“Here to see Caitlin Byrne, detainee 563270.” I handed over my identification at the jail registration desk. This was only the second time I’d come to see my wife and would hopefully be the last until her trial, assuming she had one. If she was smart, she’d take her plea deal. Then again, if she was smart, she never would have crossed me. Once approved, I sat at the first visitation booth, each containing a phone receiver on either side of a thick plexiglass window. Ten minutes later, Caitlin walked into view and sat opposite me with all the borrowed haughtiness of a bastard royal—powerless and too dense to see it. I imagined wrapping the coiled phone cord around her neck and cinching it tight until her body went limp. The visualization enabled me to produce a small smile as I brought the
