Entirely, p.14
Entirely, page 14
“Yes, let’s.” If you’re still speaking to me.
“Now that Charles is here with Becca, I’m going to grab a real cup of coffee. Come with?”
“You go. I’ll just poke my head in for a minute to see her.”
She watched Leigh leave, high heels tapping down the hall to the elevators. A prick of sadness pierced Quinn’s chest at the close friendship they once had, the old friendship in which Leigh knew nearly everything about her. That Quinn was a member of Octavia’s would melt Leigh’s eyebrows. Even if Leigh didn’t say it, she would think the same thing Jonathan did: I don’t know who you are.
Rustling behind her interrupted her thoughts, and she turned back toward the doorway Leigh had come from.
Charles was leaving the room, looking—it was hard to decipher what she saw—relieved, fearful, joyful, guilty? But maybe she saw in his expression what she expected to see. This was Maximillian, and he was good at hiding in plain sight.
Hiding and disguising himself. Again, she felt that mix of sympathy and empathy, and she reached out to touch his forearm. “It sounds like things will be fine,” she said. “That’s wonderful news.”
He nodded, then just looked at her. She hated that she couldn’t see behind the wall.
“Congratulations—you’re going to be a dad.” She rubbed his arm as if that could jostle him into expressing some emotion.
Wait . . . progress. His eyes sparked. “It’s incredible,” he said, nodding. “Unexpected but incredible.”
“It is. I’m happy for you. Both of you.”
His demeanor softened. “I suppose life will change.”
She wondered if he was referring to the club. “Life is always changing.” She shifted her weight and whispered. “Do you really believe it’s none of my business, Charles? Or that no one would have found out?”
He held her gaze. A silent command to quit with the questions, or a crack in the armor? She went with option B and kept at him, this time in a gentler voice. “Why can’t you tell her? I mean, not while she’s here, but once she’s home? Can’t you?”
“Kayla.” He exhaled, the shake of his head indicating she was missing the point. “We’re not so different, you and me. The need to reinvent ourselves, the . . . curse . . . of finding something so perfect, so sublime, the one thing that fits us like a glove. And yet. It forces choices we wouldn’t otherwise make to protect ourselves and the people we love from who we’ve become.”
“But Becca is your partner. She . . .”
“I’m aware of my relationship to Becca. Perhaps someday I’ll share my reinvention story with you, and we can sing Kumbaya together and lick sticky marshmallow off our fingers.”
Okay, so the softening stopped and Maximillian’s sarcasm was back. “But not before I tell it to—as you continue to so-helpfully remind me—my wife. And before you ask me for a timetable, I don’t know when that will be.”
Underneath the defensive tone it was clearer and clearer to her that a man who had been exposed, shamed, lurked beneath. She wouldn’t push him more; he might one day trust her with his story, and he might not. No matter what, he would have to trust Becca with it first; that would be an immense step.
“Well, she’s okay—that’s the most important thing.”
He nodded and blew out a breath. “You might have intruded on my life but, Quinn, I have heard what you’ve said—and I appreciate how much you care about Becca.”
Quinn, not Kayla.
“That I do,” she said. But although Becca was the reason she was here, this conversation happening a couple of feet from her door brought reality a bit too close for comfort.
Until Charles confided in his partner, Quinn would have to continue pretending their paths hadn’t crossed at the club.
And she would have to withhold the truth when Becca and Leigh would no doubt ask why she and Jonathan had split up.
Because with that look in his eyes and what he said about not knowing who she was, he didn’t need to say in so many words that they were through.
The tears would not stay back much longer, and she couldn’t bring herself to lie to Becca like she had lied to Leigh a few moments ago. Everything’s fine. “I’m leaving,” she told Charles. “When you go back to her, please tell her I stopped by and I’ll check on her another time.”
Jonathan waited across the street until she went inside the hospital, her hands stuffed in the pockets of her short black jacket. The hems of her black pants flared over shiny heels with pointy toes. Her look said smart, chic, business casual; no one else would know where she had just come from or what she had been doing.
You don’t really even know, do you?
No, he didn’t. But Charles did.
He began skulking toward the apartment. The walk would be good, because otherwise he would need to find a punching bag since in reality he would never actually hit Charles’s well-groomed, two-faced face.
Better yet, he turned down the familiar alley to his favorite neighborhood hole-in-the-wall bar. It was one of the few places in the city he could go to think and hide at the same time. Like a close old friend you might not see often, but when you did, you picked up just like old times.
The vintage linoleum floor squeaked from stickiness as he neared the bar, his eyes slowly adjusting to the dim light. “Hey, man,” the bartender said. “Been a long time. Welcome back. You look like shit.”
“Screw you, too, Derek.” He reached out to shake his hand, then settled on a barstool and unzipped his jacket.
“Double neat?” Derek asked, already reaching for the bourbon.
Definitely a friend. “That’s a good start.” He glanced around. Other than a couple at a table in the dark back corner leaning in toward each other, oblivious to their surroundings, he was the only customer.
Derek set the glass on the bar in front of him. “I’m guessing you don’t wanna talk about it?”
Jonathan raised the glass in a toasting gesture. “Not at all. Thanks, man.”
“You got it.” The bottle clinked against the crowded shelf as Derek put it back in the lineup.
Jonathan watched the couple. They were sitting next to each other on the same side of the booth. This place, that table, mid-day—it was a rendezvous, no doubt about it.
He was sure because he had been there. Not this place or that table, but in the same mid-day haunts. Hotel rooms, dark bars, first-class airport lounges, mini-airplane suites with fold-flat seats that qualified him several times over—what a point of pride—for the mile-high club.
We all have kept secrets, Jonathan. Some more dangerous than others.
Didn’t Becca have a right to know the truth about the man she married? How could Quinn not see where her loyalty should lie? How could she not have told him? Him.
Actually, he had the answer to this last one. Because she knew he would have insisted she tell Becca, or he would have.
And then Quinn would have kicked him to the curb immediately, no questions asked. He picked at a nick in the glass rim with his thumbnail and stared into the amber liquid. Instead she kept it from him and, still, the outcome was the same—it was over between them. He would not be able to trust her again after this.
Somewhere between his second or fifth pour, a giggle from the corner table floated his way. Maybe it was his imagination messing with him, but it looked like the guy was getting a hand job under the table. Get a room.
Shit, that reminded him. He texted Vieve to cancel his reservation for the private booth tonight. This was the second time; last week he had canceled so he could have Becca and Charles over for dinner instead. The memory came roaring back—dinner with the remote-controlled toy. They probably got a good laugh at that, Quinn and her club buddy. In on their own little secret together, Jonathan the outsider.
He would get over her. Eventually. And he would find a new investment partner. He didn’t need Charles’s hush money. Because that’s what it was, wasn’t it? Or was Charles’s decision to invest because he felt guilty playing with Quinn behind Jonathan’s back? Or was the money meant to keep Quinn accessible? When Jonathan had put the budget together for the business plan, he had earmarked a hefty sum for travel. For weeks at a time.
Busy and out of town. How nice for the two of them.
Derek set another drink on the bar. This one was lighter than the others. Yes, Jonathan had become that guy, the one who sits at the bar so long, the bartender diluted his drinks. “Can I get you something to eat? Burger?”
“Nah, I’m good, man. I can handle it. Lotta practice.” He raised the glass again. “But thanks for the concern.” Derek took a step back and wobbled sideways. Or maybe Jonathan was the one listing. Shit. “Okay, I hear you, man. Can I get a burger to go? And then I’ll take my sorry ass home.”
He stood slowly, peeled some bills from the cash in his wallet, and slid them across the bar. Derek slid a couple back to him. Now there was an honest guy. “Don’t be a stranger.” One of them wobbled past center to the other side. “Stop by once in a while, not only when life’s in the shits—Tuesday night is trivia; Thursday night is poker.”
Without Quinn, that’s the promise his future evenings held, game night at the bar.
At least when he got outside, it was almost dark, no happy late-afternoon sunshine stabbing him in the eyes.
He crossed the street with the crowd at the corner and turned toward home.
He should go somewhere else, somewhere he wouldn’t just lay on the couch and stew for the rest of the evening. But as big as this crazy city was, he couldn’t think of one single place he wanted to be.
The train clattered north from Grand Central as the conductor stopped beside Quinn, clicked her ticket in a mysterious pattern, and wedged it under the metal tab at the top of her seat.
Out the window, into the darkness, she watched the lights along the Hudson. You didn’t have to be a writer to see the metaphor—away from Manhattan, away from the club, away from Jonathan.
By the time she got off at River Run Falls, the queasiness she’d felt all day settled in her body like a brick. Instead of taking one of the cabs waiting outside the station, she walked home, hoping the cool night air would quell it.
The wood floor creaked as she entered the house. She was still learning it, all its unfamiliar textures and scents and sounds. Between staying at Jonathan’s and spending her days at the club, she hadn’t been here much.
That would change. Now she would have more time to get to know this place. Octavia would be back in a few days, so Quinn wouldn’t be needed at the club and, well . . . she probably would not be going to Jonathan’s again.
A fresh wave of queasiness roiled.
Tea. She should make tea.
She set the kettle to boil and took the tin of loose tea from the back of the countertop, releasing the scent of jasmine. Its fragrance brought him into clear focus in her mind’s eye, how he had made her tea the night she moved in, how he’d drawn her bath, how they had kissed for the first time. The memories only worsened the real physical ache in her chest. Was this how it was going to be, that everything here would remind her of him?
She spooned tea leaves into the infuser, poured the hot water into her mug, and carried it to the living room. On the couch, legs folded beneath her, she stared into the cold hearth, gray ash dusting the floor of the firebox. Carefully, she tried to sip the steaming liquid, but it was too hot to drink. She set the mug down and got her phone. Once he had a chance to calm down, to think about this rationally, he would talk to her. Of course he would.
Come on Jonathan. Pick up. Please. Pick. Up.
He threw his coat on the table in the entry and closed the shades in the living room to keep out the lights. So many lights. Bright lights. He sat on the couch, unwrapped the burger from Derek, and opened his laptop, squinting to find the key to lower the brightness.
Even dim, the screen wobbled like Derek had. Screw it. He adjusted the pillows and laid down instead.
When he opened his eyes, the blue numbers on the cable box read 8:21. Jesus, he had slept, what, three, four hours? His mouth tasted like . . . wallpaper paste. Not that he had ever tried wallpaper paste, but it was probably a close match.
He sat up carefully to assess the damage. A little dizzy. A headache in the background. But, unfortunately, not enough of one to ward off his mind’s replay of the day—from working on financial projections and getting nipple clamps ready for Quinn to watching her and Charles emerge together from Octavia’s.
A bad dream. Only it wasn’t.
Out of habit, he picked up the phone. A missed call from Leigh at 7:34 p.m. Her voicemail said Becca was going to stay the night in the hospital. They wanted to keep her for observation. How convenient for Charles. He could go to the club. Maybe Quinn would go with him.
The phone shook in his hand, and her number marched across the screen. Um, hard no. He was not ready to hear that voice.
Ignore.
She had told him that her and Charles’s . . . whatever the hell it was . . . dated back to the wedding. Now that he thought about it, she had seemed shaken that night and, stupid him, he assumed it was the stress of trying to make every detail of the reception perfect. Or that she was thinking back to her own wedding and feeling blue. He understood that, anticipated it even, that’s why he had reiterated how she could talk about Harris, how she shouldn’t feel any pressure from Jonathan. He would be patient, he understood.
At the time, it had all struck him as very mature and adult, and she had been different with him after—closer, affectionate. She smiled more. Seeing that change in her had made him so freaking happy. What a fool he was.
And those times he made her come in a secret frenzy while others were right nearby? Each time as she dropped off the ledge, the look in her eyes gave him a sensation he couldn’t put into words, like she was saying, pleading. Send me. Protect me. Push me over, catch me when I fall.
He had eaten it up, loved every nanosecond and molecule about it.
Idiot.
He got up and hauled his sorry ass to the kitchen to make coffee. While it brewed, he took a quick shower to clear his head and get rid of the eau de fried bar food stink that hung over him like a rain cloud. The coffee, the shower, they were a morning routine, and now his body clock would be upside down, but who gave a shit?
He could do what he wanted. He was independent, on his own, a free agent.
Alone.
On the way back to the kitchen, he stopped at the door to the spare room. The silk scarf on the bed, the nipple clamps, the flogger, the feather, the shelves full of toys.
He had been so clueless.
He picked up the cane. How much time had he spent watching online videos and reading books about proper technique to make sure he didn’t hurt her or strike the wrong part of her body? And how many blog posts had he read to learn more about how to pace their play and heighten her experience? He reached for the pillow he had practiced on many times before, placed it on the bed in front of him, and lashed the crap out of it.
But each strike only fueled his anger. She told him she and Charles never—strike—played together—strike—but was that really true? Strike. Had she seen him play with other people? Strike. What did she and Charles share that they were keeping from Becca, and from him? Strike. Protecting Charles and his identity apparently was more important to Quinn than being open with him.
All those times she gave him short answers when he asked how it went at the club, how she shrugged off his jokes about what members did there. And the worst part was how she continued to defend Charles. How she told Jonathan not to be so self-righteous.
He raised his arm higher. Strike! Strike! Strike!
The fabric tore. Downy feathers sprung from the slash and wafted to the mattress, the floor, the top of his foot. He eyed the pillow tear. That’s exactly how he felt—beat up, ripped apart.
And stupid. So very, very stupid.
He set the cane on the bed, wiped the sweat from his face with the towel that had started to fall loose from his waist, and hurried out of that room.
After pouring a strong cup of coffee, he went back to his laptop and logged into email to find that message from Charles, the one with the deal memo attached. Instead of “Keep your hush money, you lying sack of shit,” he typed, “Deal’s off.”
Pleased with his restraint, he clicked “send.”
Next, the gloves were coming off, and he made a list of competing investment firms, Demeleo’s rivals. When his head was clear tomorrow, he would investigate their portfolio holdings to get a feel for their investment strategies. Charles’s firm might be the oldest and most influential game in town, but it wasn’t the only one.
Right now, though, he opened his contacts and found the number for his old producer, Bryan, who had left the Explore Network to develop content for a boutique production company. It couldn’t hurt to see what he was up to in L.A.
Heck, Jonathan could bootstrap a couple of episodes of a new show out there with the money he had. Go the DIY route and screw finding investors altogether. It would mean assuming more financial risk and it would take a lot longer, but it would also mean keeping more of the eventual profit. And having more control. There was a lot of talent and creativity in California; why couldn’t he tap some of it for his own production company?
He could start slow and steady, one episode, then one series, at a time. That’s how he had started his little tour business back in the day—one trip, one paying traveler other than himself at a time.
Bryan answered fast. “J.J.! You reading minds? I’ve been going back and forth about whether to call you. You psychic or something?”
Psychic abilities. Now those would have come in handy.
“Or something. What’s up?”
“I need a location scouted and an assistant director to get three pilot episodes off the ground for a client. It’s way below your pay grade J.J. and I didn’t want to bother you, but I thought of you and . . . I dunno, I figured you might know someone.”
