by Mike McCrary
relentless
Mike McCrary
For Polly
Contents
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Part II
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Part III
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Part IV
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
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Also by Mike McCrary
Acknowledgments
About the Author
“No adultery is bloodless.”
-- Natalia Ginzburg
Part I
1
“Not good.”
Davis Briggs talks on his phone while pacing in small circles. He moves, pauses, pivots and moves again, working the pavement in front of the Viceroy hotel in Santa Monica. The place is buzzing. He carries on his anxious conversation slightly to the right side of the valet stand, away from the beautiful throngs that reside in and frequent Westside Los Angeles.
His eyes take in everything around him. His ears soak up the tension from the phone call. Ridiculously priced cars come and go with the attractive folks of LA drifting back and forth, passing by while paying Davis no mind. An invisible man among people who are hard to look away from.
The uncomfortable conversation he’s having is with his business partner, and Davis’s discomfort is only compounded by his feeling of being discounted by good-looking, wealthier people. Their eyes look everywhere but at him. Purposeful in the casual way they ignore an ordinary man. Spending their focus elsewhere, looking to see who’s looking at them. Who they need to see. Davis might as well be homeless with a tattered paper cup begging for their spare change.
He isn’t an unattractive man. No disfiguring scars. Not overweight. Not in Olympic shape either. He’s someone you went to high school with. Someone who lives down the street. A dad at your kid’s school. But certainly not an underwear model. He couldn’t begin to tell you his daily grams of protein intake.
His crime tonight is being average.
Ordinary.
And ordinarily, average isn’t what hangs out at this hotel.
Big-money suits strut by. Shabby-chic hipsters roll. Genetically fortunate women wearing impossibly tight dresses that cling to their heavenly bodies glide in and out of this hotel, and all of them come armed with loose wallets ready to vomit cash and credit. All this high net worth mass of gorgeous is what’s steaming past Davis like water rolling over a simple stone stuck at the bottom of a creek.
“What do you mean by ‘not good’?” his business partner Todd asks.
Davis is out of place. Out of his league, stuck in a game he’s unfamiliar with.
His clothes give him away, right away. He’s dressed like a guy who’s trying hard to play the part of a big-time businessman, only on a penny-pincher’s budget. Mid-priced pants and shirt that don’t fit all that well, along with shoes that are south of their prime. Not horrible, nothing necessarily wrong with what he has on, but his garb is far from custom, and its total cost is miles away from anyone else within a mile of this place.
He untucked his shirt an hour ago but doesn’t feel comfortable with it.
A man in a three-thousand-dollar suit knocks into Davis without offering an apology. Davis glances toward him as he takes a stumbling step backward, but doesn’t look long. Avoids eye contact. Avoids confrontation.
Stay in your lane, Davis.
“Look, man, I’m sorry.” Davis returns to his phone conversation. “I didn’t want to come here anyway.”
“I can’t be in two places at once. We’re not a huge shop,” Todd says. “We gotta sell. Last I heard that’s how revenue gets generated.”
“Yeah, I know how revenue works.”
“Do you?”
“Stop.” Davis rubs his face, watches a Bentley pull away.
“It couldn’t have gone that bad, right?” Todd pauses. “Right?”
Davis grits his teeth in silence, looking to the night sky for some assistance.
“Shit. It was. It was that bad, wasn’t it?” Todd says. “Oh Jesus, tell me it wasn’t that bad.”
“It wasn’t great,” Davis says, glancing toward his feet. Even while on the phone he can’t look Todd in the eye. The weight of letting down his business partner is crushing. The feeling that he’s letting his friend down fringes on unbearable.
A woman bumps into him. Davis bounces back then apologizes but doesn’t know why.
“Let’s talk about it when I get back,” Davis tells Todd.
“Tell me what happened. What did they say?” Todd starts up again.
“I’ve still got one more meeting tomorrow. I’ll make it work.” Even as it comes out of his mouth Davis doesn’t believe it.
“Davis. Talk to me, man. What. Happened?”
A beautiful woman catches Davis’s eye. Her eyes slip toward him. She looks straight at him, lets her eyes take him in. She’s not looking at him in the same way as the others. For starters, she’s looking at him. Only him. Locked in. Not looking away at all. She smiles. There’s a warmth to her, a wanting to connect with him. All but simply asking him to talk to her.
Davis freezes.
“Hi,” she says.
Davis allows a smile but doesn’t say anything.
“So shy,” she says as she passes by. “Like that. Like that a lot.”
2
“Davis, what in the holy hell happened in that meeting?”
Todd is getting exhausted from dragging it out of his friend.
Davis snaps back to the here and now, turning away from the woman as she disappears into the hotel. He clears his throat. “They said we’re creating a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.”
Now there’s silence on Todd’s side of the phone. Not normal.
“Todd?”
“We’re hearing this shit more and more.”
“I know.”
“You hear it once, fine. You hear it over and over?”
“They’re wrong.”
“Okay, I hear you. I appreciate the confidence, but after a while you gotta think maybe we’re the ones getting it wrong.”
Davis closes his eyes, thinks of getting into it for the thousandth time with Todd, but stops himself. His phone bails him out with a beep.
HATTIE, the screen reads. His wife.
“Gotta go,” Davis says.
“What? The hell you do.”
“It’s Hattie.”
“Dammit.” You can hear Todd’s eyes roll. “Call me back.”
“Of course.”
“I mean it.”
Davis flips over to Hattie. “Hi.”
“Hey, how’s it going?”
Davis cringes from the concern in her voice. They had such a hopeful conversation last night before he left town. She knows ever
ything. Knows about the struggles the business is having. Letting her down is ten times more crushing than Todd. He can’t go through this same conversation again, not now, not with her.
“It’s okay. Making some progress. Got one more meeting in the morning, but it looks good.”
“Okay. Great. That has to make you feel better.”
Davis swallows hard. Hates lying to her, even if it’s done to make them both feel better.
“Right? You feel better?” she asks.
“Yeah, it helps.”
“So you’ll be back tomorrow?”
“Yeah, I’m catching a flight after the meeting. Should be back by dinner.”
“How’s the hotel? I know it’s not the Viceroy, but I hope it’s okay.”
Davis stares at the Viceroy sign covered in light. Hates himself even more. He thinks about their talk before he left home. About how they couldn’t afford a place like that. Not the Viceroy. They decided he could stay a couple of blocks over and save a few bucks. That place down the road is still expensive as hell, but not insane like the Viceroy.
He’d argued it was the conference hotel and they had to look like they belonged.
You can’t fool these people, he said. You have to look the part, he explained.
She talked about how they have to be careful with money this time around. How they needed to be smarter and patient, at least until the business took off. They got lucky and survived the last time around, but things are different now. The last time, Davis pushed their family to the brink of financial disaster. Hattie would never use those words, she’s better than that, and would never pin any of that on Davis because they are in this together, but he knows the truth. At least he thinks he does. His projection of the truth at least
He feels the weight of every failure.
They agreed they’d play it safe until Davis and Todd’s software company got rolling. She knows it will, even when Davis doesn’t, but they need to treat it like a marathon. Not a sprint.
He reviews the rest of the talk that quickly escalated to a fight.
He travels too much.
She works too much.
The kids are driving them insane.
Money stress.
Work stress.
The house needs work.
Her parents.
His father.
The girls.
Money.
The same old ground they’ve stomping over and over again recently. He’s starting to feel like he can script the arguments before they happen. He joked one time that he would hire someone to run the lines next time they fought. She laughed, then told him they couldn’t afford that. It was funny. That’s their relationship, love with sparring, but Davis took it as a true jab intended to leave a mark.
“Hotel’s fine.” Davis quickly changes the subject. “The girls still awake?”
“They’re getting ready for bed.” She takes a beat to choose her words. “You okay? You sound off.”
“I’m fine.”
She always could spot the hint of bullshit from him.
From the corner of his eye Davis sees the same jaw-dropping woman from before, but this time she’s with a slick-looking man who seems like he was peeled away from a film set. Perfect face. Perfect hair. Fit body in a suit cut just for him.
Davis stares. There’s an undeniable energy flowing between them. They smile and laugh, wrapped around each other. Two beautiful people standing out in a crowd of beautiful people. Davis can’t keep his eyes off of them.
They turn and look to Davis, then smile.
“You don’t sound fine,” Hattie says with a sweetness only she can bring.
Davis shakes it off. “I’m just tired.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Would you tell me if it was something else?”
“Yes. Jesus, Hattie. I’m fine.”
There’s a cold silence. Davis realizes he put too much bite on his words. Davis looks up. The beautiful woman and man are gone.
“Okay,” she finally says. “I’m going to go check on the girls.”
“Hattie—”
She’s already hung up.
“Dammit,” he mutters to himself.
Davis pockets his phone, then retreats through the front doors of the hotel and into the lobby. He can’t help but think the lights hanging from the ceiling cost more than his house. Hand-carved hardwood floors are peppered with white leather chairs filled with more of the pretty people from outside. They sip cocktails. They fake laughs. Fake flashing smiles filled with the whitest teeth he’s ever seen.
There’s a muted thump of bass seeping into the lobby. Davis looks toward the bar to his right, considers it. Thinks hard about grabbing a drink, could really use one, but decides better of it. Adding booze to his already delicate equation might not be the best decision right now. Not to mention, he’s got that one last meeting tomorrow. Perhaps his last, if it doesn’t turn out better than the ones today. He takes the elevator up to his room. He knows it’s the right thing to do, but he’s not happy with himself.
The silence is deafening inside his room, but he likes it in a way.
His shoulders come down from their usual arched position near his ears. He can feel his back loosen. He feels like he can breathe a little easier in here. The room is nicer than nice. Everything is new, polished and shines to perfection. Every detail handpicked by people who know how to handpick these sorts of things. Davis knows he’s not one of those people, but he loves the fact those people are out there in the world.
There’s a slight thought about money; it’s been at least five minutes since he’s thought about money, after all. The cost of this room sticks in his brain like a planted flag claiming territory, but Davis pushes it all down almost immediately. What’s done is done. Can’t get out of this room now.
He appreciates the finer things. Can’t afford them, but likes them all the same. Pulling back the curtain, Davis steals a look out the window. He watches all the cars and limos come and go from the parking lot. Can’t help but think about the lives being lived in those vehicles. The size of the bank accounts of the people inside. The money from simply selling one of those vehicles would solve all of Davis’s money problems.
Money doesn’t buy happiness, it’s true, but it does take care of the vast majority of stress most people carry around day in and day out. That cannot be argued.
The number one thing he and Hattie fight about is money. They love each other, care about each other, but Davis knows what marriage can do to people over time. Despite what some say, being married is about more than love. You become a small company with projects and tasks, and those usually have a price tag. The difference, however, between marriage and a company is a big one.
Love.
Love helps keep it together when marriage inc. is deep in the red.
Davis sits on the side of the bed letting his head unwind. Trying to undo the conversations he had downstairs. Unspool the talks with Todd and Hattie. Hoping to find a reset button.
His black workbag rests against the wall. His presentation pitch book pokes out, just enough peeking above the zipper to tease and mock him. Calling him out while ever so quietly reminding him of today’s business missteps. Just enough to pull him deeper into his troubled head.
He debates standing up and grabbing his bag so he can review the pitch. Review it again, one more time, see if there is something he could do better than he did today. A point he could make clearer. A data point he glossed over last time. A better way to say or explain something that didn’t land well. Find something that will get them to sign on the line that is dotted.
He knows there isn’t. He’s not good at this. He’s not Todd. He balls up his fists. Shuts his eyes tight. The frustration swells. He can’t hold back what’s flooding into his brain. Failure is coming. He can’t stop it. He knows it. He grits his teeth.
The money.
The sales.
The business.
> The dream is failing.
Again.
Davis slams his fist into the wall. The dull thump vibrates throughout the room. The light above sways ever so slightly. A black and white picture of a wave crashing into the shore drops to the floor. His eyes pop open as the crunch echoes.
The glass has cracked into a spiderweb.
“Shit.”
3
Davis carves through the lobby.
He’s back downstairs, working, worming his way through the members of LA’s elite and those wanting to make you believe they’re elite.
After breaking the picture in his room, Davis decided he needed something to smooth his edges. He splashed some water on his face, changed his clothes, and came back downstairs to be among the people enjoying the fashionable Santa Monica hotel. He bobs and weaves, making a path through the crowded Viceroy’s lobby in search of a drink.
Something to smooth out his edges, all right.
More edges forming by the second.
Not an easy task, but he finds a spot at the bar. It’s still early for an LA night, so it’s not completely insane. You can still somewhat hear yourself think, but the party is only starting to swell. Won’t be long before the music and the crowd will overtake the senses. Like ants spreading over a carcass.
A bartender slides over toward Davis. Chiseled good looks, more than likely an undiscovered talent, but still seems annoyed as hell he has to do his job.