The Affair

by Colette Freedman

  It had certainly changed for Stephanie when she and Robert went to bed together. The sexual tension had been building for a while. She had recognized what was happening a long time before he did. In those early days together, they would visit sites across New England, “scouting locations” they called it, and walk and talk together. She’d learned a lot about him on those walks, about the young man he’d been, full of dreams and plans and hopes for the future, and she’d learned even more about the man he’d become, with no real plan and a lot of broken dreams, trapped in a loveless marriage, and with a job that was slowly spiraling into the ground.

  The first time they had made love had been . . . extraordinary. He had been passionate and gentle, fearful of hurting her, terrified of letting go, and afterward he had wept. She had never been entirely sure why; he had told her it was because he was happy and hadn’t, until that moment, known he’d been unhappy beforehand. But she wasn’t entirely sure if she believed him.

  She had never believed she was taking him away from a loving wife. He was always incredibly loyal to Kathy, and never said anything against her, but from the scraps of information she had picked up on their walks and talks, she’d come to understand that a great gulf had opened between them. If there had been no children, they might have split up and gone their separate ways, but their relationship was wrapped around house and home, the kids and the business. It was complicated.

  When he was with Stephanie, he acted like a single man and Stephanie treated him like one.

  They made love because they wanted to; she didn’t feel guilty, and neither did he. He was an old-fashioned and unimaginative lover, but he was considerate, and she enjoyed the physical aspect of their relationship. She especially loved waking in his arms, feeling the warmth and comfort of them around her.

  Stephanie pushed away the plate; she hadn’t tasted a single mouthful. She climbed slowly to her feet and carried the plate out to the kitchen where she dropped it into the sink. She knew she should wash it now, but a growing, numbing exhaustion crept over her, and all she wanted to do was to climb into bed and sleep. The CD had finished, and the condo was still and silent. She moved through the rooms, checking that the doors were locked and the lights were off. She recognized what was happening. It had taken her a long time to put a name to the emotion she was now feeling, and when she had, it had both surprised and frightened her. She felt lonely. So incredibly lonely.

  It was an emotion she had not experienced in a long time. She had always been resilient, confident, and self-sufficient. She was always in control, needing no one, wanting no one in her life.

  And then she had met Robert, and everything changed.

  With him, she learned the meaning of loneliness.

  These moments, she called them blue notes, happened occasionally when she wanted to have Robert around and, for various reasons, he couldn’t be there. She was experiencing the blue notes much more frequently lately. The problem was she’d gotten used to having Robert around, to having him in her life. It had been easier, so much easier, when she’d been alone.

  Then, she hadn’t known what she was missing from her life. And she wasn’t just talking about a man—she despised that nonsense that a woman needed a man to make her complete. She was talking about a partner, a lover, a friend. In the beginning it had been nothing but sex. It had just been a game. But the game had turned serious when she fell in love with him.

  If only she could be sure that he loved her. He said he did.

  But did she believe him?

  CHAPTER 35

  Friday, 20th December

  The loud ringing of the phone woke her out of a deep and dreamless sleep. She scrambled blindly for it, almost knocking it off the table.

  “Hello?”

  “Good morning, gorgeous.”

  Recognizing Robert’s voice, she pushed herself into an upright position and discovered that the bedclothes were in a knotted heap on the floor. When she slept alone she tossed and turned, but when Robert was in bed with her, she remained still and unmoving throughout the night. She squinted at the clock, trying to make sense of the digits. “My God, what time is it?”

  “Ten past eight. Wake up, sleepyhead! I thought you’d be on the way into the office.”

  “I’m going in later. I had a late call with Beijing last night; the thirteen-hour time difference is a killer.”

  The call had come in around midnight, shocking her from a deep sleep. It was her newest client, a rising techno company that was a needy, albeit lucrative account. Stephanie was available to them 24-7. After the call, she had not been able to get back to sleep until the early hours of the morning, and all the time she’d been wishing, desperately, that Robert were there with her, not to make love, just to hold her.

  She was aware that Robert was speaking to her, and abruptly his half-heard words leapt out at her. “Speaking of calls, there was a message from Carson on my answering machine this morning; he wants to rearrange the appointment. Shouldn’t be a problem.”

  She shook her head and rubbed the heels of her hands into her eyes. Her intuition and business acumen were telling her that something was wrong. “Tell me what he said, exactly what he said.”

  “Well, he just said . . . Actually, hang on a second and I’ll play you the message.” She heard him walking across the room, then a click as he hit the Play button on his answering machine.

  “You have no new messages. You have two old messages.”

  She heard the high-pitched squeal of a voice as Robert fast-forwarded through another message, then suddenly Eddie Carson’s smug voice came clearly down the line.

  “Good morning, Robert, Eddie Carson, DaBoyz Management, here. I understand from Stephanie that you start early. Will you give me a call as soon as you get in? I’ll need to rearrange our appointment.”

  Stephanie shook her head in astonishment. Eddie tried the same trick with just about everyone he worked with.

  “That’s it,” Robert said cheerfully. “It’s not a problem. Obviously, I’ll clear my calendar to see them, you know that.”

  “It is a problem,” she snapped. “This is just bullshit. I told Carson we were lucky to get you. Call him back and do not—do you hear me—do not allow him to rearrange the appointment. You’ve got to show this little bastard who’s boss; otherwise he’ll walk all over you.”

  “It really isn’t a problem—” Robert began.

  “Just do as I say,” she ordered. “Be tough with him. Tell him you can meet this morning or not at all, then shut up and say nothing. Wait for his response.” She hopped out of bed and went to stand by the window, looking down over the courtyard. Mrs. Moore was out sweeping dead leaves away from the front of the Victorian. Stephanie was getting sick and tired of Eddie Carson and his second-rate band.

  “Okay,” Robert said, but she could hear the doubt and indecision in his voice. Why couldn’t he trust her? Because she was a woman and he was a man, and men always knew what they were doing in business? Bullshit. Stephanie had her finger on the pulse of the industry, and while she loved Robert, he was considered a dinosaur in a field in which rapidly evolving technology was dramatically changing the business. She had proved, time and time again, that she was right.

  “Trust me on this. Do it now, and then phone me back.”

  “Yes, ma’am!”

  She hung up. Carrying the phone in her hand, she headed into the bathroom and turned on the shower. It would be interesting now to see how Robert handled this; if he gave in to Carson, then the video would be a disaster, because Carson would effectively take charge. If Robert kept control of the DaBoyz manager, then there was still some hope for him.

  But Stephanie also knew that Robert was so desperate for business that he might very well give in to Carson. He’d be even more desperate if he discovered that this was the last job he was getting from her agency. She was already compromised. She just wasn’t sure how badly.

  The recent Skype conversation she’d had with her boss,
Charles Flintoff, had been very strained. This was the man who’d found her on breakfast-time TV and had offered her a job on the basis of a half-hour meeting. He’d mentored her, and she’d proven to be an excellent student. She got the feeling that he regarded her almost like a daughter—he had three of his own, none of whom were following him into the business—and she, in turn, was incredibly fond of him. He had heard a whisper in the trade about her involvement with Robert, and had Skyped her immediately to ask her straight out for an answer. For a single instant, she’d been tempted to lie to him and deny the rumor, but instead had opted for the truth. She respected Charles, and the truth had probably saved her job. Charles had once told her that he only ever asked questions he knew the answer to.

  The other thing in her favor was that the few small jobs she’d sent Robert’s way had been competitively priced, and he’d delivered the goods. Charles had made no comment about the fact that Robert was married, but he had advised Stephanie that she had compromised the agency by becoming involved with a subcontractor. She admitted that when she was giving Robert the work, she’d never thought about that. “Love can be blind,” Charles said, “but infatuation can be stupid.” If she wanted to remain with the company, she had a choice: She could either break up with Robert or refrain from giving him any more business. She had to do one or the other, and although he didn’t say it, she got the distinct impression that Charles would prefer if she did both. She gave Charles Flintoff an assurance that she would not allow R&K to pitch for any further business and that if they did pitch, she would not consider them. “Then, we can consider the matter closed,” Flintoff said in his avuncular, cut-glass British accent. “There’s no need to revisit it.” Stephanie knew he would never mention it again, but even on the computer screen, she could see the disappointment in his face and knew also that her credibility with the man had been damaged. She was going to have to work hard to restore it.

  Stephanie wondered how Robert was going to react when he discovered that he was not going to get any more business out of her agency. She knew he was counting on her putting more business his way in the coming year. He’d even, rather arrogantly she thought, created a budget based upon that premise. She decided she would break the news to him sometime in January. Let him enjoy his Christmas.

  Stephanie stared at herself in the mirror. Her hair was wild and her eyes were bloodshot after her disturbed night. The flesh on her face was sagging and creased with pillow-marks. She stepped back and looked at herself critically: Her body was in relatively good condition, her breasts were still more or less firm, stomach reasonably flat, but she was losing the battle with cellulite on her thighs. What exactly did Robert see in her, she wondered? What had attracted him to her? . . . Could it be for the business she brought his company? The thought was nasty and spiteful, but it was not the first time it had occurred to her.

  Her phone rang.

  “You were right.” She could hear him smiling on the other end of the phone. “What would I do without you?”

  “Let’s hope you never have to find out.”

  CHAPTER 36

  “I like him,” Eddie Carson said, voice crackling and distorted as it came through her hands-free phone system in the BMW.

  Stephanie was looking for a place to park and was tracking a pedestrian walking down Charles Street with car keys jangling in his hand. Was he walking to his car or away from it? “I knew you’d like him, Eddie,” she said brightly. “Plus he’s a new face, with new ideas, so you can be sure you’ll get something different, a new look, for the band.”

  “Yeah, yeah, he had some good stuff, some nice ideas.” Carson sounded bored.

  “You didn’t try to change the time of the appointment this morning, Eddie, did you?”

  “Would I do that, Miss Burroughs?” Eddie Carson asked innocently.

  “Absolutely.”

  The pedestrian stopped beside a blue Prius and climbed in. Stephanie pulled right up beside the car, signal light ticking. The trick now was to make sure that no one stole her space.

  “It’s a game, Stef; you just got to play the game. But this new boy, this Roger . . .”

  “Robert,” she corrected him.

  “Robert. Yeah, he seems to know the rules. I understand you know him . . . personally.” The leer in his voice was clearly audible.

  The Prius showed no sign of moving. Stephanie ground her teeth. “What are the chances of DaBoyz breaking up?” she asked, not answering his question, keeping him off-balance. If he wanted to play games, she could play just as well—better—than he ever could.

  “None. I’m drip-feeding the press the story myself. The single isn’t going to make number one for Christmas, which is a shame, but if Roger . . .”

  “Robert.”

  “If Robert can shoot a good vid, we’ll have a reasonable chance at the charts with the next single in the early spring.”

  Stephanie knew he was lying through his teeth. The new video would be released probably a week before the band announced they were going their separate ways for “creative reasons.” The creative reasons being that only one of them could sing. The sympathy vote from the dwindling numbers of fans might push the single into the top five.

  The Prius finally pulled out, and Stephanie nipped the BMW into the space. “Sounds good. You have a great Christmas, Eddie. I’ll talk to you in the New Year.”

  “Same to you, Stef.”

  “And Eddie . . . don’t let me read in the papers that the band’s broken up. Let’s get the video out first.”

  “Keen to show off your boyfriend’s handiwork, eh?” Carson said and hung up before she could respond.

  Stephanie nodded. He’d won that round.

  “I told you.” Stephanie strode around the office, having related an edited version of the conversation she’d just had with Eddie.

  Robert was sitting behind his desk, staring intently at his monitor. “Your advice was absolutely spot-on,” he said without looking up. “They turned up at ten on the dot. The boys were as good as gold, a little overawed by everything, and very much under Carson’s thumb. He made all the creative decisions.”

  Stephanie fanned out the storyboards across the conference table. This was the first time she’d seen the finished presentation, and it looked great. Robert wanted to shoot the band’s new single, “Heart of Stone,” in the middle of the Haleakal Crater in Maui. He was going to shoot in color, but treat the image, making it look black and white, giving the video a stark, minimalist look. She was reminded, looking at the neatly precise and original drawings he’d made of each frame, just how creative he was when he was given the opportunity. “These look very good, very exciting. Different. Dark and just a little exotic. Just what the band needs at the moment—it’ll take them in a new direction.”

  “Carson was complimentary. Apparently everyone else was suggesting something light and bright and fluffy with tween appeal. He wants to take the band up into an older age range.” Robert came to stand beside her and started shuffling the pages into order. “You’d think I’d been doing this all my life,” he said. “Carson wanted a few changes.”

  “Of course he did. It’s a power thing with him, like trying to change the time of the appointment this morning. I’ve seen him do that so often. He thinks he’s managing U2, not just another cookie-cutter boy band. And if you hadn’t called him on it, then he would have given you the runaround for the next couple of weeks. Even if you had gotten the gig, he would have interfered every step of the way.” She smiled. “Hawaii was a good location choice. Everyone loves Hawaii.”

  Her voice trailed away. She was abruptly, erotically conscious that Robert was standing close—much too close—to her. She could feel the heat radiating from his body, and in that instant she wanted him, with a hungry, animal passion. She had to have him, in her arms, in her body. Watching his eyes, she saw the lust bloom in them and knew that he wanted her too. She wished that she were on the crater in Hawaii with him, making love as the sun
came up over the beautiful landscape.

  She smiled and raised her eyebrows a fraction, then glanced toward the open door to where the secretary was pretending to be busy with a catalogue, but was obviously listening in. Robert nodded imperceptibly and stepped into the outer office.

  Stephanie fanned out the images again, vaguely aware that he was sending the Russian girl home. There was a great power and energy to the images, and if Robert managed to capture it on screen, it would make a stunning video. Undoubtedly, the best pop video the band had ever had. And it was going to be released a week before they broke up. With any luck someone would see it and commission Robert to do another one for another band. She was relieved too; Charles Flintoff could not help but be impressed.

  “Good night, Miss Burroughs.” The Russian girl’s voice disturbed her thoughts.

  “Good night,” Stephanie called, without looking up. She didn’t particularly like the Russian girl, didn’t like the way she looked knowingly at her every time she came in. And there was also the doubt, just the tiniest insidious doubt that what had happened between her and Robert could just as easily happen between the Russian and Robert. It wasn’t the first time the thought had struck her. Since Robert had betrayed his wife, Stephanie had lived with the awareness that he could just as easily betray her too, which really begged the question: Did she trust him?

  And it bothered her—bothered her tremendously—that she could not answer yes to that question.

  “I think she suspects . . . ,” Robert began, walking back into the office.