It falls open without a sound. Jane is in the bed, curled onto her side. She is not wearing anything. She is smiling in her sleep. She is in the arms of another man.

I stagger forward, creating a loud noise that coincides with the crash of the door against the wall. They both jump up, blinking. Jane sees me first. “Oliver,” she gasps.

I lunge for him, hauling him out of the bed. Jane is screaming for me to stop. I think she is probably crying. “Get the fuck away from her!” I shout, throwing the man onto the floor. I don’t even know who he is. I’m ready to kill him, and I don’t even known his name.

I kick him in the gut and in the balls and send him reeling backwards. Jane jumps out of bed, wailing, naked, and throws herself across him. I have poison running through my veins. I want blood.

She cradles his head in her lap. “I’m all right,” he says to her. “I’m okay now.” He tries to get to his feet, to come after me.

“Come on,” I say, beckoning. “I’ll kill you. I mean it, I’ll kill you.” Suddenly Jane is in between us, and she throws herself into my arms, and it is so remarkably distracting that I lose my sense of purpose. She has wrapped herself in a sheet. She is so soft.

“Don’t do this,” she pleads. “For me. Don’t do this, please.”

“Let’s get Rebecca. We’re leaving.”

Jane will not make eye contact with me. “No.”

“We’re leaving, Jane,” I say authoritatively.

She stands directly between us, her hands knotted into fists, her eyes pressed shut. “No!”

And this is when Joley chooses to enter the room. “What the hell is going on?” He sees me, he takes note of Jane and this other asshole, leaning on the bedpost for support. “Sam, what happened?”

“Sam Hansen? You’re the one who’s been screwing my wife?” It all balls up inside my throat then, my shoulders. I grab for Sam’s neck. I can break it in one swift move. I know human anatomy.

Joley pushes Jane out of the way. He grabs me by the collar of my shirt and wraps his arms around mine so that I am pinned. I struggle but he is too strong for me, and eventually I relax. “Where’s Rebecca? I want to see Rebecca.”

“She’s next door,” Jane says.

“There’s no one next door.”

“Of course there is,” Joley says. “Where should she go at five in the morning?”

Jane’s hands start to tremble, and she turns to Sam. Sam. “I told Hadley to leave,” he says. “I told him last night. She must have found out. She must have gone after him.”

Jane nods very slowly, and then she bursts into tears. “She knows it was me. She knows I told you.”

Joley, for once in his goddamned life the voice of reason, walks towards Sam and practically shouts in his face. “Do you know where his mom lives now?”

“I know the town. It won’t be hard to find.”

“I can’t believe this,” I say. “I travel across the country to find my child has run away and my wife is in another man’s bed.” Sam and Joley continue to talk about some area of New Hampshire. I come closer to Jane and I take her hand. “I had so much to tell you,” I say sadly. Her cheeks are red and swollen with the tracks of tears.

“Oliver,” she whispers, hoarse. “I can’t lose her. I can’t lose her.” She looks up at me. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

I know they are watching, from across the room. I know they are watching and that is what makes it even sweeter. This has not been easy. I came across an entire continent to tell this woman I am in love with her. I came to tell her my life is nothing unless she’s by my side. And I’m not about to throw that away, in spite of it all. I know how to forgive, now. I know how to forget, I imagine, too. It is up to me to put my family back together. I squeeze Jane gently. Then I close my eyes, and press my lips against hers. Her mouth is quivering. But she is kissing me back. This much I know: she is kissing me back.

When Oliver hugs Jane like that, Sam stirs next to me. I brace my arm, so he doesn’t step forward and do anything stupid. He takes three slow measured breaths that rock his whole frame. Then he pushes past me. “Let’s go,” he says.

We’ve decided that since we know where Hadley’s gone, we have a good chance of finding Rebecca there. If we get a start this early, we’ll be there by lunch time. “I’m going with you,” Oliver says. He lets go of Jane and she sags against the post of the bed. I think she might pass out, from the looks of things.

“Oliver.” You have to feel bad for the guy. This isn’t what he expected to find in Massachusetts, after all. “It won’t do you any good to come with us. Someone has to stay here with Jane, anyway.”

“This is not a question. I am telling you: I’m going with you to New Hampshire.”

Sam takes a step forward. I can see Oliver’s face change as he drinks in the tone of Sam’s voice. “You know where Hadley’s mom lives. You two go. I’ll wait here in case she comes home.”

“Like hell you will,” Oliver says. It’s about to come to blows again, so I step in between them. “I’m not leaving you here with my wife.”

“You can’t go by yourself,” Sam says. “Half the roads there aren’t marked.”

Oliver leans toward Sam. “I can find places that are totally unmarked, you asshole. I do it for a living.”

“This isn’t the ocean.”

Jane puts her hand on Oliver’s arm. “He’s right, Oliver. You can’t go up there alone.”

“Okay,” Oliver says, pacing. He wheels around and points to Sam. “You. You go with me. Joley stays here with Jane.”

“What a goddamned pleasure,” Sam mutters.

“What did you say?” Oliver grabs the collar of his shirt, but Sam, now awake and probably ten times stronger than Oliver, shoves him with such force Oliver crashes into the door.

“I said it would be my pleasure.” Sam walks over to Jane, who is crying again. He leans his forehead against hers, and puts his hand on her shoulder. He whispers something only she can hear, and she starts to smile a little.

“We can check the grounds but I don’t think we’ll find her. We’ll take my truck,” Sam says, and Oliver shakes his head.

“We’ll take my car,” Oliver says.

After we hear the car drive away, Jane sinks down to the floor and pulls her knees up to her chest. “You win, Joley. You were right.”

“Nobody’s won anything. They’re going to find her.”

Jane shakes her head. “I should have said something to her. I should have told her about Sam, and above all else I should have tried to understand what was going on with Hadley.” She pulls herself upright, and walks into Rebecca’s empty room.

I hear all the air rush out of her, like she’s been punched hard. She touches Rebecca’s bathing suit, her hairbrush. “The room smells like her, doesn’t it?”

She picks up Rebecca’s bra. “We bought this in North Dakota,” she says, smiling. “She was so excited because it had a cup size.” She winds the bra around her waist, snapping the elastic. “I have been so selfish.”

“You didn’t know this would happen.” I sit next to her on Rebecca’s bed.

“If she’s hurt,” Jane says. “I’ll die. I’ll never be able to forgive myself. If she’s hurt, it will kill me.”

Jane lies down on the bed. I rub her back. “She’s fine. She’s going to be fine.”

“You don’t know that,” Jane says. “You don’t understand how I feel. I’m her mother . I’m supposed to protect her. I should be with her now. I should be with her.” Jane rolls over and stares at the ceiling. There is a water mark that has spread in the shape of a lamb, and another in the form of a zinnia. She sits up. “Drive after them. I want to be there when they find her.”

“We can’t do that. What if she comes back home? Someone has to be here. You have to be here.”

Jane sinks back down on the bed. She crawls under the covers,and turns onto her side. “She sleeps like this,” Jane says. “With her mouth open and her hand curled up on the side. She even slept like this as a baby, when all the other infants in the hospital were on their stomachs with their rear ends sticking in the air. You know when they brought her to me, after I had her, I was terrified. I didn’t think I’d know how to hold a baby. But she was the one who let me off the hook. She was this little wiggling mess of arms and legs,” Jane says, smiling. “But Rebecca looked up at me, and she seemed to be saying, Relax. We’ve got a long way to go. ”