Nocturne(97)

I jerked a little when the doors opened. We stepped in and stood on opposite sides like strangers. The door closed, the bell rang, and the elevator began to move.

Finally the excruciating, painful wait was over and I was unlocking my room. A room, which, thankfully, I’d not shared with Savannah. Because while I might be a complete bastard, an adulterer, a liar … I still couldn’t conceive of them sleeping in the same bed. The idea of it, the secrecy, the lies … they made me ill.

The bellman had placed Karin’s bags in the corner. I stood near the window, which overlooked the darkness outside, pacing, as she slipped into the bathroom to prepare herself for the night. My eyes darted around the room. Looking for anything incriminating. Condoms. Anything that belonged to Savannah. I knew there wasn’t anything; we’d not shared this room.

But I couldn’t slip my guilt into a drawer and hide it. I couldn’t erase the stain of lies and manipulation. The rage I felt over her betrayal was real. But not as real as my own betrayal.

I sighed, staring out the window.

I thought it all through. What would happen if Karin and I divorced? Savannah and I could be together when that happened. But would she ever be able to trust me? After all ... I’d cheated on my wife. Would she ever be able to trust that I wouldn’t do it to her? Did a relationship founded on a lie stand any chance of surviving?

My heart told me yes. My heart told me that Savannah and I were meant to be together. But in the back of my mind, doubts screamed at me that I’d doomed our love from the start.

I jerked when Karin opened the door and stepped out of the restroom. She’d dispensed with her long t-shirt nightgown, instead wearing some sheer silky thing. Crap. I felt my mouth dry, instantly. There was no doubt what she had in mind as she walked toward me in her bare feet, eyes meeting mine.

I coughed and then muttered something about going to brush my teeth. Then I slipped by her, into the bathroom and closed the door. I turned on the water, all the way, and leaned on the counter. What the f*ck was I doing? How did I end up in this place? In a hotel room with a woman I was married to, while the woman I loved was one floor, a thousand feet and a million miles away from me?

I closed my eyes, because I didn’t like who I saw in the mirror. I didn’t like it at all. Then, finally, I slipped out of my outer clothes, brushed my teeth, and slid on a heavy bathrobe.

When I opened the bathroom door, the lights in the room were off. I could hear her breathing. I walked toward the bed. She would be on the side closest to the window, so I slid off the bathrobe and got under the blanket.

Karin was three inches away from me and I wanted to flee.

As soon as I was under the cover, she slid over toward me.

“I missed you,” she whispered.

Another stab of guilt. Because the truth was, I hadn’t missed her at all. Then I froze, because she put her lips to my neck and a hand on my stomach.

“Gregory, why won’t you touch me? You’re my husband. I’m so sorry ... I’m sorry I lied. Forgive me.”

Jesus. Forgive her? If she only knew what she was saying.

“Kiss me,” she said, and then her lips came into contact with mine. I responded because what the f*ck else was I supposed to do? But it was the most uncomfortable kiss of my life. She moved closer, and her right hand worked its way down my stomach until she was touching my penis, and God help me, but of course it responded instantly, even though the rest of my body was rigid, uncomfortable.

Her kisses became almost frantic, and the next thing I knew, she’d brought her lips to my neck again, as she raised to her knees, her fingernails raking lines in my ribs.

“I want you, Gregory. Please.”

Her pleading made me want to run away and hide. To sneak under the bed. My stomach was in knots as she frantically pulled at my underwear. I winced and closed my eyes, because she touched me again, but I’d collapsed, flaccid, completely impotent.

My body had revolted, announcing in no uncertain terms what my confused mind hadn’t made clear. No. Fucking. Way.

She froze. Then turned away, flinging herself to the far edge of the bed with her back to me.

I stared at the ceiling. Humiliated. Nauseous.

She shook with the beginning of a sob then whispered, “Do you really hate me that much?”

I couldn’t answer. Instead, I lay there, silently, alone, as my wife cried herself to sleep.





Savannah


“Savannah, that’s an A-flat.”

“Huh?” I whispered, turning to Nathan.

“It’s an A-flat.” He took his pencil and helpfully circled the offending note for me. “You’ve missed it like every other time we’ve gone over that line. There’s a key change in measure thirty-six.”

Sighing, I grabbed his pencil from his hand and put a star over the key change. “Well, what the hell? This is a march for Christ’s sake, who writes this many key changes into a march?”

Tim elbowed me from the other side.

“What?” I snapped. He just nodded toward Joseph McIntosh, staring down at me from his conductor’s stand expectantly.

“I said, Ms. Marshall, that I want the flutes to ease up on the staccato on that run of eight notes starting at thirty-six. The way he’s written them is too choppy. Still accent them, just not so forcefully. And, in the correct key, please.”