“Did his failure to ejaculate bother him?” Jesse said.
“He never said.”
“Even when you were married?”
“Children were an issue early on, but then . . .” She spread her hands and shook her head.
“His current wife know about this?”
“About me?” Stephanie said. “I don’t know. I was the least of her problems anyway.”
“He was a philanderer,” Jesse said.
“Relentless,” Stephanie said. “But, hell, so was she.”
“Lorrie?” Jesse said.
“Sure.”
“Revenge?” Jesse said.
“Maybe, but I think she would have fooled around even if Walton were Goody Two-shoes.”
“She promiscuous or did she have a favorite?” Jesse said.
“I don’t know. I didn’t follow it all that closely. Tom Nolan said she was pretty hot and heavy with Alan Hendricks.”
“The researcher.”
“You could call him that,” Stephanie said.
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R O B E R T B . P A R K E R
“What else could you call him?”
“Power behind the throne.”
“Tell me about that,” Jesse said.
“More and more, Alan did not only the research but the writing. More and more he decided what the subject matter would be. More and more he was doing the interviews, and writing the stuff, and Walton would say it.”
“How do you know,” Jesse said.
“Tom Nolan.”
“You’re friendly with him.”
Stephanie smiled again.
“Yes, I am,” she said.
“How’s Tom’s staying power?”
Stephanie smiled widely.
“Sufficient,” she said.
Jesse smiled with her.
“How come you didn’t tell me all this stuff when we talked before?” he said.
