped the back of the chair until her knuckles paled.