by ANDREA SMITH
Gina had been right when she said the world was full of skanks just waiting to close in on another woman’s man.
The September breeze felt good as my hair blew free. I loved the fall. It was my favorite season. The sun was shining, but the air had a cool, crispness to it that left a promise of low humidity coming for at least the next few months.
I twirled around letting the sun hit my face; the wind whipped through my hair. It felt delicious. I was back into my skinny jeans much sooner than I'd expected to be.
Everything seemed almost normal. I'd refused to grieve the way that Trey had wanted me to; the way that my father had; the way that Gina, Tristan and Susan had. The tiptoeing around me as if I were a china doll that would break into a million pieces had grated on my nerves.
The hardest part of all of it was trying to explain to Preston as to where "Mama's baby" had gone. Trey had told her that her baby sister was in heaven with her grandma. Preston had no conception of that at fifteen months of age. He explained to her that "Baby Marley" was an angel now up in heaven with "Grandma Marley."
I thought back to the small graveside service of a few weeks back. I recalled that tiny little casket that had held my stillborn child; the child that I'd never seen. Why hadn’t I noticed that I hadn’t felt her kick since that morning that Gina was in labor?
Maybe it was my fault. Maybe if I'd paid more attention to the lack of movement something could have been done. The doctor had said there was no way I could have known. Infections such as the one I had were rare; there were other complications. It was a fluke. One in a million.
My father had been out of sorts with the situation. He'd tried to console me but consolation wasn’t what I needed. I'd never known this child. Marley Renaud Sinclair. It was on the granite tombstone that Trey had picked out. It read 'The beloved daughter of Tylar and Trey Sinclair. Rest in peace our little angel.’
I hadn’t talked to Gina since the memorial service. I knew that Gina couldn’t fathom my impassiveness. I didn’t see things that way. She hadn’t been born yet. There wasn’t the same connection that I had with Preston. It was what it was.
As I neared the circular drive in front of our house I could see Trey’s Mercedes and another car parked behind it. Shit! It was Amber’s sporty little BMW parked right behind Trey’s car. What the hell was she doing here?
It seemed like they were spending a lot of time on this most recent case. Trey was very impassioned by it. He said this case was a ‘prima facie’ case against a major global company that had a long history of conspiracy and collusion.
Apparently, this particular case involved infractions against older, female employees. It was another MDML situation. He'd won the previous case he'd worked on under MDML. That had produced another nice chunk of change for us.
I was in no mood to deal with Amber. I hoped that Trey hadn’t invited her to dinner or anything. I looked at the watch Trey had bought for me for Christmas. It was only 3:30 p.m. in the afternoon. I was surprised he was home already unless they were working here. They had done that occasionally while I'd been recuperating from the stillbirth delivery much to my chagrin.
Something seemed different this time. My car obviously wasn’t parked in the drive. Jean was visiting her daughter since Preston was gone. Something, perhaps instinct told me to assess the situation before going inside. I retracted my steps and went around to the back of the house. I peeped through the window of the kitchen. It was clear, no one was in site. I went around to the other side in the back where the family room was located. As I crept closer to the window, I could hear conversation. It was Trey’s voice.
“What will you have Amber? We have wine, or I could make you a mixed drink?”
“Wine would be fine Trey, thanks.”
“You’ve got it counselor, but only one. We have quite a bit of work tonight going through these depositions and I need you at 100%.”
“I’m always at 100% Trey. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”
I peeped up over the window sill. Trey had his back to me thankfully as he was at the bar getting their drinks. Trey was in his business clothes; Amber was in a red Chanel suit that was short and tight. Her hair and make-up were impeccable; her nail color matched the color of her suit perfectly. She had on four-inch heels that accentuated her muscular legs.
Trey handed her a glass of wine; he had a bottle of beer. They were now turned facing each other. The window I was at was not in their line of vision.
“Cheers, counselor,” she said, tapping her glass of wine against his bottle of beer.
“Cheers,” he replied smiling.
They each took a drink and I noticed that Amber did not take her eyes off of him. Trey set his bottle of beer down on the coffee table and started organizing the files stacked on the table. She continued to sip her wine watching him.
“Do you want to use my laptop instead of yours since it’s already out?” he asked.
“Sure thing; I’m a better keyboard jockey than you anyway.”
“I won’t argue that counselor,” Trey said as he scooted over to allow room for her to sit next to him on the sofa. “You’ll need to log in under my password. It’s ---”
“I know what it is, Trey,” she replied rolling her eyes, “You might as well not even have one.”
“Hey, I’ve got too many other important things to remember besides all these damn passwords,” he mumbled.
She looked over at him, smiling.
“It’s awfully quiet in here today,” she commented as her long fingers pressed the keys on his laptop to log in. “Where is that little angel, Preston?”
“Oh, she’s spending time with my parents in Bristol.”
“That’s nice,” she remarked. “Did Tylar go with her?”
“No, Tylar has been pretty busy with the horses. Her car’s not out front so she may have had to go into town for something. She’s been doing the shopping since Jean is visiting her daughter in Atlanta for a few days.”
“There,” she said sweetly, “I’m all logged in and have the depo files accessed. Which one do you want me to pull up?”
“Let’s start with Smith,” he replied, digging through one of the file folders stacked on the coffee table.
“Which one?” she laughed.
“Oh, that’s right. We have about ten of them. How about "Ohio" Smith?”
“You’ve got it, babe,” she said, typing away. “There we go.”
“Read back the testimony on page five relative to the questioning about the integrity concerns submitted.”
It looked as if Amber was scanning down the screen searching for it.
“I can’t find it,” she replied, biting her lower lip. “Do I have the right file opened?”
Trey scooted closer looking at the screen and then back at his notes. I watched as Amber leaned over toward him, her low cut blouse underneath her opened jacket gave Trey a full few of her pushed-up breasts.
I continued to watch my husband with his gorgeous female law partner that had clearly made her intentions known to me on an earlier occasion.
I felt like a voyeur; it was wrong to spy on my husband when he'd clearly given me no indication that he wasn’t to be trusted. I started to turn away to go around and make my entrance when a sudden movement caught my eye.
It was Amber. She'd suddenly turned her face to Trey’s; she leaned into him and found his lips with her own. I stood there like a frozen statue. I watched as Trey pulled back from her and stood up. He was clearly taken aback. He raked one hand through his thick, burnished hair, shoving his other hand into the pocket of his trousers. He paced back to where she was now standing by the couch.
“Amber,” he said, almost apologetically, “this can’t happen.”
“Why Trey?” she asked her voice soft and melodious. “We both want it and you know that.”
“I don’t know anything of the sort. I’m married and you know that. Have I done anything to lead you to believe that I wanted anything more f
rom you aside from a professional friendship?”
“Trey, I'm so sorry. I totally misread your vibes. I’m usually pretty good at picking up on someone’s vibes. I feel like a total idiot.”
She stood up from the couch and quickly grabbed her briefcase. Tears started flowing from her perfectly made up chocolate brown eyes. Her brows were furrowed into a frown as if she was angry with herself.
“Amber - wait. You don’t have to leave. We can forget this happened and continue working on the case.”
She collapsed onto the couch, her hands covering her face as she began to weep softly.
“Don’t you see?” she asked, “I have made a total fool out of myself in front of someone that I so admire and respect. I can’t face you again, Trey. I'm such an idiot.”
Her sobs got louder as she hung her head in apparent shame.
Trey was in front of her in a second; he took her hands and lifted her up from the couch.
“Listen,” he said softly, “you aren’t an idiot and I'm totally flattered. You're a beautiful and talented lawyer, Amber. I’ve enjoyed working on this case with you. I don’t for a minute want you to feel ashamed, okay? If the situation were different . . .”
She looked up at him with her tear-stained eyes and sniffled. She nodded innocently, still watching him with those big brown eyes. My stomach lurched; I knew that she wasn’t finished with him yet.
“Do you really mean it, Trey?”
“I do,” he said softly.
Their eyes met and held. I watched as Trey cupped her face between his hands. She studied his face as he wiped the tears from her cheeks with his thumb. The same way that he'd wiped my tears many times before.
Oh God. I knew what was coming next. He lowered his face to her tear stained cheeks; he gently kissed one and then the other; he kissed the tip of her perfect turned up nose. He smiled looking down at her still. She laced her arms around his neck as his mouth lowered to hers.
I watched as he wrapped his strong arms around her and pulled her close to him; their tongues found each playfully and passionately. Their kiss continued to last for what seemed like forever. Her hands lowered to his ass, gripping it and pressing him in against her. I heard her moan his name.
I wanted to move, but I was frozen to this spot. What had happened between Trey and I that he would fall victim to this manipulative bitch? Beautiful women had always paid attention to Trey; he'd seemed impassive towards it. This was different.
Trey had clicked with Amber from the start. Perhaps he'd clicked with her in a way that he never could with me. He liked that she was his intellectual equal; he liked her spirit and her love of law. He liked that they shared the same passion for it.
I watched as Trey finally pulled himself from her. My eyes studied him; I saw that he'd grown hard for her.
“I can’t do this,” he rasped, wiping her lipstick from his mouth.
“Make love to me, Trey,” she said softly. “I want you. Come to my place. No one will ever have to know. Let me rock your world."
He looked torn and indecisive; it was a look I was not familiar with in Trey. He put his hand on the back of his neck rubbing it as if contemplating his next move; he turned away from her taking several steps back.
That's when he saw me at the window. Our eyes locked momentarily. I saw the look of panic that crossed his face. God only knows what he saw in my eyes.
I was suddenly able to move again. My legs were making up for lost time as I turned from the window and raced across the yard. I got to the pasture and continued running toward the horse barn. The wind was at my back as if to help me to get the hell away from what I'd just witnessed. Everything was blurry; I realized that my eyes had filled up with tears. I needed to get away from the pain. That was all I could think about at the moment.
I threw open the door to the horse barn screaming for Marcus. He finally came out of the tack room with a look of alarm on his handsome face.
“What is it, Tylar? What the hell is wrong?”
“Take me away from here Marcus, please?” I sobbed. I buried my face into his chest. “Please take me to Gina’s now.”
“Tell me what happened,” he insisted.
“There isn’t time,” I shrieked, “I need out of here now please!”
He grabbed his jacket from the hook and pulled the keys from the pocket of his jeans. We headed out behind the barn where his truck was parked. He opened the door for me as I climbed in.
As we pulled down the long graveled drive to the road I saw Amber’s BMW pulling out. Trey was outside crossing the pasture that I'd just raced across.
“There’s Trey,” Marcus said, looking over at me. “Do you want me to drop you here?”
“Keep driving,” I stated firmly.
“Tylar,” he said, “I don’t want to face his wrath. You know how he is about me being too friendly with you.”
“Marcus, I just caught Trey with another woman. Trust me; you've no reason to worry. Please take me to Gina’s. I’m just as much your employer as Trey.”
“You got it,” he said as his truck blew past Trey. Neither of us glanced over.
Marcus walked into the apartment building with me to make sure that Gina was home. I'd let my phone die in my purse. I didn’t use it nearly as often as I had before we had moved to the country. My father generally called on the landline as did Gina since our cell reception wasn’t the best out in the country where our house was located.
The doorman buzzed Gina and Tristan’s apartment. She was home and I went up. I thanked Marcus and told him not to worry about any repercussions from Trey. I told him to tell Trey I threatened him with his job.
“Yeah right,” he laughed. “He knows we’re too tight for that. You calm down okay, Ty?”
“I'll be okay, Marcus. Thanks for being a friend.”
I took the elevator up to our old apartment; it was bittersweet that the apartment Trey and I'd once inhabited together had much better memories than our large, cold house in the country.
Gina had the door open and was holding Reese in her arms when I came in. She immediately knew that something was seriously wrong.
“What is it, Ty? You look like shit.”
“Thanks Gina; I knew I could depend on you.”
“What the fuck, girlfriend? I haven’t even seen you in more than a month; not since you buried Marley.”
“Stop!” I shouted. “Don’t go there!”
I'd startled Reese. He started crying leaning against Gina, rooting for her breast.
“It’s okay, baby,” she crooned to him, unbuttoning her shirt so that he could gain access. He latched on immediately, sucking loudly as he nursed.
“Can I use your phone please?”
“You came all the way into Atlanta to use my phone?”
“My phone died, Gina, can I please use yours?”
“Go right ahead. Are you going to tell me what the hell's going on?”
“I will. I need to make this call first.”
Gina walked into the living room having handed me her cell. I phoned my dad’s cell number. I breathed a sigh of relief when he answered.
“Dad, its Tylar. I’m calling from Gina’s phone.”
The tears started flowing along with my hysteria. I didn’t know where to begin with him. We had no history together but for now I needed a dad. I needed him.
“Tylar, are you alright?”
“No, Daddy,” I sobbed, “I’m not alright. I need to come home.”
Gina listened to everything I shared with my father on that phone call. I could see her tense up when she heard what I'd observed Trey doing with Amber. She was nursing Reese trying to stay calm, but I knew she was ready to go off.
After I got off the phone with my father, Gina got up and took Reese to the nursery. The same nursery that had been Preston’s when we lived here. How happy we had been here I thought. She returned in a few minutes after putting him down for a nap.
“Ty,” she said, her voice cracking wit
h emotion, “will you please sit down and talk to me?”
I went over to the couch where she'd gestured me to be seated. I sat down next to her. She turned and looked at me as if she hadn’t seen me in years instead of weeks. She took my hands into hers and swallowed nervously.
“I'm so sorry for what you've gone through these past several weeks,” she said to me softly. “I know that maybe I have been too tied up with Tristan and Reese to be there for you. I’m sorry,” she said, starting to cry.