Everything to Gain and a Secret Affair

  I’ve lied by omission, she thought, remembering the line Bill had used in Venice some ten days ago now. By not being open with Peter, I’ve only compounded our basic problem. I’m as much at fault as he is. And there was a problem. More than one, in fact.

  Face the truth, Vanessa suddenly admonished herself. Be a big girl, accept things the way they are now. They’re not the same as they once were; they haven’t been for a long time.

  A distracted look settled on her face as she focused on her marriage, the drawings spread out in front of her now forgotten. She and Peter no longer communicated very well, hardly at all, really. The shared confidences of their courtship and the early days of their marriage had long since been abandoned. Their sex life was practically nonexistent. And whenever they did make love these days it was usually because they had quarreled. Peter had always believed that this was the best way of making up. Certainly the easiest for him, she now thought.

  But quite aside from this, they spent a great deal of their time apart. They were always in different places, or so it seemed to her.

  And their interests were very different. They had grown apart . . . as they had grown in different ways.

  It’s no marriage at all, Vanessa thought. It’s just a sham, truly it is. We stay together out of . . . what? Suddenly she did not know why they stayed together. Unless it was out of habit. Or loyalty. Or lack of a better place to go. Or someone else to go to. Or laziness. Which one of these reasons it was, she had no idea. Perhaps it was all of them in combination.

  Placing the pencil on top of her drawing board, Vanessa leaned back in the tall chair where she sat and stared out of the huge window in front of her. Her mind was racing.

  Her design studio was in a building downtown in Soho, on the corner of Mercer and Grand. It was a fifth-floor loft looking south, and she had fallen in love with it at first sight because of its spaciousness and extraordinary natural light.

  The view from her window was familiar to her, but it never failed to please her. She had not grown tired of looking out at her own special corner of Manhattan. The splendid nineteenth-century buildings were lined up before her eyes, while behind them the pristine twin towers of the World Trade Center, all black glass and steel, pierced the afternoon sky.

  Two centuries juxtaposed, she thought, as she did every so often. The past. The present. The future.

  The future. Those words danced in her head.

  What was her future?

  Was it to continue to live this lie with Peter? This lie that was their marriage . . . no, the remnants of their marriage.

  Or was she going to leave him?

  Is that what the future held? A life without Peter Smart, the only man she had ever known, except for Bill Fitzgerald? Well, that wasn’t quite the truth either, if she were scrupulously honest. There had been one other man in her life. Steven Ellis. Her college beau. Her first lover, her only lover until she had met Peter. And then married him.

  And now Bill Fitzgerald was her lover. Her clandestine lover. Was it because of Bill that she was suddenly looking truth in the face? Had her relationship with him forced her to be honest for the first time in several years? More than likely. Yes, it’s because of Bill and the way you feel about him, a small voice in her head whispered.

  A deep sigh escaped her. She did not know what to do. Should she make Peter see their marriage for what it was, a sham? If she did, what would happen? And what did she want to happen? Peter might say they should start all over again, try to make a go of it. And where would she be then? Was that what she wanted? A future with Peter Smart?

  What she had said about him to Bill was true. Peter was a good man, a decent human being. And he did love her in his own way. Furthermore, he looked after her well, and he had been extremely supportive about her work, had encouraged her career. Peter was a caring man in a variety of ways, and reliable, dependable, loyal.

  And she was absolutely convinced he would be hurt and unhappy if she left him. He depended on her in so many ways.

  Why would she leave Peter anyway?

  Because of Bill?

  Yes.

  But Bill hasn’t asked you to leave Peter. He hasn’t made any kind of commitment to you, that insidious voice whispered. In fact, he rapidly agreed to an affair, a secret affair. He accepted the idea of being your clandestine lover. Actually, he suggested it, the voice added.

  But Bill or no Bill, her life with Peter had grown . . . empty? Yes. Stale? Yes. Lonely? In many ways, yes. They didn’t share anything anymore, at least that was the way she saw it, the way she felt. There was so much lacking in their relationship. For her, anyway. Maybe Peter felt differently. Maybe he expected less of marriage than she did.

  And what did she want in a marriage?

  Emotion. Love. Warmth. Companionship. True feelings shared. Sexual love. Understanding. Was that too much to ask of a man? Surely not. Certainly it was not too much for her to give.

  Peter had not offered her many of these things lately, quite the contrary. And wasn’t that one of the reasons she had ended up in bed with Bill in Venice? Yes, the little voice answered. But it had also happened because she was overwhelmingly attracted to Bill. Falling in love with him? Yes, it was happening. Hadn’t she known that days ago in Venice?

  Falling in love, Vanessa thought. More like falling into madness.

  It was dusk when Vanessa left her studio and got into the waiting radio cab that she had ordered earlier. As the driver headed uptown, her thoughts again turned to the problems in her life. Wrestling with them was not proving to be very fruitful; certainly she wasn’t coming up with any answers for herself. The only thing she knew for sure was that her Venetian interlude with Bill, the feelings they had shared, had only served to point up the unsatisfactory relationship she had with Peter.

  Comparisons, she thought, I hate comparisons. They’re odious. But, of course, how could she not compare the emotional closeness she and Bill had enjoyed with the aridness of her life with Peter?

  It suddenly struck her that Peter was denying her his love, himself, just as he had denied her a child. Instantly, she crushed that thought, not wanting to confront it, or deal with it now.

  On the spur of the moment, she leaned forward and said to the driver, “I need to make a stop on the way uptown. I’d like to go to Lord & Taylor, please.”

  “Okay, miss,” the driver said, and turned left off Madison when they reached East Thirty-ninth Street. He headed west to Fifth Avenue, where the famous old store was located.

  The driver parked the cab on the side street, but Vanessa walked around to Fifth Avenue and stood looking at the Christmas windows. They were always the best, she knew that from her childhood. The windows were full of wondrous mechanical toys, breathtaking scenes from famous fairy tales and the classics, magical to every child.

  Pressing her nose against the window, as she had done when she was a child, she smiled inwardly, watching an exquisitely made toy ballerina, dressed in a pink tutu, pirouetting to the strains of “The Sugar Plum Fairy.” The music was being piped out into the street, and it brought back such a rush of forgotten memories that Vanessa’s throat tightened unexpectedly.

  Her mother and father had always taken her to see The Nutcracker if they were in New York over Christmas, just as they had brought her here to see the store’s windows before going inside to meet Santa Claus and confide her Christmas wish.

  Sometimes they had not been in Manhattan at Christmas, but in California or Paris or London, depending on her mother’s current movie or play. Or what her father, Terence Stewart, was directing at the time. She was an only child, and they had always taken her with them on location or wherever they went. She had never suffered because of their theatrical careers; she had had a lovely, and very loving, childhood and had remained extremely close to her parents.

  Eventually Vanessa turned away from the window, suddenly overcome by feelings of immense sadness and loneliness. An aching emptiness filled her, as it so often d
id. It was a feeling that threatened at times to overcome her. Somehow, she always managed to throw it off. She knew what it was—the longing for a child. But Peter did not want the responsibility of a child, and so she had buried the longing deep inside herself, sublimated the desire for a baby in her work. But, occasionally that terrible yearning gripped her, as it was doing now. She tried to still it, wishing it away.

  Pushing through the swinging doors, Vanessa went into the store, her mind focusing on Helena, Bill’s little girl. She was looking for something truly special. Helena was six, and there were so many things to buy for a child that age. Taking the escalator, she rode up to the children’s department, spent ten minutes looking around and left empty-handed. Nothing had caught her eye.

  As she hurried across the main floor, Vanessa stopped to buy tights and winter boot socks, then picked up eye makeup she needed before returning to the cab.

  When she arrived at their apartment on East Fifty-seventh Street, Vanessa was surprised to find her husband at home. He usually never got in from his law office before seven in the evening at the earliest.

  She shrugged out of her topcoat in the foyer and was hanging it up in the closet when he came out of their bedroom.

  He was holding a couple of silk ties in his hand, and his face lit up at the sight of her. Smiling hugely, Peter said, “Hi, sweetie.”

  “You’re home early,” she answered, walking forward.

  He nodded, kissed her on the cheek as she drew to a standstill. “I wanted to get my packing done before dinner.”

  “Packing?” A frown marred the smoothness of her wide brow. “Where are you going?”

  “To London. Tomorrow morning. I have to see Alex Lawson. As you know, he’s filming there at the moment. Anyway, his contract for his next two movies is finally ready, and I’ve got to go over it with him, walk him through it. It’s a bit more complicated than usual.”

  “Oh, I see.”

  “Don’t look so glum, Vanessa. I’ll be back in ten days, certainly in time for Christmas.”

  “Does it take ten days to walk an actor through a contract? Or is he particularly dumb?”

  “Vanessa! How can you talk like that about Hollywood’s biggest heartthrob,” he said and laughed a deep-throated laugh, amused by her comment. “You, of all people! Coming from a show business family as you do.”

  When she made no response and moved away, Peter took hold of her arm and gently turned her to face him. “I thought we’d go somewhere special for Christmas. Mexico . . . Bali . . . Thailand. Anywhere you want.”

  “But my mother will be in New York for Christmas . . .” Her voice trailed off. Suddenly she felt depressed.

  “All right, then we’ll stay here; it was just an idea. But no problem, no problem at all, sweetie.” He went back into the bedroom.

  Vanessa followed him, placed her Lord & Taylor shopping bag on the bed, and sat down next to it.

  Peter spent a moment or two sorting ties, then he turned around and gave her a puzzled look when he saw the expression on her face. “What’s the matter?” he asked, walking over to the bed, looming up in front of her.

  She met his steady gaze with one equally as steady, but the expression on her face was thoughtful. Her husband was thirty-eight years old. Slim, attractive, a man in his prime. He had a genial personality, natural charm, and was popular both with his friends and clients. A brilliant lawyer, he had become highly successful in the past few years, and the success sat well on him. Peter Smart had everything going for him. And yet his personal life was abysmal. She ought to know; she shared it with him. It was empty, arid, pointless. As was hers. Didn’t he notice this? Or didn’t he care? Then it suddenly hit her like a ton of bricks: Was there another woman in his life? Is that why he had nothing to give her anymore?

  “You’re looking odd,” Peter remarked in a quiet voice.

  She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry you’re going away; I’d hoped we could spend a quiet weekend together. I want to talk to you, Peter.”

  He frowned. “What about?”

  “Us.”

  “You sound serious.”

  “I feel serious. Look, you and I . . . things are just not right between us these days.”

  He gaped at her. “I don’t know what you mean, Vanessa.”

  “What’s our life about?” She gave him a penetrating stare. “We seem to be . . . drifting apart.”

  “Don’t be so silly!” he exclaimed with one of his light, genial laughs. “Our life is very much on track. You’re a doer and an achiever, and you have a career you love. You’re doing extremely well, and you’ve accomplished so much with the design studio. I’m going great guns at the law firm. Things couldn’t be better on that score. So why do you ask what our life is all about? I don’t understand what you mean.”

  All of a sudden she knew that he didn’t, that he was genuinely puzzled. She exclaimed, “But we’re never together. We’re always in different places, and when we are in the same city, you constantly work late. And when we’re at home you haven’t got a lot to say to me anymore, Peter; and there’s another thing, we don’t seem to be as close physically as we were.” It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him if he was having an affair, and then she changed her mind. He might well ask her the same question, and then what would she say?

  Peter was shaking his head, looking miserable, the laughter of earlier wiped out of his eyes. He threw the ties onto a chair and sat down on the bed next to her, took hold of her hand. “But, Vanessa, I love you, you know that. Nothing’s changed. Well, I guess it has. I’m successful, very successful, and in a way I never dreamed I could be. This is the big one for me, the big chance, and I don’t want to screw it up. I can’t, because what I do now, how I handle everything now, is for our future. Yours and mine. Our old age, you might say.”

  “Old age!” she exploded. “But I don’t care about that! I want to live now, while I’m still young.”

  “We are living, and living very well. And doing well. That’s what counts, sweetie.” He gazed into her eyes, and said more softly, “I guess I’ve been neglecting you lately. I’m sorry.” He put his arms around her, tried to kiss her, but Vanessa drew away from him.

  “You always think you can solve our problems, our disagreements, by making love to me,” she said.

  “But you know we always do solve what ails us when we’re in bed together. We work it out that way.”

  “Just for once it would be nice to make love with you because we want to make love, not to get us over one of our quarrels.”

  “Then let’s do it right now.”

  “I don’t want to, Peter. I’m not in the mood. Sorry, but this little girl doesn’t want to play tonight.”

  He recoiled slightly, startled by her sarcastic tone, and said slowly, “Is this about the baby? Is this what all this talk of drifting apart is about? Is that it, Vanessa?”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “I know I’ve been tough on you about having a baby—” he began and stopped abruptly.

  “Yes, you have. You made it perfectly clear that you didn’t want children.”

  “I don’t. Well, what I mean is, I don’t right now. But listen, sweetie, maybe later on, a few years down the line; maybe we can have a child then.”

  She shook her head and before she could stop herself she said, “Perhaps we ought to separate, Peter. Get a divorce.”

  His expression changed immediately and he sat up straighter on the bed. “Absolutely not! I don’t want a divorce and neither do you. This is silly talk. You’re just tired after all the work you did in Venice, and the schedule you’ve set for yourself with the new collection.”

  Vanessa was regarding him intently, and she realized that he was afraid of losing her. She could see the fear in his eyes.

  When she remained totally silent, Peter went on swiftly, “I promise you things are going to be different, Vanessa. To be honest, I thought you were happy, excited about your design career. I hadn’t reali
zed . . . realized that things weren’t right between us. You do believe me, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” she murmured wearily. “I believe you, Peter.” She got up off the bed, and walked toward the bedroom door. Dismay lodged in her chest. “There’s not much for dinner. Shall I make pasta and a salad?”

  “Certainly not. I’m going to take you out, sweetie. Shall we go next door to Mr. Chow’s?”

  Vanessa shook her head. “I don’t feel like Chinese food.”

  “Then we’ll go to Neary’s pub. Jimmy always gives us such a great welcome, and I know you love it there.”

  CHAPTER

  NINE

  Southampton, Long Island, December 1995

  Vanessa surveyed the living room of the cottage through newly objective and critical eyes. There were no two ways about it, the room looked shabby and decidedly neglected.

  She did not care about the shabbiness; the faded wallpaper, the well-washed chintz and worn antique rug were all part of its intrinsic charm. It was the feeling of neglect that bothered her. She knew that the entire cottage was scrupulously clean, since it was maintained by a local woman. But the living room, in particular, had a lackluster air to it.

  Bill would be arriving in a few hours to spend the day and part of the next with her, and she wanted the cottage to look nice. Since he spent so much of his time roughing it in battle zones and second-rate hotels, she felt the need to make it comfortable, warm, and welcoming for him.

  When her parents had divorced several years ago, they had not known what to do with Bedelia Cottage. Neither of them had wanted it and yet they had been reluctant to sell it, oddly enough because of sentimental reasons. They both had a soft spot for it.

  And so they had ended up giving it to their daughter. Vanessa had been thrilled.

  It was located at the far end of Southampton and stood on three acres of land that ran all the way up to the sand dunes and the Atlantic Ocean.

  The cottage was not in the chic part of town, nor was it very special, just a simple, stone-and-clapboard house, about forty years old. It had four bedrooms, a large kitchen, a living room, and a library. There was a long, covered veranda at the back of the cottage which fronted onto the sea.