* * *
And now, sitting in the back of the Town Car, going over in her mind that scene with Victor Matrick, Nico shuddered.
She looked out the window again. The car was on Seventy-ninth Street, nearly at Kirby’s building. It wasn’t too late to change her mind, to tell the driver to pass Kirby’s building and take the FDR Drive and go home, which was what she should do, but she wasn’t quite ready to face Seymour. She needed something special right now, to be held and caressed, perhaps; to be allowed to feel like a little girl, and she couldn’t do that with Seymour. She couldn’t be vulnerable. But Kirby had seen her vulnerable and naked—both emotionally and physically—and even a little disgraced, like when he tied her up and made her beg him to do things to her . . .
What would it be like to be married to Kirby instead of Seymour? she wondered, as the car pulled into the driveway of Kirby’s building. And slipping quickly past the doorman, she urgently punched the elevator button, thinking—Kirby! What if Kirby was the answer—and she was in love with him after all?
She walked quickly down the hallway, suddenly consumed with an irrational fear that he wouldn’t be home, and she wouldn’t be able to see him after all. She rang the bell, and when he didn’t answer the door right away, her heart began pounding in her chest. She had to see him, she thought, pressing the bell again. She could hear it ringing inside his apartment, and she held her breath, hoping to hear footsteps. Instead, she heard nothing, and beginning to panic, she rapped on the door with the side of her fist.
He wasn’t home, she thought in despair, this one time when she really needed him. She looked at her watch; it was five-fifteen and he’d said he’d be home by five o’clock. She would wait. She would give him five minutes, and standing nervously in front of his door, she kept checking her watch, and after four minutes had passed decided she would wait another five. How could he do this to her? she wondered, and then began thinking terrible thoughts. Maybe he had done it on purpose. To punish her, to show her that he wasn’t tied to her schedule. Or maybe he didn’t like her anymore and didn’t want to see her again, and this was his way of getting rid of her . . .
From the end of the corridor she heard the ding of the elevator and the sound of the doors sliding open. This had to be him, she thought, and sure enough, in another second Kirby came strolling around the corner, wearing a knit skullcap and a brown leather jacket, carrying his cell phone in one hand and a bag of groceries in the other. “Hey,” he called out, as if she were a casual acquaintance he’d run into on the street. It wasn’t exactly the greeting she was hoping for, and for a second, she was crushed. But she told herself it didn’t matter; the important fact was that he was there.
“I was just about to leave,” she said.
He shifted the groceries from one hand to the other, and reached into his pocket for his keys, giving her a quick peck on the lips as he unlocked the door. “I had to rehearse this scene for my acting class and I was totally into it,” he said, stepping past her and into the apartment. “You know how when you’re totally into something and you don’t even notice that time is going by? And then I remembered that I had to get milk. Every day, I keep telling myself to get milk, and I don’t.” She followed him into the kitchen, watching him as he removed a container of milk from the plastic bag and placed it on the top shelf of his nearly-empty refrigerator. Milk! she thought. She wished he’d been thinking about her instead.
“How are you?” he asked, turning around. “I haven’t seen you for, what? Like a week?”
“I couldn’t help it,” she said, relieved to discover that his slight aloofness was only due to the fact that he’d been missing her. “I’ve had a hell of a day . . .”
“Me too,” he said emphatically, passing by her and going into the living room. “I’m kind of nervous and excited. I’ve got to do this scene tonight in my acting class and I want it to be really good.”
“I’m sure it will be,” she said.
“It’s like real emotional, you know?” he said, sitting down on the couch and raking his hands through his hair. He looked up at her. “What are you doing?” he asked. “Come over here.”
“Oh, Kirby,” she murmured. She suddenly felt like a puddle of need. I never feel this way, she thought, and wondered if she was going to cry.
“Hey, what’s up?” Kirby asked. She sat down next to him, and he put his arms around her shoulders, and she relaxed against him, relishing how wonderful it felt to just be held. Kirby wasn’t the most intelligent person in the world, but he always managed to figure out what she needed emotionally, and she turned her face up to him, wanting to explain about her day. But he must have misread her signals because he immediately started kissing her.
Her mouth stiffened in protest. She went along with him for a few seconds but then pulled back. “Kirby, I’ve had a really weird day,” she said urgently, wanting him to understand. “I had to fire someone . . .”
“I thought you did that all the time,” Kirby said jokingly.
She smiled patiently, suddenly annoyed that he was trying to make a joke when she was desperate to be serious. “The person happened to be my boss. Or rather, my old boss. And now I’ve taken his job.”
“So you should be happy,” Kirby said, tugging on her arm to pull her toward him. He nuzzled her neck just below the ear, and whispered, “You’ve got a new job. I’m always happy when I get a new job. It means I’m gonna get more money.”
“It isn’t just that,” she said, turning her head away.
“You’re not going to get more money? That doesn’t sound very smart to me.” He sat back triumphantly, as if he’d just revealed some great insight. She looked at his handsome, placid face. It was, she thought, like the face of a golden retriever. Beautiful, but dumb.
Her stomach dropped. She couldn’t really feel that way about Kirby. It wasn’t his fault he didn’t quite understand. He just wasn’t very educated—he’d only had two years of community college while he was trying to break into modeling. “Come on, darling,” she said, standing up and taking his hand. “Let’s go into the bedroom.” Once they started having sex, everything would be fine and she’d have those good feelings about him again.
“I was wondering if you even wanted to have sex,” Kirby said, allowing her to lead him. “You’re being kind of strange today.”
“It’s only because of my day,” she said, quickly undressing and then carefully placing her clothes on the top of his bureau, tucking her underpants beneath her skirt. She lay down on the bed, and he lay down naked on top of her. Now that did feel good, she thought, wrapping her arms tightly around his back so that she could feel the weight of him. There was nothing like a young man with a muscular body. His skin was so soft—softer, she imagined, than her own . . .
“Should I get the ties?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. Sometimes he tied her wrists to either side of the bed (there was no headboard, so he tied her to the metal strut on the back), and being constrained always heightened her arousal. But she didn’t want that today. She wanted him to set her free from her afternoon. She wanted him to make her feel like someone else, the way he always had before. Some wanton woman in a porn movie, maybe. A woman who did it with a man while other men watched . . .
“Fuck me,” she said.
He slid his hand between her legs. “Whatever you want, pretty lady,” he said.
Oh no, she thought wildly. Why did he have to say that? Especially when her desire was so fragile at the moment. Pretty lady. She mustn’t think about it. She had to ignore it and relax. But she couldn’t stop thinking about it. Did she even want to have sex at all?
“You’re not that wet,” he said.
“I’m sorry,” she said, smiling gingerly, hoping to cover up her feelings. “I guess I’m tense . . .”
“I’ll untense you,” he said. He slid down to the bottom of the bed, pushing her legs apart, and then placing his hand on the top of her vagina, pulled the lips up
and open. He began licking her, and she put her hand on top of his head, willing herself to feel something. But this wasn’t really working either—in fact, it just felt kind of annoying.
What was wrong with her?
“Kirby,” she said softly. He looked up. “Let’s just have sex, okay?” she said.
“Sure,” he said. “Anything you want, babe. You know that. You know I’ll do anything . . .”
She put her finger over his lips to silence him. If he started talking too much again, she really wasn’t going to be able to continue. She leaned her head back, running her hands over his muscled shoulders, and felt a small, surprising bump. A pimple? Kirby Atwood had a pimple . . . on his shoulder?
Stop it, she commanded herself. She wasn’t going to do that thing that women did, focusing on a man’s little flaws until he lost all his sexual appeal. She was damn lucky, she reminded herself sternly. She was forty-three years old; she was fortunate that any man wanted to sleep with her at all, especially a man like Kirby. She was going to enjoy this. She had to enjoy it. She had to escape . . . And concentrating on his hard penis, and the way it felt inside her, and the pure physical joy of being with a hot young man, she pushed up her hips, placing her hands on his buttocks and pulling him deeper into her.
For a few moments, she almost managed to forget everything, allowing herself to scream with pleasure. Afterward, she clung on to him, running her hands over his back and his buttocks, relishing the feeling of his smooth skin and pressing him into her even after he began to experience detumescence.
“Wow,” he said, looking down at her. “That was pretty intense.”
She nodded, not wanting to let him go. Thank God her Kirby fix still worked, she thought. But as she was getting dressed, the reality of the situation hit her, and she felt a little sad. There was no getting around the fact that it wasn’t quite as good as it used to be, and that someday, probably soon, it wouldn’t work at all.
Chapter 13
THE PHONE IN THE SUITE EMITTED TWO SHORT RINGS, indicating an inside visitor. Wendy grabbed the phone and put her hand over her other ear. Magda was watching TV with the volume turned up to drown out the sound of the vacuum cleaner, which a maid was running in a desultory fashion over the carpet while eyeing the mess with disapproval. “Hello?” Wendy shouted into the phone.
“Tessa Hope is here. Should I send her up?” the woman at the front desk inquired.
“Yes, please,” Wendy said. She glanced at her watch. It was two-thirty—Shane was fifteen minutes late. A fact of which she would definitely apprise Ms. Hope as yet more evidence of Shane’s lack of parenting skills. She went out into the tiny foyer and through a door that led to the children’s rooms, which consisted of two small rooms and a bathroom, mirroring the bedroom and living room on the other side. In the first room were twin beds; on the floor between them Tyler and little Chloe were coloring. Tyler grabbed Chloe’s crayon. “That’s not how you do it, stupid,” he said.
“Tyler. That isn’t nice,” Wendy said patiently, taking the crayon from Tyler’s hand and giving it back to little Chloe.
“She’s going outside the lines,” Tyler objected.
“She’s only two,” Wendy said. “She’s allowed to go outside the lines.”
“I’m going to go outside the lines too,” he insisted.
“You can, if you want to,” Wendy said, looking down on him. The poor baby. She could understand his irritation, being cooped up in this small space. But it was only temporarily. She bent down. “We’re going to have a big new apartment soon,” she said, touching his shoulders so he looked at her face. “Will you like that?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “We already have an apartment.”
“Are we going to see Gwyneth, Mommy?” Chloe asked.
“You’ll see her on Monday morning, when you come back here. You’re going with Daddy now, and then you’ll come back here on Sunday night.”
“Why do we have to come back here?” Tyler asked, glaring down at his crayons. “Why can’t we stay at our house?”
“Don’t you want to stay with Mommy?”
“Why can’t you come to our house?” Tyler asked.
Wendy smiled. “Because Mommy and Daddy don’t live together anymore,” she said, for about the hundredth time. “Mommy is going to find another apartment and then we’ll all live there.”
“Will Daddy come too?” Chloe asked.
“No, Daddy is going to stay in his apartment.”
“You mean our apartment, Mommy,” Tyler said. “That’s where we live. You live in this hotel.”
“You live here too,” Wendy said patiently.
“I want to go home,” Chloe said, beginning to cry.
The buzzer rang. Wendy picked up Chloe and sat her on the bed. “Magda,” she shouted. “Can you get that?”
“Why?” Magda shouted back.
“Because it’s the door . . .” She sighed and carried Chloe through the small foyer as Magda suddenly decided to be helpful and opened the door. “Oh,” she said, and turned away.
“It is Daddy?” Tyler asked, racing toward them.
Tessa Hope, the lawyer, stood uncertainly on the threshold, surveying the scene with barely disguised horror. Tessa was thirty-five, single, and attractive in a standard, Upper East Side kind of way. She was wearing a Roberto Cavalli print blouse, jeans, and high-heeled Mary Jane shoes in black patent leather. She was also considered to be the toughest divorce lawyer in the firm of Berchell & Dingley, and was number forty-three on the list of the city’s fifty most powerful women.
“I’m sorry,” Wendy said, “come in. Shane was supposed to pick up the kids at two-fifteen but he’s late. Have a seat . . .”
There wasn’t, of course, anyplace to sit, all available surfaces being covered with papers, books, screenplays, DVDs, a sponge, a hairbrush, a remote-control airplane, and various items of clothing.
“It’s okay. I can go downstairs and wait if you’d like,” Tessa said cautiously.
“No, come in,” Wendy said. “The maids are just leaving . . .” She cleared a small space on the couch, and Tessa sat down carefully. “It’s not normally like this. It’s usually a little more controlled,” Wendy added apologetically.
“It’s fine,” Tessa said, smiling stiffly. “Your children are adorable.”
“Thank you,” Wendy said proudly. She paused, suddenly noticing Magda’s hair. “Magda, sweetheart, didn’t you say you were going to wash your hair?”
“I did, Mother.”
“No you didn’t,” Wendy said.
“I don’t like that shampoo,” Magda replied.
“Who are you?” Tyler asked Tessa.
“This is Mommy’s lawyer,” Wendy explained.
“I don’t like lawyers,” Tyler said. Wendy put her hand on his head. “He’s just a little shy. Aren’t you, buddy?”
“He doesn’t seem shy at all to me,” Tessa said gamely, crossing one leg over the other.
“Don’t like lawyers,” Tyler said into Wendy’s leg.
“Tessa is very nice,” Wendy said. “She’s going to make sure that you can stay with Mommy forever and ever.”
“We are going home now,” Chloe announced.
The buzzer rang. “Daddy!” Magda exclaimed, running to the door. Shane came in. He was, Wendy noted with satisfaction, looking a little peaked. “You’re late,” Wendy said.
“I had to go to the drugstore. I don’t feel good.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t take the kids.”
He gave her a look. “I don’t feel that bad. Just a headache. I’m fine.” He eyed Tessa warily.
“You remember my lawyer, Tessa Hope,” Wendy said, indicating Tessa with a gesture.
“Yup,” Shane said noncommittally.
“How are you, Shane?” Tessa asked, standing up.
“Great,” Shane said, picking up Chloe. “You’re working on a Saturday?”
“I work every day.”
“You and Wendy shoul
d make a great team,” Shane muttered. He turned to Magda and Tyler. “Are you ready, guys?”
“So you’ll be back tomorrow. At five,” Wendy said.
“Yes, Wendy,” Shane said, annoyed by the question. “When are you going to Cannes?” he asked, giving her back the same attitude.
“On Monday night,” Wendy said. He knew when she was leaving, and she knew what was coming next.
“I don’t know why you can’t just let them stay with me until you get back,” he said. “This shuttling back and forth is stupid.”
“You’re lucky to have them at all, Shane,” she said.
“Yeah, we’ll see about that,” Shane said, looking past Wendy at Tessa. Then he gathered the kids and went out.
Wendy paused and stuck her head out the door. “Only organic food, okay?” she shouted after him. “And firm bedtimes.”
Shane nodded, not bothering to turn around. She watched her little troupe as they walked down the muted hallway, until they stopped in front of the elevator.
“Bye, Mommy,” Tyler said cheerfully, turning back to wave.
“Bye-bye,” she said warmly. “See you tomorrow.” She watched until they got in the elevator, feeling a mixture of anger and frustration, but mostly anxiety. Her kids, it appeared, didn’t seem to need her at all. They didn’t even seem to be that interested in being with her.
But that was only because she was still living in the hotel, she thought. When she got a new apartment, it would all change and their lives could go back to normal. As soon as she’d returned from Palm Beach, she’d hired Tessa, and Tessa had arranged for the children to split their time between her and Shane. That too was temporary. Wendy hoped to be able to get Shane out of the picture completely.
She closed the door and turned back to Tessa. “Who could ever have imagined that two people could hate each other so much?” she asked, referring to Shane. It was a rhetorical question, and she didn’t really expect an answer.
Tessa gave her one anyway. “He hates you all right,” she said, gathering up her things. “In any case, he’s not going to give up easily.”