...And Never Let HerGo

entirely against her Catholic beliefs.
    But by September 1995, Anne Marie was a long way from being in love with Tom. She had been trying to get away from him for months, and he always seemed to draw her back as if he had an invisible wire that never let her get too far. She hated that. She hated his calling her friends to check on her, and his phone calls, his incessant E-mail, his drop-in visits. Sometimes she saw him driving by on the street below her apartment, probably checking to see if her car was there.
    She had been disenchanted with Tom before September, but now Anne Marie had met Mike Scanlan, and she remembered what normal dating could be like. Without realizing what a Pandora’s box she was opening, Anne Marie told Tom that she didn’t want to see him any longer except on a platonic basis. Tom did not take it well. He would not accept it at first. Then he raged at her that he had broken up his home and left his wife—all for her. And now that he had done it, she was telling him she didn’t want him? How could she be so cruel?
    It was no use arguing with Tom, or pointing out that she had been fair. Anne Marie had told him he must never consider her when he made any decisions about his marriage, but he hadn’t listened.
    Anne Marie confided in Kim Horstman once again, telling her that Tom was obsessive about her. He was calling her fifteen to twenty times a day, leaving messages on her answering machine that she
had
to talk with him. Why wasn’t she returning his calls? It was vital that they get together to work out their problems. And then there was his E-mail. Whenever she turned on her computer, Tom’s E-mail rolled down the screen. He was sending it into the governor’s computer system so he couldn’t say exactly what he meant, but Anne Marie caught the hidden messages there.
    She hadn’t told Tom about Mike Scanlan, but with his connections all over New Castle County he had a way of finding out things.By October, Anne Marie and Mike were dating often. There were nine notations on her calendar: dinners, drinks, parties.
    On October 8 the pope came to Baltimore, and Mike took Anne Marie to the Mass he held at the Camden Yards stadium. “I asked her in the beginning of that week,” Mike recalled, “and she was kind of surprised—thought I was joking—but she was pretty overwhelmed by it. She has an uncle, a monsignor, and she said several times, ‘Oh I wish James [were here]. James would love this!’”
    After the pope’s visit, Anne Marie had even more dates with Mike. They went to Holidazzle, a fashion show fund-raiser for children with mental disabilities, and to a friend’s house for dinner afterward, on October 9. The Faheys usually got together for Sunday dinner, and soon Mike had a standing invitation. “And I usually made it,” he said with a grin. Anne Marie’s siblings were always vigilant where she was concerned, but Mike walked the Fahey gauntlet and was stamped approved.
    Mike had
his
family for dinner the day after Thanksgiving, a tradition for him, and Anne Marie was invited. “I wasn’t sure she’d show up,” he said. “She knows how tough her family was on me, so I think it was—I thought it might be—‘get-back time,’ but she came over and had a great time.”
    The next night, after dinner with his parents, Mike took Anne Marie to
Tosca
at the Grand Opera House. On December 1, the new couple went to Governor Carper’s reception, where the marines collected Toys for Tots. And a night later, Mike had a
Caddyshack
party, which was hilarious, with everyone dressed as someone from the Bill Murray movie with its manic golf course antics.
    Christmas was approaching but it seemed the oddest season. On December 4, Anne Marie flew to Puerto Rico for a weeklong legislative convention. Along with Tom Carper’s press secretary, Sheri Woodruff, she would represent the state of Delaware. But while Anne Marie was in Puerto Rico, she became ill and fainted. Doctors weren’t able to diagnose what was wrong with her. It may have been the heat or some bad food. Or it may have been that she was living with such dread that Tom would approach Mike and tell him terrible things about her, she was barely eating.
    When she returned from Puerto Rico on the eleventh, Anne Marie plunged into a whirl of activities. There was a Women for Carver dinner, lunch with a friend a day later, and the weekend was filled with parties. Anne Marie always called parties “fiestas” when she