by Nicole Bokat
“Would you like a bite?” he asked.
“Thanks, no. Just admiring.”
“I’m jealous of my appetizer.”
“Don’t be.” Natalie said, despite her good intentions, “I like my men less green.”
“Good to know.”
She felt an ache in her groin and tightened her legs together to squelch it. Stick to the script. She stuck her fork into a piece of squash. “I was up before dawn that morning I met you because I was upset—about the accident the night before.”
Simon nodded, appearing unfazed. “It was unsettling. Luckily, the road was deserted.”
“I’m not convinced that I didn’t injure … someone, not a dog.”
“But I checked. There was no one there.” He cupped his hand over hers, his skin cool and dry. “You poor girl. Have you been thinking about that all this time?”
“No, just recently. Something … reminded me of it.”
His eyes on her were so saturated with blue, it was as if they were animated, a Disney prince’s or, maybe the villain’s. “What about your sister, what does she say?”
“Stepsister. Isabel. We’re not related,” Natalie said. Same mistake the emailer had made. The muscles in her shoulders and back twinged, like when she lugged her equipment to a shoot, her camera hanging from the strap around her neck. She pulled her hand away. “She’s not concerned.”
He placed his spoon down on the plate under his soup bowl. “Well, Isabel said she’d call the police to make sure no one was hurt. Did she reach them?”
“Yes. Nothing was reported.”
“Well, that should ease your mind.”
He sounded earnest, not rattled or conniving. A good sign.
She said, “I hoped to get your take on what happened.”
“And here I thought you fancied seeing me again.”
“No, I mean, yes.”
What could she say? I came here to sleep with you? Had she? She fiddled with the napkin in her lap.
He pointed to her black diamond. “That’s enchanting. I hope it doesn’t mean what I think. It’s the wrong color, but you’re an artist, unconventional, I suspect. If that’s not too much of a cliché.”
Natalie splayed out her fingers and noted the black diamond. “You mean an engagement ring? No.” She could feel her face flush. “I’m separated, soon-to-be divorced.”
“Sorry. I’m meddling, none of my business.”
“It’s okay. This was a gift, from Isabel actually.”
“Ah. Fascinating choice on her part.”
Isabel. She was the glittering star, the energy center. Maybe it wasn’t money he was after, but Isabel’s attention. Admirer. Stalker fan.
“It’s from her and her husband, a Christmas present.”
Simon smiled seductively. “I see.”
What did he see exactly, that the first prize was taken but that she was available, hurting and hopeful, and not sure, in that moment, if she came to confront him about the night on the island? Or not only that?
“Have you ever been married?” she asked.
“Dodged that but came close. More than a year ago now.” He slowly sipped a spoonful of soup. It was a pleasure to observe. “You have similar taste in jewelry. Probably why I noticed.”
“I’m sorry. About your breakup.”
“Don’t be,” Simon said. “Otherwise I wouldn’t be here with you, at an advantage with my not-green skin.”
Natalie rubbed her index finger over her lip. Those were not the sentiments of an Isabel devotee.
The dinner arrived, glimmering and sumptuous looking as any enhanced photograph.
“Delicious,” Simon said, tip of the tongue to his bottom lip. “Let’s enjoy ourselves.”
To strengthen your brain, you must savor life’s positive experiences.
“Yes, let’s,” she said.
She wanted to believe: bbGodfrey wasn’t at the table.
eleven
—
SIMON HAILED A TAXI AFTER DINNER TO TAKE THEM TO HIS apartment downtown.
“Just one glass,” Natalie said, as she slid onto the cracked leatherette seat. “Then I should get back to the hotel.”
“Of course.” He glided next to her. “Whatever you want.”
Natalie could smell the fennel, that licorice scent, behind the mint he was sucking. She glanced quickly at his profile—so close now, two fingers rubbing his jaw—and felt the hunger rise in her. She imagined him stroking the inside of her thigh, the pressure of his mouth on hers. She wanted to wrap her body around his so there was no space between them. His proximity was both luxurious and perilous, like sun tanning with a reflector at the peak of the day. It wouldn’t be wrong to get more out of the evening than she’d planned.
For the duration of the short, bumpy ride, Natalie stared out the window at the passing upscale shops and restaurants, flags and bright window shades flashing by, a colorful pinwheel. This chant pealed through her head: What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing?
They entered his building with the forest green awning and the ornate limestone trim. Simon strode with such an easy confidence, in his slim, gray trousers. On the elevator to the ninth floor, they didn’t talk. But he looked at her with a friendly, open smile.
His co-op was ultramodern: sleek wood, a flat screen television, tapered floor lamps, and a floor-to-ceiling modular bookshelf with spider plants in clay pots mixed among the sprinkling of hardbacks. It was too Scandinavian chilly for Natalie. But that didn’t matter. She wasn’t moving in.
Simon gestured for Natalie to sit on the couch. Across from her, on the coffee table, was his closed laptop. “What would you like, red or white?”
“White, please.”
“Another Chardonnay or Pinot Grigio?”
“Oh, either,” Natalie said, picking at the cuticle of her thumb. “Whatever you’re having.”
Simon ducked out into the adjoining kitchen and Natalie arched forward, running two fingers over the computer’s silver surface. She could flip it open, scan his email, rapidly, the way spies or CIA operatives did in movies with the pounding soundtrack playing in the background. Of course, she didn’t dare. Instead, she studied the framed photographs on the console table against the wall. One was an older shot of a slim couple, in their mid-to-late thirties, the woman in a sleeveless salmon-pink dress and a strand of pearls, the dark-haired man in an unbuttoned navy suit jacket with a pastel blue shirt underneath. The woman, whose exquisite face was reproduced on the smaller boy, nevertheless had her arms draped over the taller child, also a male, whose features more closely resembled the man’s. Undoubtedly: Simon’s family. The younger boy with the flaxen hair and the twisted smirk stood in front of his father whose attention seemed inner-directed, while the older brother, straight-shouldered and slim, with a longer chin and smaller eyes, leaned into his mother’s embrace.
The other picture was taken in a park, with hedgerows and wide-armed beech trees in the background, a college-aged Simon next to a ginger-haired girl, arms around each other’s shoulders, both of them grinning as if they’d gotten away with a prank.
Simon returned with the long-stemmed glasses and handed one to Natalie. He sat in the chair across from her and placed his flute on the coffee table in front of him. “Tell me more about yourself.”
Her nerves were jittering. She took a sip. “Like what?”
“Interests, hobbies, that sort of thing?”
“No time. I have a daughter who’s a teenager.” Might as well get that out in the open. Some men’s smiles would freeze and crack. Their bodies would retreat.
Doesn’t matter. He’s just a …
“Hookup, Mom,” she heard Hadley say.
Simon edged towards her, his attention so focused it held weight. “You must have gotten married right out of university.”
“I was twenty-four. We met at school.”
“Does she live with you, at least?”
“During the week. My ex is close
by, so she stays with him and his fiancé on weekends.” As soon as it was out of her mouth, she regretted that last bit. No need to sound so easily replaceable.
He reached for his glass. “Engaged before divorce, is that one of America’s peculiar customs, like baseball hats and guns?”
She laughed. “Not officially. My situation is just … odd. What about you, your family? I saw those photos.” She pointed and then noted how his expression changed, a warning.
“Yes, that’s them, in our salad days. Before life—and death—happened.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said quickly, glimpsing at the beautiful woman, the preoccupied man. “What about that other one, the young woman? Your fiancé?”
“Ha! Imogen Howe? No, but a good sport, that one. The fiancé was years later and then there was my last relationship, a bit of a shambles. But I shouldn’t compare to your situation.”
“That’s okay,” Natalie said, drinking her wine. Would Simon consider her as good a sport as Imogen Howe, she wondered, when this evening was over?
“Your daughter must cheer you up. Less lonely that way.”
“There are other kinds of loneliness.”
Simon nodded, his eyes on her.
The silence was full between them. She felt the air pulsing like before it rained.
He stood up slowly, almost ceremonially. “You game?”
“I’m not sure this is a good idea.”
“Did I misread the signals?” When she shook her head, he asked, “Then, why not?” he asked. “We’re both free.”
Simon took her hand, guided her, in the shadows, to his bedroom, and then lifted her face in his hands. When he kissed her, his tongue was slow and tangy from the wine. He pressed in closer and slid his hand underneath her shirt, caressing the small of her back. He gazed at her attentively, waiting for her permission. When she leaned into him, they fell onto the bed, and he snapped her bra open in one nimble movement.
Wow, practiced. She was so hungry, she didn’t care. Natalie’s mouth grazed the skin on his neck.
Simon pulled her shirt over her head and kissed the hollow of her belly. He took her breast in his hand, his mouth slightly open. The ache in Natalie extended from her groin to her nipples. He inched her pants down and she let him, astonished by her lack of shyness. This was the first man, other than Marc, who’d seen her naked in two decades.
Once she was fully undressed, he ran his fingers across her C-section scar, then down and inside of her. When she moaned, he nodded. For a moment she felt tested and observed, like a roast that had reached the correct temperature. But then she was watching as he unbuttoned his shirt and unzipped his pants; the sensation passed. She could see his chest was pale with sandy-colored freckles, even in the dim light from the hall, his stomach firm and his arms sinewy, as if he spent his days rowing on a crew team instead of stuck at a desk. Marc was slender, but his muscles less toned, dry patches on his torso from flare-ups of eczema, the body of a man with a demanding job, mortgage payments, and a child to support.
Don’t think of Marc!
But then a passing fantasy: grabbing her phone, sneaking a picture, sending it to her husband. See, asshole, this dazzling man I’m having sex with?
When Simon reached for the band of his underwear and tugged, she said, “Don’t. Keep them on for a minute. Just lie down with me.”
“With my undies?”
She smiled at the word. “Yes. If they’re off, I won’t be able to stop myself.”
“Why would you stop?” he asked with a laugh.
There was a thin thread of doubt holding her back, a holdover from years of marriage, that sex should be an act of love. Before Marc there had only been one other, the college boyfriend, with the eager grin and the knobby knees who had professed his love for her. She’d lost her virginity to him in a dorm room that stank of moldy towels and unwashed underwear.
“Please.”
“Of course,” Simon said politely as if she’d requested a glass of water. He scrambled to reposition them, so that he was on the bed with Natalie on top of him.
She thought of Marc, of their last months, their sexual struggles. Either he was too tired from work to make love or he’d lose his erection halfway through. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m under a lot of stress,” he’d say. He was forty years old. Work pressure could last another thirty years, she’d worried. But, of course, in the end, his job had nothing to do with it.
She’d had sex without love that last year after all. At least Simon’s body responded to hers.
Caressing her with one hand, the other one working its way back between her legs, he asked, “Is now okay?”
“Yes,” she said, cravings so strong. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d had such cravings.
When he entered her, she thought: See Marc? See how much he wants me?
Afterwards, Simon’s eyes on her breasts caused Natalie to cross her arms over them, as if his mouth hadn’t just been there. He smiled, lazily, at her modesty and then lying on his back, drifted off to sleep. She grabbed her clothes off the floor and scurried to the bathroom. She closed the door and, with shaking hands, tried to negotiate sleeve holes and pant legs, clumsy as a teenager.
In the mirror, Natalie saw that her mascara was smeared. She took a tissue from a container on the shelf above the toilet and rubbed it under her eyes to little effect. “What are you doing?” she repeated, this time aloud. Then, quietly, she peeked back in the bedroom—still asleep—before padding into the living room. There, she knelt down to move the laptop closer to her. The screen was a blank blue with a line for the username and one for the password. Deciphering Simon’s codes would take time, if even possible. Natalie closed the lid quickly, looked up as if expecting to be caught. She took a full breath and wandered to his bookshelf.
It was half-empty. The book titles had the words “wealth” and “finance” and “money” in them. There was one resting on its side, with the wrong end facing front, the pages rather than the spine. Instinctively, Natalie lifted the book to rearrange it. When she saw the cover, her stomach contracted, the regurgitated wine, putrid in her mouth. She ran to the toilet, spit out, then, everything pumping, heart and lungs, and leg muscles, returned to the bookcase. She opened Get Happy Now and read the inscription: “To Gillian, Much Joy and Success, Isabel Walker.”
Who the hell was Gillian?
Papers had slipped out and fallen to the floor. Natalie’s fingers felt fat and clumsy as she gathered them. She clutched them and the bestseller close to her and made sure her back was in the direction of the bedroom in case Simon appeared. In her hands were a few pages from the downloaded brochure of the annual Happiness Conference on Grand Cayman, with the dates accented by a yellow highlighter. The others were images of Isabel from a Google search, dozens of them, including the Photoshopped one that she, Natalie, had taken for the book jacket. Isabel looked alternatively regal or relaxed, pallid as a Swede in winter or luminous as if kissed by the Mediterranean sun. There was the posed picture from her website and candid shots of her at various events, that he, Simon, probably took himself—a voyeur.
Oh my God. Oh my God.
She bowed down, hands on thighs, head low, waiting for the nausea to abate. She had fucked—God, she hated that word, its guttural ugliness—a man obsessed with Isabel. A stalker, a voyeur, and who knows what else? But what was Natalie’s role in his game? She could hear the chugging of her own blood when she thought of the splatter on the island road. What to do? Disclose her findings to him or play it dumb? She waited to see how her body would react next. It released the book back in the exact spot she’d found it. She crept to the bedroom, legs gelatinous.
Simon was awake now. The first few buttons of his shirt were undone and his feet were bare, but otherwise he was dressed. He was reclining against the pillows, legs sprawled. When he saw Natalie, he sat up to make room for her next to him.
She perched at the edge of the bed, no closer.
; “That was quite nice,” he said.
“I’m just wondering,” she said, her voice jangly, “what was your girlfriend’s name, the one you mentioned in the restaurant, when I told you I was divorced?”
The right side of Simon’s mouth curled upward. “Why do you want to know?”
“Just interested in her and, uh, what kind of women you like.”
Simon bent towards her. “Isn’t that obvious?”
The smell of his skin was a trap, how it made her want to curl into him as if they were a couple. She eased away. “Do you mind … telling me?”
“Her name?” He shrugged. “Gillian Monroe.”
The name, at least, wasn’t a lie.
“Is she English, too, living in London?”
“She works in New York now. Why?” Simon stood up and stretched his arms above him as if preparing for a workout. “You don’t need to be insecure, if that’s what this is about.”
“It’s not that, just curious.”
“She’s not my favorite subject, things ended badly, and all that.”
“Was she with you in the Cayman Islands?” To see Isabel, the two of you, in this together, whatever “this” is.
His muscles constricted so that his face closed up. His lips formed a straight line. “You’re starting to be a little creepy.”
She strained to sound nonchalant, but it came out a tremble, the yearning inside her growing. “I just meant, it was a vacation. It would make sense.”
Simon shifted his weight even further to the side of the couch. “What’s with this third degree? Do you put all the men you have casual sex with on trial?”
The definition of what had transpired shouldn’t hurt. Yet she felt a pang between her ribs.