“I forget how,” he pouts.
“Well… I heard that in order to get into Coney Island, you have to prove you can tie your shoes. If you can’t do it, we can’t go.”
Gabe doesn’t pause long to see if maybe I’m bluffing before he pushes away from us and puts on his shoes, tying perfect bows.
Mac chuckles, and I shrug my shoulders. “All the negotiation skills I learned as a lawyer have been invaluable raising a child.”
Gabe jumps up from the couch and grabs my hand. “Come on, Dad. Let’s go.”
I stand up, easily bringing Mac’s body up with me, letting her slither down my front as I set her on the floor. Fuck, that felt good and I start to pop a little wood, so I set her away from me. This weekend is going to be torture not being able to fuck her.
Grabbing my wallet and keys, and to take my mind off fucking Mac, I ask Gabe, “What do you want to do at Coney Island today?”
Only my son can give an off-the-cuff discourse on Coney Island. “I want to ride the Cyclone, play skeeball, eat hot dogs and cotton candy, and then go to the beach, and then we can ride the Cyclone again. I’ll ride it once with you, and then Mac can ride it with me.”
As Gabe keeps chattering, I open the door and glance one more time behind me. Mac is staring at Gabe with the most delighted grin on her face as he starts talking about the best way to build sand castles, and I swear, I don’t think the kid has taken a breath yet.
Turning around, I start to walk out the door and am brought to an abrupt halt because someone is standing there, hand poised in the air to knock.
I used to think her the most beautiful woman in the world at one time in my life and now I can barely look at her pale blonde hair and light blue eyes without bile surging up in my throat. “Marissa… what are you doing here?”
She narrows her gaze at me, as if calculating what is the best possible thing to say to me, to not only announce why she is here, but to pick at my wounds while she’s at it. For some reason, ever since I left her for cheating on me, Marissa takes every opportunity to strike out in retaliation. Even though I’m the one that was wronged, she still feels the need to make me suffer.
“I’ve had a change in plans, so I’m here to get Gabe.”
Of course, she did, I think to myself tiredly as she pushes past me into the apartment. I’m sure she and Anthony broke up… again.
She doesn’t say a word to her son, but pins Mac with a snotty glare. “And you are?”
Giving a sigh and running a frustrated hand through my hair, I open my mouth to make introductions, but Gabe beats me to it. Grabbing Marissa’s hand, so she will give him attention, he says, “This is Mac, Mommy. She’s Daddy’s friend.”
Marissa’s eyes glow hot for a moment, then she appraises Mac up and down. I watch as the heat leaves and she turns away from Mac dismissively. She’s being dismissive because Marissa knows that my past modus operandi was to fuck women and leave them. I think she actually takes great pride in having a hand in creating the new Matt Connover.
So she dismisses Mac because in a million years, she just can’t envision me opening myself up to someone again. “I don’t appreciate you bringing your flavor of the week around our son.”
Fury lances at me, not just because of the insult to Mac, but because of saying such a comment in front of our son. I struggle to keep my voice calm in front of Gabe, so he doesn’t really understand just how offensive his mother is being. “Marissa… I’m not doing this with you. Not in front of Gabe. We’re on our way out to Coney Island. I can bring him by your place later this evening.”
“Sorry. That just won’t work for me. I’m taking him now.”
Gabe tugs on Marissa’s hand and whines. “I want to go to Coney Island with Daddy.”
Marissa never takes her eyes from mine when she responds to him. “Not today, baby. We have other things to do.”
“Marissa,” I beg, because although I’d never beg that bitch for anything for myself, I have no pride when it comes to begging for my son. “Don’t make Gabe suffer because you want to get back at me.”
She doesn’t say a word to me, but her eyes light up in victory that she has made me beg her. Something happens inside of me… almost a sinking sensation, as if I was in an elevator that had dropped suddenly, causing my stomach to lose equilibrium with the rest of my body. Overwhelming sadness hits me that this… right here… this is destined to be my life from here on out. Marissa is never going away, she’s never going to stop being hatefully vile, and I’m always going to be battling with her for every scrap I can get with Gabe.
How in the fuck can a woman that purported to love me… married me… made love to me and bore my child, who then later went on to cheat on me… how in the world can that woman still continue to enjoy torturing me?
“Mac,” I say quietly, while staring at my ex-wife. “Would you mind taking Gabe back to his room for a moment so I can have a few words with Marissa?”
“Sure,” she says softly. “Come on, Gabe.”
Gabe looks at Mac and then cuts his gaze back to me in question. “Go on, buddy. I’ll work this out with Mom.”
“Okay,” he says timidly, because no matter how calm I’m trying to make myself, he’s picking up on the bad vibes. He takes Mac’s hand and leads her away.
I watch my son, who I love beyond all measure, lead the woman who I may love, but I’m still not quite sure, away, and turn to face the woman who I absolutely despise.
Chapter 29
“Marissa,” I try one time to appeal to any bit of humanity that may exist in her blackened soul. “Please don’t do this. He’s so excited about going to Coney Island.”
“Sorry, Matt. It’s not your weekend for visitation, and it’s my right to take him.”
“Why do you do this?” I ask her bluntly, because we’ve never actually talked about our relationship since our divorce.
Her eyebrows rise up in surprise. “Do what?”
“Punish me,” I tell her. “Why are you always trying to punish me, when I didn’t do anything wrong?”
“Does it hurt, Matt?” she asks me in mock sympathy, her eyes cold as ice.
“Yes,” I tell her truthfully.
“Good,” she hisses at me, and I take a step backward because the venom in her voice is palpable. She keeps her voice low but lays out her feelings to me viciously. “Never fuck with a woman scorned, Matt. You may be a hot-shot lawyer and can bend people to your will, but as a man… you simply don’t have the fortitude to ever go head to head with a pissed off woman like me. I will shred you every time, because you men like to think we’re the weaker sex, but that would be a foolish mistake to think so. We’re the smarter and more ruthless of the two, and if I’m strong enough to bear your eight-pound son without any pain meds, don’t think I won’t castrate you without a backward glance if I had the chance.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I ask her, completely bewildered and stunned by her rage.
She seems to get a bit of control over herself, because her voice is more even toned. “I’m talking about the fact that I came home one afternoon to find all of my bags packed, waiting in the foyer. I found you there, telling me I had thirty minutes to clear out of my home. You had sent Gabe off to your parents, so I couldn’t even see my son before you kicked me out. I’m talking about the fact you told every one of our family and friends all the dirty details of my indiscretions, rather than try to talk to me about it. You never once laid my crimes on my doorstep to deal with, but made it public knowledge with which to humiliate me. You never once let me try to atone for my sin. You simply cut me off and cut me out.”
I blink at Marissa… several times. I think she might be a mirage who might disappear if I keep blinking at her, because it can’t be real… not this woman standing in front of me acting like she was hurt when our marriage crumbled. Not the woman who ended up with everything… our son, a huge child support payment, and my balls in a vice grip.
“I don�
��t understand,” is all I can say, because, fuck… I really don’t understand.
Marissa sighs and looks at me in disappointment. “No, Matt… I don’t suppose you do. Let me put it this way… I hurt you—you hurt me. You’re pissed at me—well, guess what... I’m pissed at you. You’ve changed—I’ve changed. It’s all fucked up, but this is the way it is. So deal with it. Now, if you don’t mind, go get my son so I can get out of here.”
Her eyes are like shards of ice as she glares at me, and I actually feel like said shards are ripping through me right now. Marissa is pissed, but I also hear pain in her voice and that pisses me off, because there is a tiny part of me that actually might be a little empathetic to her.
And that pisses me off even more, because that bitch doesn’t deserve an ounce of it from me. She has absolutely no business making me feel bad for dissolving our marriage.
Granted, I may have rained hell down on her when I found out, but it was within my right to do so. So what if I kicked her ass out on the street? She had been fucking some art professor at the time, and I was quite sure he’d let her crash with him. And so what if I told everyone we knew what a lying whore she was? It was the God’s honest truth.
And where is the fucking gratitude? Because thereafter, once I calmed down, we were able to work out a shared custody arrangement and I agreed to give her Gabe during the weekdays in return for her being a stay-at-home mom given that I traveled so much. I paid her a lot of fucking money every year so that her sole job was to be there for Gabe when I couldn’t.
Fucking bitch!
Turning away, because I really can’t stand to look at her face a second more, I walk back to Gabe’s room.
Mac is sitting on his bed, and Gabe is showing her some of his books. He’s sitting beside her on the bed with his favorite book, The Giving Tree, open on his lap and he’s reading to her. It’s a beautiful moment, my young son comfortable enough with my girlfriend to read to her. It should warm me… fill me up with all kinds of yummy, gooey goodness.
Instead, I feel nothing but anger, disappointment, and disgust. I feel pain, remorse, and even fucking guilt. These are all feelings that I fucking hate because they make me feel terrible and so when I look in on Mac and Gabe sitting there, I think I just go ahead and will myself to turn off all my feelings, which includes the good ones too.
I don’t spare a glance at Mac but walk over to put my hand on Gabe’s shoulder. “Hey, little man. Let’s get your stuff together. Mom has important stuff she needs to do, and you’ll have to go with her.”
Gabe whines, “No, Daddy… I want to stay here with you.”
And while I might be able to shut off many of my feelings, it’s impossible to do so where Gabe is concerned. My heart practically shrivels in on itself that I have to send him with his mom. By the terms of our custody arrangement, I have no right to him today. If I try to even argue about it with Marissa, she’ll pitch a fit right in front of Gabe and the one thing I promised myself I wouldn’t do, is let Gabe know how I truly felt about his mother. So I was always calm with her and treated her with respect when he was around, starting from the very day I booted her ass out, sending Gabe to stay with my parents so he wouldn’t see the storm that was unleashing.
Since that day, I never argued or raised my voice with her. If I felt she was going to be combative, I always backed down, because winning a fight with Marissa was never as important as making sure Gabe never had to see how fucked up his parents really were.
Kneeling down, I pull Gabe up from his bed and into my arms. I squeeze him as hard as I can manage without crushing my little man. “I know. I want you to stay here, too. But go with Mommy, and I promise that we’ll go to Coney Island next weekend. Okay?”
Gabe nods his head, and I stand up. Taking his little Marvel Comics suitcase, I quickly pack up his stuff and zip it up. Mac stands up from the bed but doesn’t say a word. I’m not sure if I can handle her saying anything to me right now, because my insides are so chewed up.
Lifting the suitcase, I turn to Gabe. “Let’s go.”
I watch as he turns to Mac and hugs her leg, looking up at her. “Bye, Mac. See you next weekend.”
A sweet moment, really. The way Gabe has taken to her so quickly. Mac looks down at him with a smile and strokes the top of his head. “Bye, Gabe.”
I should be filled with warmth over this, because just an hour ago, I was terrified he wouldn’t like her.
Now?
Now, I’m not feeling much of anything because I’ve demanded that blessed numbness be my crutch for right now.
Gabe takes my hand and we walk together back out to the living room, where Marissa stands waiting. She at least gives him a warm smile and says, “I’m sorry to do this, baby. Mommy has to do something important, but you can see Daddy next weekend and he’ll take you to Coney Island then. Okay?”
My son isn’t so easy to forgive this right now, so he just glares at her and then turns to hug me. I kiss him on the head and as I pull away, I look one more time at Marissa. I go ahead and open my gaze to her so I can get another hefty dose of her bitterness and gloating hate that would normally come after a victory such as this.
Instead, she just stares at me passively, as if she’s trying to see something that maybe wasn’t there a moment ago. I quickly avert my gaze, because I don’t want to give her anything she’s seeking, and turn my back on them both, walking back into my kitchen. I hear the front door open and close, and then they’re gone.
Putting both of my palms on my kitchen counter, I hang my head down and close my eyes, trying to replay the conversation with Marissa in my head. Trying to figure out where it got out of control.
She told me I didn’t give her a chance to atone for her sin.
It’s true enough. No apology would have ever made a difference to me. But I’m thinking by the mere fact she brought it up, it may have made a difference to her. It may have absolved her of her guilt. It may have made things better for her.
Savage rage such as I have never felt except for one other time in my entire life, and that is when Cal confessed to sleeping with Marissa, rises in me. How dare she try to make me feel guilty after what she did to me? How dare she try to put any of this on me? The blood is pounding so forcefully through my veins that the light actually dim a bit in my eyes.
“Are you okay?” Mac asks quietly, and I realize she’s walked into the kitchen.
My head snaps up, and she flinches by what she sees in my eyes. That makes me feel guilty, and it seems like I can’t fucking win with women these days. I apparently do nothing but hurt them.
“No, I’m not fucking okay,” I snarl at her, and she flinches again. “How can I be okay after that?”
But between the two of us, only I know that the thing with Marissa was so much more than what Mac actually observed. She didn’t get to see the really juicy stuff that occurred after she took Gabe back into his bedroom.
“I’m sorry,” Mac says quietly and she’s saying that not only because she feels bad that Gabe was just stripped away from me, but she’s sorry that I’m obviously hurting and she’s sorry that I’m angry right now.
Fuck… appears everyone is just sorry.
Except for me, of course. I apparently don’t understand the concept of apology. Otherwise, I’d have let Marissa “atone for her sin”.
What a crock of shit!
I push away from the counter and look at Mac. Her face is lined with worry, she’s got her hands clasped tight, and she’s on edge. I know I must be putting off some seriously angry vibes, and I make her nervous. That should appall me but it doesn’t. It actually sort of pisses me off more.
Fucking women and their tender sensibilities.
The anger that pulses through me, coupled with disappointment and choking guilt, are too overwhelming and I need some way to purge this out of my system. And what better way than the fantastically amazing woman who fucks like a goddess standing before me.
Stalking up to her, I wrap
my hand around her neck and palm the back of her head, pulling her in close. I know my eyes are hard and bitter right now, my voice harsh with rage. “Do you see, Mac?”
“See what?” she asks quietly, almost fearfully.
“Do you see why I am the way I am?”
“Because of Marissa?”
“Yes… it’s all because of her,” I say, gripping her head tighter.
Mac stares back at me, completely confused and utterly worried. I watch her, wondering at what point Mac may lay the same guilt trip on me in our relationship. It’s bound to happen, right?
I’m startled momentarily when Mac raises her hands and lays her palms on my cheeks. Lifting up on her tiptoes, she pulls on me slightly so my head bends down. She touches her mouth to mine, lightly, and at first, I do nothing. Instinctively and immediately, my body wants her, but I don’t capitulate right away, holding my arms tight with pure refusal to embrace her.
Then Mac plays me… because she knows how to get me to react. She flicks her tongue out over my bottom lip and that one touch causes me to groan and my dick to get hard. Mac seizes the opportunity and plunges her tongue in my mouth.
She kisses me… almost frantically, but I still don’t make a move to hold her.
She’s not daunted though. She merely moves her lips from my mouth to my neck, murmuring, “I need you,” before biting at my skin.
Okay, that packs a punch right there, and lust seizes me.
My hands come up, not to grab ahold of her, but to grab ahold of her shirt and pull viciously at it, ripping every button from the fabric so they scatter across the tile floor.
See Mac… that’s how you rip a shirt open.
Mac merely gasps, not in outrage, but in desire. My hands frantically pull at her jeans, pushing, pulling, tearing at the denim, trying to pull them loose from her body.
I manage to get them and her underwear off, and drag her to the floor. I don’t even bother with her bra but do lean down and bite at one of her nipples through the silk, causing her to cry out.
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