...And Never Let HerGo

been doing with a woman who had disappeared? For that matter, what had he been doing having dinner with another woman without even mentioning it to her? It was as if the earth had opened up beneath her feet and everything in Debby’s world had begun to slide in. She would have bet money that Tom had no secrets from her—not about women. She had bet her life on him for fourteen years.
    Tom was still talking. He said that Charlie wanted to speak to her on the phone and asked her when he could call her.
    “Five-thirty, I guess,” she said. “At my house.”
    Charlie Oberly was a respected attorney in Wilmington and had once been the Delaware State Attorney General. He was a good friend of Tom’s. Debby didn’t mind talking to him. Actually, she wanted to find out more about what was going on. She stayed at work for another hour, blindly doing what she needed to do to clear her desk. But she couldn’t focus or concentrate as she tried to figure out what on earth Tom was involved in.
    When Charlie Oberly called Debby, he asked her if she had spoken with Tom on the previous Thursday night and during the day on Friday. That was simple enough to answer. Tom had said he had a meeting with his law firm in Philadelphia on Thursday night and she had spoken to him on the phone a couple of times after ten—the first time, she thought, was during
ER,
and again later. She had seen Tom early Friday morning and talked to him on the phone a few times during the day, and he had spent Friday night with her.
    Oberly listened to her timetable but he didn’t give her much information. She needed to talk to Tom.
    At nine-thirty Tuesday evening, Tom called her from his mother’s house in Stone Harbor. By this time, Debby had had too many hours to think and she was very upset. As soon as she heard Tom’s voice, she said, “Who
is
this Anne Marie Fahey?”
    “I’ve been seeing her.”
    “When?”
    “Up until September of last year, but it’s over.”
    “Are you in love with her?”
    “I did fall in love with her,” Tom said, “but it’s over, Debby.”
    She could scarcely believe that Tom had been that involved with another woman and never once mentioned it to her. On the rare occasions when she dated anyone else, she had always told him. Andnow it seemed that Tom had hidden what was apparently a love affair from her, even as he kept telling her how very much he loved her.
    “How can you tell me you love me?” she asked.
    “I do.”
    “I know she’s a lot younger,” Debby said. “I can’t compete with someone who’s thirty years old.”
    “She had so many problems,” he said. “I was so good to her—I was helpful and I was interested—but then I couldn’t get rid of her. She was so mentally ill, Debby, and she attached herself to me, and I knew I had to unload her.”
    “How long, Tom?” Debby asked. “How long did you see her?”
    “About three years.”
    “Three years?”
    Tom kept insisting that she had nothing to feel bad about now, since he was no longer in love with Anne Marie Fahey. He didn’t seem to understand why she was so emotional, but Debby was so distraught that, for once, she couldn’t hide her real feelings. She felt betrayed, and she felt a fool for never once suspecting him.
    Tom said he was sorry that he’d ever had to tell her about Anne Marie, but since it was probably going to hit the news any minute, he wanted her to know the truth first. Of course, he had no idea what had happened to Anne Marie, who was such a ditsy girl that he never could tell what she might do next. She could be any of a dozen places.
    “Are there others?” Debby asked when he had finished telling her about Anne Marie, a woman she had never even
heard
of until the day before.
    “One
other,” he replied quietly. And then he said that he had been seeing Susan Louth since November.
    “Why didn’t you tell me?” Debby cried. “How could you let me believe that I was the only woman in your life?”
    “I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
    “My
feelings?”
Debby felt as though she had no breath left in her body. “Don’t you know that lying to me is worse than that?”
    Debby wasn’t even thinking she could be making Tom so angry that he might leave her. She spoke her mind without thought of the consequences. She was absolutely devastated, but she didn’t think of leaving
him.
Her mind scurried around, trying to mend the damage, albeit unconsciously. Her future had been with Tom for so long