I never should have got out of the hot tub.

I was luxuriating in the steaming water when Karen asked me to get her a Diet Pepsi.

“Excuse me?” I murmured.

“I’m in postcoital bliss,” she said. “And when I’m in postcoital bliss I need a Diet Pepsi.”

“Why don’t you get one?”

She shook her head.

“When a woman’s in postcoital bliss it’s the guy’s job to get the Diet Pepsi,” she smiled. “It’s a rule.”

“I’m in postcoital bliss, too.”

“Too bad.”

I saw I wasn’t going to win so I lifted myself out of the tub. She looked at me with what I wanted to think was a lascivious expression.

“Besides,” she said, “it’s your fault.”

That was very nice of her to say.

“Then you don’t mind if I get myself one, too?” I asked.

“Not at all.”

Even though no one could see us on the deck of our house I wrapped a towel around my midriff as I padded into the kitchen. I turned to admire Karen as she stretched her long neck back onto the edge of the tub and closed her eyes. Her black hair was wet with steam. Her wide mouth bent into a smile.

I loved her to distraction.

I had just opened the refrigerator and taken out two cold, shiny cans of Diet Pepsi when the phone rang.

And stopped.

I stood stock-still and watched the sweep hand on the kitchen clock. No, no, no, no, I thought. Let it be a wrong number. Let it be an obscene caller that chickened out. But don’t let it ring again in thirty seconds.

Exactly thirty seconds later it rang again.

I snatched the receiver off the hook and snapped, “What.”

I knew who it was.

“Son!” Graham’s mock cheerful voice pierced my eardrum.

And it had been such a nice evening.