Joel took a sip of the bourbon he had ordered from the stewardess and tried not to think about what would have happened to Susannah if he hadn't given in to the vague impulse that had taken him to his mother-in-law's doorstep that morning. Kay didn't like her mother, so he had only met the woman a few times in social settings and had never spoken with her long enough to realize that she was mentally ill. But Kay should have known.

As Joel thought about his wife, he felt the familiar combination of disgust and arousal she always managed to produce in him. She hadn't even disclosed that she had a daughter until several months after their wedding-about the same time he had begun to have second thoughts concerning the wisdom of his marriage. Kay had assured him that the child was better off with her mother, and not being anxious to take on the burden of another man's offspring, Joel hadn't pressed her. She went to see the child whenever she was in New York, and he had assumed that Susannah was well cared for. By the time Kay had given birth to his own child, he had nearly forgotten the existence of the other one.

He swirled the bourbon in his glass and stared blindly out the window. What kind of woman could conveniently forget she had a child? Only someone like Kay-a woman who was too silly and shallow to see what would be perfectly obvious to anyone else. He should have taken it upon himself to investigate long ago.

He turned his head to study the little girl at his side. She sat straight in the seat with her hands clasped neatly in her lap. Her head was beginning to wobble a bit, and he suspected the noise of the airplane engines would soon put her to sleep. As he watched, her eyelids, like fragile eggshells, began to drift downward, and then they abruptly snapped back up.