“Double fucker,” Gail said. “Seriously.”
“How could I have been so stupid?”
“Claire, what if that e-mail wasn’t referring to an affair?” Jackie intoned in her voice of reason. “Not that I’m trying to protect Michael, because this is monstrous. But what if it was something else?”
“Yeah, well,” Carolyn said, sounding all too familiar with the self-protective naïveté of deflecting uncomfortable realities with vague possibilities. “There’s far too much smoke for there not to be a fire smoldering somewhere.”
“Little white lies, hon,” Gail reminded her.
But Claire didn’t need reminding. Not this time.
Jackie nodded with a sad groan of acceptance.
“My question, sweetie, is what you plan to do with this knowledge?” Carolyn asked, handing her a glass of ice water.
“I’m going over to the house tonight and I’m going to confront him,” she said, the water swishing over the rim of the glass as she gestured with mounting intensity. “I’m going to see what the bastard has to say about all this. And then I’m going to—”
“Whoa, time out, hon. I was hurt, clueless and divorced at twenty-four, and I’m not going to let you make the same mistakes I did during my first rodeo. Have you called Jack yet?”
Claire nodded, composing herself. “I’d almost forgotten. I have an appointment this afternoon. But now I’m not sure of the best way to handle all of this, given these new developments. Do I file for divorce immediately and get the lawyers to sort out whatever is going on with this potentially serious Janus issue and all the unpaid bills?” She stood and began pacing, pinching the ache between her eyebrows. “I totally blew it by not printing out those files. I just got so sidetracked and—”
“No,” Gail responded, looking as if she were about to dine out on Michael’s insides. “Have your preliminary meeting with Jack. Give him his retainer and get him up to speed. And then you’re going to do a little Sherlocking before you confront Michael with anything.”
Claire’s expression was drained of everything except skepticism and misery.
“Hold on,” Carolyn said. “She needs to digest this first, take a little breather and get her head screwed back into place. It’s going to take more than a new scarf and a competent lawyer to clear things up.” Carolyn walked Claire back to the couch and sat her down. “A little away time will keep you from a drape-drawn retreat into bed for a week. Believe me.”
“She’s right,” Jackie said. “Go away for a day and channel your energy. You need to come to grips with your own emotions before unleashing them on Michael.”
Gail seemed to weigh the options. “Fair enough. Go marinate in some fabulous spa for twenty-four hours. That boutique hotel near Beaver Creek would be perfect. And then when you get back to Denver, you’re going to get back into that computer. Something’s up, and you need to know what’s going on in order to plan your next move.”
Claire shook her head. “I can’t. I had that one shot when Michael apparently forgot to log out—which he never does. It was like there was an angel on my shoulder guiding me to the computer. But unless she comes back and whispers his new password to me, I’m screwed. And isn’t that illegal, by the way?”
“Illegal? This is your house and your computer, too, Claire. And if you just happen to stumble onto some information there, then I’m sure Michael will be more than happy to negotiate fairly with you.” Gail raised her eyebrows in a mother-knows-best ending to the conversation.
“But I’m still locked out of his desktop without the password.”
Claire walked down the portrait-lined corridor to Jack Kaufman’s office, willing herself to maintain her fight, and not turn around and head straight for the spa.
“Please, come in,” Jack said, stepping into the hallway and reaching a welcoming hand to her just as she had stopped to gather her wits.
“I nearly ran away,” she said as he ushered her into his sleek office and offered her a chair. “But Gail thinks the world of you.” Claire scanned the well-appointed space, focusing a trained eye on the handwritten lyrics to Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” which were beautifully framed and hanging above Jack’s desk. Her nerves relaxed slightly. The manuscript had probably cost him in the neighborhood of a quarter million at auction. And she wondered how much of that her pal had helped fund. “So here I am. And I thank you for getting me in on such short notice.”
“I’m always happy to meet any friend of Gail Harrold,” he said, sitting below Dylan’s poetic rallying cry and pulling a Mont-blanc pen from his pocket. “So, how can I help you?” he asked with a kind smile.
Her mind reverted to Michael’s computer screen, to Andrew, and once again her ability to speak in coherent sentences all went pftt. She tried to start at the beginning, or what she thought was the beginning, but the story kept going farther back in time than the night at The Palm. And the more she strove to organize the story of her marriage and its disintegration, the more disorganized everything sounded. It was like trying to paint a scene from memory, struggling with recreating the exact hues and expressions, only to find that it had never really existed, at least not as she had remembered it. So Jack asked her pointed questions, and slowly she was able to piece it back to life. When finally it was out there in all its blackness and devoid of any stardust, Claire numbly asked what needed to happen next.
“I would not have advised you to move out of the house,” he said, running a hand through his wavy hair. A silver wedding band disappeared into the gray at his temples and reappeared against the darker patches at the top. “But what’s done is done and we’ll work around that. Do you anticipate a custody fight?”
The question threw her. She couldn’t imagine Michael going that route. He hadn’t been unfair about her time with Nicholas so far. “No, I don’t think he would do that. He understands the importance of consistency from both of us for Nicky.”
“Well, divorce brings out surprising sides to people, Claire. You need to be prepared for the unexpected.”
“Can he fight for sole custody?”
“Judges strive to put the best interests of the minor first, which is typically time with both parents. Assuming there aren’t any drug or alcohol issues?”
“No.” But a more frightening possibility suddenly hit her. “Could he say that I’m unfit because I, um, allowed Andrew into the house with the cocaine?”
“We’d have a pretty good argument against that, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves. What I do advise for now is that we file the divorce petition. I want you to get copies of your financial documents, including bank and brokerage account statements, credit card bills, home loan papers, etc. ...”
“We don’t have a mortgage,” Claire said as she fiercely took notes, shoving aside any thought that Michael would try to take custody. She knew he couldn’t manage caring for Nicholas without her, nor could she fathom him being that cruel. With one glaring exception, she had always been an excellent parent.
“My paralegal will give you a list. You can take some time to digest everything we’ve discussed and to gather this information, along with the other information you said you needed to get from your home. But we need to get this done soon in order to establish a clear mark in time of the marital breakdown. The longer we delay, the more time Michael will have to potentially hide or transfer assets, or even run up debt. Did you have a prenup?”
“Yes, but it just covered Michael’s trust from his family and future inheritances, which he gets exclusively. He also gets to keep all of his premarriage assets, and I keep mine. I have no problem with the document.”
“I’ll need a copy of that as well. And I definitely don’t like what I’m hearing about unpaid bills and mysterious calls for information. It may be nothing, but I don’t think that’s what you believe, and in my experience, your first instincts are generally right. We’ll get to the bottom of it in discovery, but the more information you can gather in the n
ext three or four days before he knows we’re filing, the better.”
“I can’t believe it’s come down to this,” she said, looking up from her notepad and feeling parched and lightheaded. “I just never imagined I’d be serving him papers.”
“No one ever does when they’re saying ‘I do,’ Claire. But by us filing first, and not Michael, you’re going to be demonstrating to him and his team your resourcefulness and determination to get this resolved. On our terms.”
She nodded weakly.
Jack finished with the finer points of the divorce process, along with his retainer and other fees, and told Claire that the petition would be prepared and ready to be served to Michael just as soon as she gave him the go-ahead. He took her shoulders in his hands and gave her a gentle, reassuring squeeze. “You’re in good hands, Claire.”
“Thank you.”
“And I’ll hold your check for the retainer until after we serve him, so as not to raise any red flags.”
“It’s from my own account, so no worries.”
Claire emerged from Jack’s office building and into the bustling parking lot. The glare from the afternoon sun reflected off the eighteen stories of mirrored facade, causing her to wince. She groped for her sunglasses in her quilted leather bag, and hid behind their comforting shelter. In her rattled state she had forgotten where she’d parked her car; she scanned the shiny rows of four-wheel drives and Lexuses, searching for a sign of something familiar. A bicycle courier jumped the curb in front of her and the whoosh of cool air danced over her cheeks. A blond man in an expensive pinstriped suit set the remote alarm to his Mercedes as he moved toward the building entrance. His hair was slicked back with gel in the same fashion Michael wore his. The high-pitched beep of another alarm turned Claire’s attention to a younger man. He, too, bore a striking resemblance to Michael, and walked alongside a woman with gorgeous auburn curls. Then another look-alike. The terrible Fellini-esque fantasy closed in on her and she felt her stomach swirl up into her skull.
She hurried up and down rows, searching for the Jeep. When it appeared just a few cars away, she scrambled inside and turned on the ignition. The chill inside was bracing, and she exhaled a cloud of breath as she reached for her cell phone and dialed information. She couldn’t escape this town, the proximity of Michael, soon enough.
CHAPTER 37
The mountain hotel was quaint and welcoming with its whimsical eaves and blue-striped awnings. Claire barely recalled the drive, but there she was, mired in fresh turmoil, handing her bag to the bellman and giving herself over, body and soul, to this place of rejuvenation. She hoped it would help.
She checked in and confirmed an appointment for a massage at six o’clock. That left her a little over an hour to relax, but she knew that her mind would not allow her any peace when it was too busy obsessing over what Taylor looked like, and how Michael could have been such a snake. So she put on her favorite 2004 Bolder Boulder 10K T-shirt and, running her fingers over the faded lettering on the shirt, remembered how lovely life had seemed then. Nicholas hadn’t yet gotten sick and Michael probably hadn’t started cheating on her. As far as she knew. She headed for the gym before the memory sucked her will away. Maybe if she ran long and fast enough, she might find herself in a place with a better view.
After three miles in under thirty minutes, Claire entered the ladies’ changing area of the spa, where a young woman gave her a silk-lined terry bathrobe, slippers, and a key. She glanced around the softly lit room where women lolled in nearby hot tubs and uniformed staff delivered herbal teas to the guests as they lingered in this relaxing cocoon. How good it was to be there, she reminded herself, to be shielded, if only temporarily, from the detonation of any more bombs.
The scent of eucalyptus drifted from the steam room across from Claire’s locker. She stepped in and the door sealed behind her like a vacuum. Adjusting to the dim light, Claire saw that she was alone in the fog. No unwelcome chitchat, no examining eyes. She laid a towel down on the marble tiled bench, stretched her naked body out along its length, and closed her eyes. But within seconds, unbidden and unwelcome, the vibrancy of distant memories snuck up on her and she saw herself with Michael in the steam room of the Georges V in Paris for their honeymoon, drunk on champagne and making fast, silent love on the slick marble. It was so powerful, this Proustian sensorial moment, that Claire tried to physically expel it. She coughed forcefully and waited for the steam to do its detoxifying best and rid her of the sensation. Bastard, came the familiar refrain. Why had she chosen someone with such an inability to be forthcoming and at ease with his life, and her? The fog grew denser. Ten minutes crawled by, and she felt about as soothed as she was going to get.
After showering, she curled into a plush chair in the waiting area, feeling more mired than ever in the noxious soup of anxiety about the future and, now, her husband’s extracurriculars. A man called her name softly. Claire looked up through heavy eyes to see a uniformed therapist with dark hair and a sincere face. He greeted her and led her down a moss-colored hallway to her treatment room, where he left her to undress. The room was warm and smelled of vanilla and hot cider. Letting her robe fall to the floor, Claire climbed onto the massage table and covered herself with the sheet.
A moment later a knock came at the door and the massage therapist returned. He dimmed the lights and asked if she had any areas that needed extra attention.
“My psyche,” she replied. Catching his raised eyebrows, she tried to steer things back to a more impersonal level. “My neck and shoulders. I tend to carry my stress there. And I’ve got a bit of a sinus headache as well.”
He gently rearranged Claire’s hair off of her forehead and neck. “Let’s see what we can do to get rid of all this stress.” He stood behind her and cupped her head in one palm, and, alternating between firm strokes from her shoulder to her temples and gentle acupressure on her ears and scalp, he began to free the pressure behind her eyes. His fingers and knuckles expertly unleashing endorphins, his hands releasing tightly wound knots. “Just close your eyes and try to relax.” Her breath slowed to the pace of his strokes, and Claire focused on the healing energy she felt in his touch. He moved on to her neck, kneading with his elbow and forearm. There was something special about the way he gripped her skin and muscles, so knowing and intense, and yet completely nonthreatening. She drifted into a welcome state of calm as a knot at the base of her neck seemed to unclench like a baby’s fist.
He entwined her fingers with his own, and raising her hand upward, massaged her palm, her arm, her armpits. Her flesh prickled as he moved along the side of her rib cage and breast. When he lifted her other arm, she could feel his breath on her skin, could sense his proximity and energy. She let her arm go limp under the strength of his grasp, allowing herself to drift, weightless. And all the anguish she’d been holding on to began to recede. He placed a folded towel over her breasts and slowly inched the massage sheet down so that her stomach was exposed to her hips. The sliding motion of the crisp linen across her torso and the nubbiness of the towel caused her nipples to harden. His fingers touched down on her belly, and her muscles contracted. But he massaged her stomach in a soothing circular motion, causing more layers of tension to evaporate like a fine mist.
Pinning one hand over the sheet on her left hip, he uncovered her left leg with his free hand and tucked the sheet under the length of her right thigh. In shielding her nakedness, he grazed a hair from her untended bikini wax, sending a shiver through her. The alternating sensations of relaxation and stimulation were surprisingly arousing. She pretended she was someone for whom reminders about appropriateness were not legion and ingrained, and further melted into the fantasy that life was wonderful and steady, heartbreak-free. He began massaging the balls of her feet, then the arches, all the right pressure points, slowly and thoroughly.
As Claire reached a new level of surrender, he raised her leg perpendicular to her torso, and with a firm, deep grip worked each muscle group up to her buttoc
ks. He moved to the side of the table and placed her ankle on his shoulder so that her legs rotated away from each other. The cool draft she felt whisk between her legs was in dramatic contrast to the heat she’d felt emanating there just seconds before. And instead of feeling vulnerable in this position, Claire reveled in the liberating freedom of the moment. She let her lips part, wetting them with her tongue. Her body grew warmer and she didn’t care that her breathing was perceptible and quick. Gently, the therapist placed her leg back on the table and cloaked it under the sheet.
When he uncovered her right leg, he didn’t tuck the sheet under her other thigh as he had done before. Instead he immediately set to work massaging the acupuncture meridians of her feet, then moved slowly upward with long, deliberate strokes. Calf, quadricep, hamstring all releasing. Her skin became one large exposed nerve, charged by the slightest contact. When he lifted her body to reach under her buttocks, his hand lingered for a second, and then worked its way around to her inner thigh. This time he must have felt her growing wetness, heard her soft moan, and he allowed his fingers to wander and explore as she let her knees fall open. And with that tacit permission, the sheet cascaded to the floor where the towel that had covered her breasts already lay.
Claire floated naked in a quiet ecstasy, wondering through closed eyelids what name it was she’d seen embroidered on his polo shirt. But the only name that came to mind, inexplicably, was Richard’s. She squeezed her eyes tighter and focused on the improbable thing that was happening to her. He ran his hand down her leg again and then, almost teasingly, stroked her from her ankle back to where she, just as improbably, desired his touch the most. His fingers became Richard’s fingers, moving rhythmically around, and then inside her. Faster and more powerfully he stroked her, and she responded with appreciative gasps. She tried to shut out the image of her friend’s face and her shocking fantasy. But this man had found her buttons, her cadence. And there, in that room, next to other rooms where facials and sports massages were being given, he brought her to an astounding orgasm. At the height of her climax, she let out a transcendent sigh of satisfaction or, more likely, payback—but most definitely release. After it was over, Claire lay there in the soft light, her forty-three-year-old body and spirit utterly exposed before this intimate stranger. Tears rolled from the corners of her eyes as she exhaled.
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