CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE WINNIE

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

WINNIE

Two days after my self-diagnosis, Chrissy shows up at my door. She is armed with an unholy number of brochures and articles. She flings them onto my coffee table in triumph, her version of hello.

“What’s all that?” I crane my neck from the kitchen.

“All kinds of useful information.” Chrissy perks up, throwing me her sunniest smile while sucking on her electronic cigarette. “Mainly about how people do get pregnant with endometriosis. I mean, it’s not impossible. There are ways, treatments, cures. A whole lotta options, actually.”

She arranges all the brochures in a line on my table. I’m starting to regret telling her about my suspicion. I know she means well, but I don’t like to poke at the subject. I put an old-school cube of sugar into each of our coffees and take the hot drinks to her. She takes a sip, closes her eyes, and moans.

“How do you make it taste so good?”

“Real sugar, chicory, and just a drop of sorghum. That’s how Memaw used to make it.”

I take a seat on the couch, and she is quick to follow and launches into talking shop.

“Spoke to Lucas yesterday. He said you guys are all sold out for the next three months. He thinks they might continue for a second year. How do you feel about that? I know we discussed Hollywood—”

“I’m not going to Hollywood.” I place my cup on the table. I hate to disappoint her, but giving her false hope would be worse. Chris’s mouth curls into a pout, but she doesn’t say anything.

I place my hand on her knee. “Thank you for the suggestion. I really appreciate it. But I don’t think I’m ready. In fact, I really wanna take it one day at a time after we finish The Seagull. I don’t think I fully allowed myself to recover after what happened.”

“You mean, you’re not sure if you’re going to sign for a second year with Calypso Hall either?” Chrissy frowns.

Nodding, I lick my lips. “I’m not saying yes or no right now. All I’m saying is that I’m done giving myself a deadline to ‘get better.’ I’ll do whatever is right for me mentally. Right now, I don’t know what that is. But I know going to Hollywood is not something I want to pursue. I don’t care about fame and glamour. I care about art.”

“Oh, Winnie.” Chrissy sighs, puts her coffee on a coaster, and scoots toward me. She wraps an arm around my shoulder. “How on earth did I manage to find the one actress in New York City who doesn’t care about all the gravy? You were always about the main dish, hon.”

I chuckle. “Maybe you chose wrong.”

“Oh, I chose the best.” She stands up, wiping at her eyes. She looks around herself, as if suddenly realizing where she is. “The place looks better. I don’t know how to explain it, but it does.”

Other than stuffing Paul’s running shoes in the shoe rack, I haven’t made any changes. But I think I know what she means. Even the furniture doesn’t look like it’s holding its breath waiting for my husband to come back.

“Thank you,” I say.

“Just promise me one thing,” Chrissy says. “You’ll take a look at the brochures I brought over. I’m not blowing smoke up your cute little butt, Win. I know you’re in a state of despair, but there’s so much more in life ahead of you. And some of it? It’s really darn good, as you say.”

By the time Chrissy goes home, I feel a lot better. This, of course, doesn’t last very long. Fresh dread floods me when I glance at the overhead clock in my kitchen while making a half-hearted attempt to tidy up the place. Arsène should be here any minute now. Together, we’re going to raid Paul’s office. Paul’s shrine, which has been locked for almost a year, ever since he died.

Arsène is late. I use the time to go into my bedroom and change into a casual sage housedress. Nothing fancy, but it’s one dress I know I look good in. The doorbell chimes. When I hurry to zip my garment, my skin catches in the zipper. “Ouch. Darn it.”

I groan as I make my way to the door. When I fling it open, he is standing on the other side, and it’s like we’ve never said goodbye. There is something so familiar about him. So dangerously comforting.

“You’re late.” I lean against the doorjamb. How else can I greet this man, who spent the entire night two days ago holding me, brushing my hair back, whispering in my ear that everything was going to be okay? Then, the day after, when I woke up and his friend was there, Arsène looked distracted and impatient, just barely holding himself back from kicking me out of his apartment.

“Time is a subjective experience, Bumpkin.” He sails past me like he owns the place, walking into my apartment, giving himself a tour. He is taking it all in as I stand by the door.

“So this was Paul’s domain.”

I lean over the kitchen island, feigning disinterest. “Our domain. We designed the place together.”

Tonight smells, and tastes, and feels like goodbye. The finality is thick in the air, suffocating me. After this, Arsène and I will go our separate ways. No more secrets to uncover, no more wounds to poke. He is going to walk out of my life, and probably sell Calypso Hall in quick succession.

“That’s sweet,” Arsène drawls, ripping his eyes from a painting on the living room wall to glance at me. “You said you have infertility issues. Did you ever freeze your eggs? Better yet, embryos? You could still have a nice little bundle of joy from him.”

I blink, digesting the offhanded way in which he broached this personal subject. I don’t know if I should be outraged or amused.

“How is that your business?” I ask.

“It’s not.” He approaches the credenza and sifts through items like it’s a crime scene. “But I’m a problem solver, and when presented with one, I usually find a solution.”

“And then what? Get a surrogate? They cost a fortune.”

“In North America, yes. But there are agencies—”

“Well, we didn’t freeze anything,” I answer shortly.

And even if we had, I wouldn’t want to use it, knowing everything I know.

“Too bad.” Arsène puts a vase back in its place and pivots in my direction. “Now, where’s the key?”

I withdraw the small thing from my dress’s pocket and dangle it between us.

“Do you think we’re going to hate whatever we find out?” I swallow hard.

“I hope so,” he says. “Makes it easier to let go.”

And then we’re right there. In front of the door I’ve been staring at for months like it was the open mouth of a lion. Before I turn the key in its hole, I take a deep breath.

“God, you’re still in love with him. That’s pathetic.” The words crawl over my back from behind, like claws.

“Pot, meet kettle,” I murmur.

A chuckle escapes him. “Oh, Winnifred.”

What?I want to lash out. What am I missing? How are you and I different? But it doesn’t matter, and it wouldn’t bring me closer to inner peace.

I turn the key and push the door open.

Paul’s office is a vision of averageness. Files tidily stacked on his desk. A row of three screens adorned with Post-it Notes. There are filing cabinets, dusty pictures of us on his desk, and a stress ball. Nothing stands out. Nothing screams scandal. Adulterer. Cheater.

Arsène moves swiftly to one side of the room. “I’ll take the filing cabinets, you check his desk drawers.”

He pulls every single file out of them, then each filing cubby, turning them upside down and patting them from all angles to see nothing is hidden inside.

“Be careful. There’s no need to destroy his things,” I grind out.

“Bumpkin,” he answers, already sitting on the floor, sleeves rolled up to his elbows. “You have to stop being loyal to people who haven’t been loyal to you. It’s not a gracious trait. In fact, it’s a little off putting.”

“This is not about Paul.” I shove my hands into drawers, rummaging through notes, pens, a calculator, and some highlighters. “It’s about your hunger for distraction.”

“At least I’m hungry for something.” His words cut straight into me. “When you’re done with the drawers, power up that PC and let me know if it requires a login code, will you?”

For the next hour, we work silently. The PC doesn’t require a code. At the same time, we don’t find anything of interest on it. The filing cabinets turn out to be duds too. We go through letters, flip open the pictures, roll the carpets, seeking hideout spots where Paul could’ve kept something secretive, but it’s one disappointment after the other. There’s nothing in the office to suggest Paul had ever been anything more than a boring, married hedge fund manager.

At some point, I start feeling foolish and actually—bizarrely—become mad at Paul. I’ve built up this office to be the holy grail of all secrets, and nothing is coming out of it. I feel like I’m disappointing Arsène.

Why I care about disappointing this man is beyond me, but I do.

Another hour ticks by. We recheck everything we looked into before. Our nerves are shot, and the silence piles up on us, like deadweight. No stone is left unturned. But we’re no longer friendly, or hot for each other, or even mildly civilized. The tension is everywhere, tangling around our limbs like ivy.

“Stop.” Arsène’s voice slices through the silence. It is sudden and makes me gasp as I browse through another one of Paul’s clients’ files. “You and I both know we’re not going to find anything here. It’s a waste of time.”

“That can’t be.” I clutch the file closer to my chest. “Paul was so uptight about his office. So secretive—”

“That’s because he has sensitive information here about companies worth billions of dollars. Not because he kept Grace’s panties under the printer.” He stands up from the floor. A thin film of sweat coats his forehead. “We gave it our best shot.”

Is that all? He can’t leave! Not like this. Not so soon.

I follow him out of the room, dejected. “Well, you know. It’s late, and I haven’t even offered you anything to eat, not to mention drink .?.?.”

He rolls his sleeves down his muscular forearms. “Don’t worry about it. I have some leftovers in my fridge.”

Still, I trail behind him. Out of the hallway, to the living room, and toward the door. Panic flares in my chest. Arsène may be callous, cold, and full to the brim with venom, but he’s been a friend for the past few weeks. A brother-in-arms of sorts.

“Have a good life, Bumpkin.” He swings the door open abruptly.

“Stop!”

This shrill, foreign voice, I realize, came out of me.

He does stop, his back still to me. He doesn’t move, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I need to say something. Anything, Winnie. Finally, I find my voice.

“There are still some things I want you to see. Albums .?.?. stuff like that. Maybe I’ve missed something.”

Arsène turns around to face me. His expression is utterly unreadable.

“I know it’s hard. There’s a level of acceptance attached to us saying goodbye. We found out everything there was to find, and none of it was good. After I leave here tonight, we probably won’t see each other again. And your last connection to Paul will be gone. I get that.” But he doesn’t get it at all. My grief for Paul is independent from my relationship with him. To me, Arsène became his own entity. Not just means to an end. “But it’s better to Band-Aid it.”

“We can Band-Aid it tomorrow,” I hear myself say, though nothing in my brain authorized these words to leave my mouth. “Tonight, we can avenge what they did to us. Come full circle.”

“How?”

I lick my lips, staring down at my feet. “We can have sex.”

His stare alone gives me whiplash. I can tell he thinks it’s a terrible idea.

“Are you drunk?” He narrows his eyes.

I huff. “Don’t tell me you haven’t thought of it.”

“No,” he drawls. Then, in case he wasn’t clear: “I mean, yes, of course I’ve thought of it, but this is a terrible idea. Even for you, Bumpkin.”

Though as he says this, he is also closing the door behind himself to allow us some degree of privacy.

“Why not? You were the one who couldn’t stop kissing me—”

“The problem’s not attraction.” He steps forward and wipes a strand of hair from my face. “The problem is it’s going to complicate things, resurface issues, and very possibly make your bleeding little heart confuse rebound sex with feelings. Plus, there is still the little issue of my technically being your boss.”

“Not for long,” I point out. “You want to sell Calypso Hall. And don’t be so sure I will magically like you just because we sleep together.” I lie brazenly. “Plus, think about the revenge—”

“Retaliation is a primitive, self-defeating notion. I won’t do or not do things based on what Grace would have thought about them.”

Darn him and logic. I can tell he’s made up his mind. He pulls away.

I collect the shreds of my pride and take a step back. No need to beg.

“Well, then.” I straighten my spine. “I won’t keep you any longer. I hope you have a good life, Arsène.”

“Chances aren’t looking good, but thank you. Same goes to you.”

He turns around, opens the door, steps away, and shuts it softly.

I stare at the door for a few moments. Then I sink to my knees and let out a self-pitying whimper. I wish I could cry about it, but, as usual, the tears don’t come. The heartbreak, however, is real, and I don’t know why. If it’s because of the rejection, the disappointment, or the idea that another chapter regarding Paul is over in my book.

It takes me a few minutes to collect myself. When I finally do, I stand up and turn toward Paul’s office. Intuition tells me I’m missing something. The doorbell chimes. I freeze. I’m not in the mood for company. I take another step toward Paul’s room.

“Open up, Bumpkin.”

After approaching the front door, I plaster my forehead against it, closing my eyes. “Why?” I sigh. “Give me one good reason.”

“One?” His voice is so close I know he is leaning against the door too. “Because we fucking deserve this.”

I swing the door open, and he is standing there, panting, like he ran up the flights of stairs. His hair is a mess. His cheeks are flushed. He looks alive. I don’t remember the last time this man looked like more than a perfectly handsome preserved corpse.

“Let me make one thing clear.” He raises a finger. “After tonight, we’re not going to see each other again. You were born for greater things than being the arm candy to another man who could never love you.”

“Yes,” I answer, just as breathless. The only thing that stands between us is the narrow space of the threshold.

“After this, there will be no more dinners, no more movies, no more cuddles.”

“No more schemes, no more information to share,” I add, nodding.

“This.” He points between us. “Is consensual, correct?”

“Yes.” I angle my chin down, watching him. “I want to have sex with you.”

“I want to have sex with you too,” he admits on a choke, tipping his head back, closing his eyes. “Fuck, I’m hard pressed to think of anything I’ve ever wanted more.”

Anything? Even Grace?

We collide and explode into one unit, his hands in my hair, my lips fused to his. He is stumbling into my apartment, one hand tight around my waist, kissing me frantically, desperately, while he struggles to peel my dress off. My arms snake around his shoulders. My back hits the wall, but his hand cups my head, protecting me.

“Where’s the goddamn zipper?” He groans into our kiss, his tongue swirling around mine, dipping down to my neck.

“The side of my dress. But be careful, the zipper—”

Before I can complete the sentence, the zipper rolls down, catching the skin around my ribs. I let out a hiss. Arsène rears his head back, sobering up.

“Sorry. Fuck. Slower.” He rubs his thumb over the flesh where my skin is reddening. “You good?”

I nod, unbuckling him while my dress drops to the floor. I kick it off. He unclasps my bra, his tongue and mouth already where I want them to be. His shirt is off. His pants too. In less than a minute, we are completely naked in front of each other. He rips himself away from me suddenly, taking a step back.

“Wait.” He is heaving. “Let me look. I wanna have my fill. I’ve been fantasizing about this moment for far too long to devour you quickly.” He shakes his head, laughing at himself a little.

I stand with my arms at my sides, my chin up, like the Venus de Milo sculpture, proud and tall and unbothered. I examine myself through his eyes. My modest height, my too-small breasts, my wobbly knees. My un-Grace-ness. But no matter how self-conscious I am, satisfaction is written plainly over his face. He is enjoying every inch of me.

“You know.” He circles me lazily, completely naked, a predator on the prowl. “When I saw you in Italy, I had the acute sense that Paul chose you because he saw you as an investment. A piece of art bound to increase in value over the years. Something different, precious, one of a kind; he was right. You are not like the rest, Winnifred.” He stops behind me. He buries his face in my shoulder, his hot lips skimming over my skin. He is bracketing me from behind, his entire body flush against mine. “You are nothing like other women. Nothing like other people. But, like all pieces of art, you are bound to break.”

His lips trail my neck again, his hands cupping my breasts from behind. My head falls sideways, allowing him access to work his magic, while I arch my back, digging my behind against his erection.

“Break me, then.”

“I can’t.” His lips touch the shell of my ear. “You’re already broken.”

I turn my head, catching his lips in mine, and we kiss again. I’m ready for him. The emptiness inside me intensifies. Somehow, we find ourselves on the floor, starving and half-civilized, kissing, dipping fingers, stroking and licking and demanding more of each other.

“Tell me you have a condom around here.” His hands part my thighs, roughly pushing them apart. “Otherwise I just might die from blood loss on my journey to the nearest bodega.”

“No, no condom. But I’m clean .?.?.” I hesitate. “And as established, can’t really get pregnant.”

He stops kissing me. His eyes meet mine. There’s struggle behind them. “I’m clean too.”

The rest is unspoken. He positions himself between my legs, and in one swift push, he is inside me, filling me completely. I’ve never felt so desired, so sexy, my entire life. He starts moving inside me.

“Ah, this is no good.” He drops his head to my chest, kissing the valley between my breasts.

I run my fingers through his silken hair, dread filling me. “It’s not? Do you want me to .?.?.??”

“No, you’re good. Shit, you’re perfect.” He is still inside me. “What I mean by this is no good, is that it’s too good. Way too good. I’m about to come, and I’m two thrusts in. I’ve never .?.?.” He raises his head, and he is thoroughly blushing. What a wonder. “Never without a condom.”

“Oh.” Relief washes over me, and I hug him tighter, moving underneath him, rolling my hips, making him go crazy. “Come whenever you want. I’m close too.”

“God, Winnifred. You’re so sweet, even when you’re killing me.”

We find our rhythm. It’s fast and intense. Urgent and needy. When he comes inside me, I stifle a cry it feels so good.

He stays over afterward. Sleeps in the bed Paul and I once shared. Or, rather, lies in Paul’s spot. Taller and larger in frame. His dark eyes watching me, instead of those sunshine baby blues I’ve been used to seeing from across the pillow.

There is very little sleep involved on our last night together. We have sex, then we pull away, talk a little. His arm is draped over me in a possessive gesture I’ll miss. And then he is inside me again, kissing, biting, moaning. Sometimes we fuse together before we even finish a conversation. We’re a jumbled, delicious mess.

When the sun rises, I’m dead to the world. The good kind of exhaustion takes over me. My bones feel heavy, and I’m lulled into a deep sleep. When I wake up, the clock says 11:20 a.m., and Arsène is nowhere in sight. I peel myself off a bed that smells like a stranger and make my way to the kitchen. Half-exhilarated after the night I’ve had, half-devastated that this is the end.

There’s a note waiting for me, stuck on the coffee machine, where he knows I will see it. It’s his parting gift. His white flag.

Call the doctor.

—A.

And so I do.

I call my OB-GYN. This time, I don’t hang up. I don’t let panic take over me. The receptionist announces cheerfully that they actually have an opening tomorrow, at around noon. I take it with both hands and thank her approximately five hundred times.

Before she ends the call, the receptionist reminds me to bring my insurance card, along with a photo ID. After I hang up, I rummage through my wallet. I can’t find the darn insurance card. It’s been a hot minute since I took care of myself, having spent the majority of this past year in deep hibernation.

Then I remember that Paul put our insurance cards, along with our passports, birth certificates, and social security cards, in the safe in his closet.

I walk over to our room, ignoring the mangled sheets, and open Paul’s closet. The safe stares back at me. I don’t have the combination for it. Paul didn’t share it with me. I never thought much of it at the time. Trust hadn’t been an issue in our marriage—or so I thought.

My extensive knowledge of movies reminds me I have only three tries before the safe self-locks. I rack my brain for what the code may be.

I try his birthdate first. Fail.

I try my birthday, letting out a wry chuckle when the light blinks red. No surprises there.

My Spidey senses tell me it has to be a birthday. It must. Paul lacked the creativity to come up with any other combination. He always used birthdates. I used to make fun of him about it. His Gmail, Facebook, Instagram passwords .?.?. all birthdates. Usually his own. He didn’t remember his parents’ birthdays. He was sure about the months but never about the days. His secretary had to remind him a week in advance to buy presents and schedule a call on his calendar.

Which leaves me with one other person.

After making my way to Paul’s office, I power up his computer and log in to his company email, which is surprisingly still working. His name pops green on his company’s internal software. My heart beats hard in my chest. Oops. He’s online. Let’s hope no one thinks he’s back from the dead.

I scroll through his emails until I find what I need. A birthday sheet shared by a few of the PAs that includes all of Silver Arrow Capital employees and their birthdays.

I find Grace’s. January ninth. I make my way back to the safe, crack my knuckles, and hit the numbers 010991.

The green light flashes, and the safe slides open effortlessly. Nausea rolls through my stomach, the bile tickling the back of my throat. What a darn cheater the man was. I grab a stack of plastic cards wrapped in a rubber band from the safe’s jaws. Sort through them. Find the insurance card. I pocket it in my sweatpants with shaky hands, shoving the rest of the cards back. Something draws my attention just before I turn around to leave. A box, no bigger than a mug, in the corner of the safe. It is brown and plain. Months ago—weeks ago, even—I would have left it alone.

Now? I want to know. I grab it and flick it open. There’s a lot of scented black tissue covering whatever’s underneath. I toss the wrappers away, my heart pounding so loud I can feel its thuds between my ears. The first thing I see is a USB stick. The second thing is a piece of paper rolled like a map. No, a few pieces of paper. Square. White. I unroll the batch, and what I see stuns me.

No. No. No.

I gallop toward the bathroom, kneel in front of the toilet, and throw up, retching uncontrollably. Tears run down my face. My whole body is trembling.

Standing up on wobbly legs, I stumble back to the box, which is flung over the bed, and pick up the pictures again. Yes. It is exactly what I think it is. Ultrasound pictures, indicating a small little bean of a baby swimming safely inside its sack. I turn the picture to the other side.

First scan. 6 weeks. G + P = PJ!

Paul and Grace were pregnant.

They were going to become parents together.

Arsène was wrong. They were going to leave us for one another. Paul never would have let another man raise his child. For all his faults, he’d always wanted children. A herd of little stinkers to call my own. He’d pat my ass after we’d have sex. His way of wishing I’d get pregnant.

Which begs the question—what happened? Where had their plan gone sideways?

I examine the ultrasound photos again, more carefully now, as adrenaline gives way to far deeper emotions. Rage. Pain. Shock. The name of the clinic, and the date of the scan indicates it was done some time ago. Mere weeks after Italy.

Suddenly, I remember the picture in Grace’s Instagram account. The one that was in the private investigator’s file.

Miss my baby.

Innocently, I thought she was referring to Paul. But she wasn’t.

She was referring to her miscarriage.

That’s what went wrong for them. Grace had had a miscarriage. Bad omen? One of them had chickened out and decided to stay with their partner. Probably Grace, knowing what I now know about Paul.

Grace shone where I had failed. She almost gave him a baby.

My marriage was a sham.

The so-called love of my life was a joke.

I’m all fired up and shaking with anger as I make my way back to Paul’s office. I’ve never been this affronted, this wounded in my entire life. I can’t think clearly, and it scares me, because I’m not completely in control of my actions right now.

I shove the USB into Paul’s computer and wait for a new folder to pop up on the screen, bracing myself for the worst. Once it does, it presents a few dozen videos. By the thumbnails alone I can tell these are old videos. It is apparent that they were transferred from a videotape. I click on one and don’t recognize the people in the video. This is not Paul’s family. Not his mom, not his dad, not his siblings. These are complete, beautiful strangers. I’ve never met them in my life.

Who are they? Why did Paul have this? Was he keeping it for a friend? A colleague?

Then I realize .?.?. these people in the videos are not strangers at all.

At least, I know one of them. Intimately.

Gosh, Paul, why did you take part in this awful woman’s schemes?

The next half an hour passes in a daze. I shove the USB and ultrasound pictures into a FedEx envelope and call a courier to send it to Arsène’s apartment. There is no reason to pick up the phone and call him. We decided not to see each other again. It’s for the best, seeing as what I’m about to do will shock him and those around him to the core.

Next, I give Chrissy a call, informing her that I’m dropping out of The Seagull. She doesn’t answer, and I go straight to voice mail, which is a huge relief.

Finally, I text Lucas, Rahim, Renee, and Sloan a heartfelt apology.

Dear Seagull Cast,

I know you’re going to hate me, and to be honest, you have every reason to.

What I’m about to do is put myself first and disregard your best interests.

I’m going away for a while. As some of you know, I lost my husband almost a year ago.

Well, what you don’t know is that in recent weeks, I’ve lost much more than that.

I lost my hope. I lost my faith in humanity. I lost the precious memories I have from my late spouse. I lost everything. But I think I’m beginning, for the first time in years, to gain something too. Perspective.

Even if I stayed, I’m not sure I would’ve made a valuable contribution to Calypso Hall. I know Penny will do an amazing job as Nina.

Though I do not expect you to forgive me now, I hope that one day, in the distant future, you will.

Love with all my heart,

Winnie.

I am being selfish. I am putting myself first. I am taking a leaf out of Arsène’s book.

The last step is to do what I should’ve done the week after Paul had passed away.

I pack a small bag, buy a one-way ticket to Nashville, and turn my back on New York City for good.