Sex Happens

by Carol Soloway

  Just as the doorbell rang, she finished spraying her hair.

  She opened the door and smiled at Seth standing on her doorstep, pristine in a pressed, light blue shirt and tan trousers. His beard was perfectly trimmed, and he looked even more well-groomed than usual—actually quite handsome.

  He handed her a yellow rose. “Ready for Chat Noir?”

  “Of course.” She put the rose in a glass vase, locked the door, and she and Seth went to his car.

  She sank into the soft leather seat and inhaled the mint-clean scent. Glancing around, she saw no sign of Luke and started to relax. They talked about the practice: how it had grown and how they’d nurtured it together. Before she could ask him to reconsider leaving, Seth immediately found a spot in front of the restaurant and parked.

  They walked up to the hostess, and he announced himself. The hostess led them to a corner booth. Seth smiled approvingly, waited as she slid into the booth, and then sat down beside her.

  The wine steward approached. While the steward and Seth discussed the wine selection, Alex started to panic. She knew Luke was capable of anything and wondered, What if Luke followed us here? Would he harm us? Assuring herself they were safe, she took the red velvet menu folder from Seth.

  The waitress placed a basket of bread on the table and offered olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

  “Order anything you’d like,” Seth said.

  Alex smiled and looked at him, almost boyish despite his sophisticated demeanor. She broke off a piece of bread and dipped it in the olive oil. “Seth, you can have a bigger percentage of the practice.”

  “That’s not important to me. This is not a ploy to get you to offer me more. I told you, I’m going to give you the whole practice when I leave.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “Maybe one day you’ll trust me.”

  “Please wait.” She needed him, but before she could make any promises to him, she had to break the bonds that chained her, first to Gabe and now to Luke.

  Seth reached over, took her hand, and kissed it. “Actually, I don’t know how I’ll be able to leave your kids.”

  “I’m sorry you’ve had to spend so much time with them with this monitoring,” she said, appreciative of the way he brought out the best in them.

  “Alex, I’ve loved it. I’ll miss them terribly, and Jonathan has me wrapped around his little finger.”

  The waiter approached, and they both ordered.

  The steak with the mushroom garnish was perfect. The soufflé was pure heaven. Conversation flowed from memories of the years they shared studying and then building their practice to her children and, finally, to how much Seth enjoyed getting to know them. Then, almost too quickly, the curtain fell on their magical evening.

  Seth opened the car door for her and then went around to the driver’s side. “Damn,” he said.

  “What happened?” She got out of the car and stood near him.

  He assessed the slashed tire. “Some kids, I’m sure,” he said.

  “Probably,” she agreed but knew it had to have been Luke.

  “I’ve got the auto club, but I can change the tire in a few minutes.”

  As Seth started to remove the knife-damaged tire, she cast nervous glances up and down the street, expecting Luke’s truck to round the corner.

  “Alex, please go into the restaurant and wait,” he said.

  She agreed and went into the restaurant. Twenty-five minutes later, the spare tire securely in place, she and Seth drove away. When they reached her house, she was too afraid to let him come in, not with the metronome that was Luke threatening to destroy her with every dissonant beat.

  Obviously sensing her reluctance, Seth kissed her good night and left.

  She looked around the house and checked her phone. No calls from Luke. She waited. No pounding on the door. She finally fell asleep, only to be awakened by the phone ringing well before dawn.

  She fumbled for the receiver and then pressed it to her ear.

  “So you made it home from your date at the Chat Noir exclusive dinner establishment,” Luke said.

  “How do you know where I went?” she asked, confirming her suspicion that Luke had followed them and punctured Seth’s tire.

  “I was on my way to pay you a visit when I saw my enemy’s car in front of your house. And I’ll be damned, but then I saw you. You were all gussied up when you got into his car. My curiosity was up, so I just had to follow him for a little while.”

  “Leave me alone,” she yelled. “I’ll call the police.”

  “Do that and you’ll pay. Seth has already started to pay.”

  “Why were you at my house?”

  “Alex, Alex, don’t you get it? I was outside of your house, getting ready to come in to see how you were doing with your new alarm. You know, help you out with the codes.” He laughed. “Then I watched you get in his car. I can’t have you going on dates.”

  She slammed the phone and sank back against the pillows, tasting the anger within his words.

  CHAPTER 44

  As Thanksgiving flowed into Christmas, Alex marked off each day on the calendar, desperate for the resolution of her custody battle. The boys went to Hawaii with Gabe and Linda, Seth was heading east to visit his children in Arizona, and the First Friday Book Club women cancelled their December meeting.

  The new alarm system worked perfectly, but she still feared Luke. It had been three weeks since he’d called. His eerie silence haunted her. Strange how she felt a modicum of safety only when Luke was within view. It was like holding a live grenade for security.

  After finishing her over-the-sink tuna fish dinner, she heard the doorbell ring. Certain it was Luke, she called out, “I’m not opening the door.”

  “Do as I say,” Luke demanded, loudly enough for her to hear him through the closed front door. “Or would you rather I go to Seth’s house?”

  She opened the peephole and spoke through it. “Why are you involving him?”

  “Seth’s my enemy,” he said. “I have the codes to his exclusive condo. Even they have plumbing problems, and they’re on service with my company.”

  She knew Seth wasn’t leaving until the morning, and she feared Luke would confront him. “Luke, you can’t use business information like codes for personal reasons.”

  “The codes are office knowledge. I think I’ll just enter Seth’s complex and chat with him for a while. I want him to be scared about his fate if he continues with you.”

  “He has nothing to do with this,” she said.

  “Or maybe I should just visit Jon, your little boy.”

  “Gabe wouldn’t let you near him.”

  He laughed, a harsh menacing laugh. “I’m sure I could find out where his little nursery school is located.”

  “No,” she begged, terror short-circuiting her brain.

  “Alex, I came to give you your Christmas present. I’ll leave, but please open it. I’ll call when I get home to see if you like it.”

  “I don’t want any presents from you.” She walked away from the door.

  Relieved, she heard his truck pull away. Then she went to the door. Through the peephole, she looked down and saw a beautifully wrapped box with a huge pink ribbon.

  She started to go upstairs but stopped. She decided it would be safe to retrieve the gift. She looked through the peephole again. His truck wasn’t in the driveway or in front of the house. Relieved, she punched in the code to shut off the alarm, opened the door, and picked up the gift. Before unwrapping it, she shut the door and started to reset the alarm.

  After she programmed the alarm, the system wouldn’t turn on. The code wasn’t accepted. She tried again but still couldn’t turn the alarm on. Her fingers were shaking so much she thought maybe she’d gotten the code jumbled. After fumbling with the phone, she managed to dial the alarm service.


  The technician on duty told her maybe a door or window was open.

  She assured him that she had closed everything and checked it. She also insisted she would have heard the alarm ring if anything had been opened after she set it.

  The technician said he would check her system from his computer.

  She waited, wondering whether she should call the police. But she was certain, just like before, the sergeant would tell her it was just a threat. Maybe he wouldn’t even believe her.

  The technician returned and told her the side door, the one from the garage to the backyard, was open.

  “It was closed.”

  “Dr. Rose, my system shows it’s the side door that’s open.”

  “But the alarm was on only a few minutes ago,” Alex said.

  Impatiently, the technician insisted, “It needs to be shut in order to turn the alarm back on. Please check it, now.”

  She walked to the door leading from the house to the garage. It was locked. Then she walked through the garage to the side door, the one from the garage to the backyard. It was open. She knew she had closed it this morning, but maybe she hadn’t locked it, and the wind blew it open. She wasn’t sure. Lately, she wasn’t sure of anything.

  But if the door had been opened, then Luke could be in the garage. Panic gripping her, she looked around, expecting him to reach out and grab her at any second. Quickly, she locked the side door, then went into the house and locked the door from the garage to the house. She tried the code again. This time, it was accepted.

  “Are you there?” the technician asked. “Everything’s clear from this end.”

  Still uncertain about how the door had opened, she went to the family room, sank into the couch, and placed the present on her lap. Wondering whether his gift was another malevolent warning wrapped in a pink bow, she pulled off the ribbon and opened the box. She stared at the pink-and-white tennis outfit. Presents and threats—the chaotic reality from her childhood reborn in Luke.

  She left the present on the couch, checked the deadbolt, and went upstairs.

  She turned on the bedroom light and gasped.

  Luke grabbed her.

  Her heart started to race, and she tried to pull away from him. “What are you doing here?” she screamed.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know? I’m smarter than you, even with your high-priced alarm.”

  “Luke,” she said, the name burning her throat. “How did you get in here?”

  “I’ve told you, I can read a person and gain more knowledge than any intellectual could from any book.”

  “Yes, you told the kids that, but how did you get up here?”

  “Carefully planned,” he said. “I was sure you wouldn’t open the door for me tonight. So earlier today, I set up the ladder leading to your balcony. You were so busy you didn’t even notice me walking around your precious house. You probably felt so safe in your new ‘a-larm,’ you didn’t even think about me. You didn’t think I could outsmart you and your ‘a-larm.’”

  “But your truck was gone,” she said, terrified, shocked at the sight of him, here in her bedroom.

  “I backed my truck out of your driveway and drove just out of sight. Then I quickly ran back to your house, hid by the bushes, and waited for you to open the front door to get the present. After you opened the front door, I had to run fast to get to the side yard and open the door to the garage so you wouldn’t be able to put the alarm back on. That gave me time to climb the ladder, get on your balcony, and open the sliding glass door to your bedroom.”

  “Why?” she asked, too terrified to think.

  “By the way, I knew you’d forget to put the bolt into the slider.”

  “Luke, you can’t just come into my house, my bedroom.”

  “Getting into your house without triggering the alarm was a piece of cake. I was trained in ’Nam.”

  “For this?” she asked.

  As though he didn’t even hear her, he continued. “Vietnam, now that was a challenge. If you weren’t very clever, you’d fall through the traps—the rolling traps or the window traps.”

  “I’ve heard about—”

  “You people heard about it, but I lived it. I had a buddy who fell into a rolling trap. Twenty-four bamboo sticks lacerated him. When I tried to pull him out, the sticks rolled and shredded him.”

  She was afraid to say anything. It could trigger a horrific memory and set him off. She smelled alcohol and knew the synergistic effect of PTSD and alcohol; it could make an already volatile man commit horrific acts. Terrified, she knew she had to let him talk.

  “I was selected to be the one to go into the tunnels to check and see if any of our dead were in the tunnels before we’d throw in the grenades. We had to retrieve our dead. The Vietcong laughed at us for caring, but we did.”

  So he’s been trying to prove his prowess ever since—first the fishing, then the hunting, and now me, she thought and knew she had to extricate herself from him. “Luke, I need you to leave—now.”

  “It’s me who will make the demands. And I’m here to give you my terms for your peace, or rather Seth’s—I mean Jon’s—peace.”

  “Jon?” she whispered. Unwilling to allow him to bully her any more but fearful of any harm he might do to her son. “I can’t keep doing this with you.”

  “You can’t, huh? Listen to me. You will give me the new code. And you will have sex with me when I tell you.” Then like a scratched CD that kept replaying the same line, he repeated his demands.

  She stood there, too scared to move.

  He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her around to face him. “Now, get your ass into bed, or your friend Seth won’t be able to work again. Trust me.”

  Fearful but resolute, she’d decided she wasn’t going to let him coerce her into sex. The touch of his body once so enticing, now repulsed her with the same intensity. She looked at him and said, “I will not have sex with you.”

  He laughed. “People like to think they’re smarter than animals.”

  “They are,” she said, recalling how he delighted in vetting himself against his prey. It didn’t matter the sport; he was a hunter, and, tonight, she was his prey.

  “Yeah, the richer they are, the further away from animals they think they are. But I can smell when they’re afraid. I can smell you now.” He glowered at her. “I’m a trained hunter.”

  “I’m calling the police. Your ladder is on my balcony, and they’ll know you broke in.”

  “Alex, there’s no broken window or door. And don’t you remember, you asked me to fix the light on the balcony. I took out the light earlier this evening so it wouldn’t turn on when I got on the balcony. I put the old balcony light in my truck and left a new one on the table on the balcony. You know, like I was getting ready to replace it for you.”

  She dashed to the door. He jerked her back. Then he grabbed her wrist and squeezed it forcefully.

  She struggled, trying to free herself. “I won’t have sex with you tonight or ever again.”

  “You won’t, huh?” he asked and glared at her. “You’re very brave, very brave.” He pulled her hair, turned her, and pushed her onto the bed.

  “How long do I have to do what you want?” she asked. Repulsed by his strength—the strength that had attracted her to him—she shook with disgust.

  “Undress,” he demanded.

  As though in a trance, separating herself from reality—a trick that had always worked for her as a child—she undressed. Exposed, she turned onto her back. What had happened to the man who had untied the teenage girl’s hands from the bedpost years ago? How had his kindness turned to rage?

  As Luke took off his jeans, she started to get up.

  “Don’t even try anything,” he warned and leaned over her, his penis above her face. He reached for a pillow.

  Sh
e stared up at him and felt as though, once again, she was watching the delighted hunter.

  “Turn over, lie face down, and put this under your belly.” He pushed the pillow at her.

  She took the pillow, turned over, and adjusted her body to allow him the perfect angle to thrust into her, denigrate her by doing it doggie style. It was better facedown, she thought. Then she wouldn’t have to look at his face and watch him overpower her.

  He climbed on top of her, stopped, and stood up.

  Suddenly, she felt much more weight than his one hundred and eighty pounds being lifted off her.

  “I don’t know what got into me,” he said, as he put his pants on, ran to the bathroom, and then left.

  She lay motionless until she heard the door shut. She staggered to the bathroom. There, on the mirror, was a message scribbled in bright red lipstick: “Tell anyone +Seth dies/Jon cries.” It was smeared. Luke had probably written it before she came upstairs and then tried to hastily erase it right before he ran out. She also knew Luke had no fear she’d go to the police because that could destroy her custody case; therefore, he’d become more brazen.

  If she reported him to the police, she knew Gabe’s attorney could use it to discredit her. She knew how easily the truth could be twisted. But she decided she couldn’t let Luke get away with this. She had to go to the police station—they had to believe her this time.

  As she distractedly drove to the station, she realized she’d missed the exit for the station, but she kept driving. When she reached the two gilded, winged angels at the gates of the Brea Cemetery, she didn’t know how or why she drove there. But she did know the sometimes fear guides us to the place we need to be no matter how much we resist.

  She parked and shut off the engine. Staring through her car window at the names on the headstones, she finally saw her mother’s grave. Her mother had died of a stroke at fifty-four, freeing Alex’s father to reunite with his lover, Robert. Although her father had never said anything, Alex was certain he knew what really had happened at home while he was at work. But a man whose wife kept his secret would keep hers until the end.