She Regrets Nothing

by Andrea Dunlop

  “Oooohhh! Not another crusty billionaire, though, babe, not a good look.”

  “No! God, never again. He’s our age. And so dreamy.”

  “Oh my God, who is he?”

  “Oh, you don’t know him.” Laila wished she could tell her.

  “Well, what’s his name, anyway?”

  “Jake.” The name was out of Laila’s mouth before she could think of anything better. But of course, Nora had no reason to suspect the connection, and so it triggered nothing.

  Just then, mercifully, Laila’s phone beeped with a text message. “Oh, honey, that’s him! I have to go, but I promise to tell you all about it when I get home, okay?”

  Nora cheerfully sent her off, blissfully unaware that the man she’d spent hours crying over that very morning was the very one spiriting Laila eastward.

  During the long car ride to Montauk—that once-sleepy town on the farthest edge of Long Island—Laila quickly began to feel like she’d known Blake for years.

  As he drove, he told her about his family—and there was much to tell. His father’s legal imbroglios, it turned out, barely held a candle to his personal ones. Blake had a half sister from his father’s previous marriage, his only sibling, and she’d been in and out of rehab for years. Blake’s theory was that she’d never recovered from her father leaving their family for another woman—not Blake’s mother, blessedly—that it had done indelible damage. He respected his father and still loved him, but their relationship was strained. It had become Blake’s mission to live his life entirely in opposition to the example that was set for him.

  Laila listened intently, for she knew that such an outpouring might not happen again for some time. In the very beginning, some men tell you everything you need to know about who they are, what they want, if you’re able to read between the lines a little. It’s so easy, after all, to unburden oneself to a beautiful, patiently listening stranger. But then once the stakes were raised, once you were no longer a blank slate, the dam would close.

  They stopped in a tiny, ruinously expensive grocery store to pick up provisions. The domesticity of the errand made Laila’s heart ache. Rather than imagining their wedding—a moment of triumph her mind might have otherwise skipped forward to—she pictured the marriage itself. As she watched Blake chat with the grizzled man behind the fish counter, she imagined them in ten years, toddlers in tow. In thirty, on their own again, making their way through this same little grocery store, laughing at how quickly the years had gone by.

  By the time they reached the house, it felt to Laila like they’d known each other forever. She looked at her phone and realized she had a text from Nora: Let me know you got there safe! Xoxo

  She returned the text and smiled to herself. A loose end tied for now. She would not allow a whisper of guilt to take hold; Blake was a single man.

  The house was a spectacular, modern, beachside mansion of cool gray stone and steel angles.

  “It’s my family’s house,” Blake hastily explained, “though I’m the only one who comes out here much. Since the whole prison debacle, my dad prefers to summer in the Riviera. Too much scrutiny here.”

  Laila smiled; Blake might feel like a kindred spirit, but he still used summer as a verb.

  “Let me show you the beach side,” he said, taking her hand. He’d kept his hands to himself up to that point, though she wished he wouldn’t.

  The back deck was a sleek stone patio with a covered swimming pool, beyond which was a tall sand dune dotted with a small fence poking through the sparse seagrass. And beyond that, the silvery ocean, churning beneath the cloudy sky. Laila felt herself being absorbed into a new identity, one completely separate from her cousins. Perhaps they were meant to be a bridge, and Blake was her destination.

  She finally turned to Blake, taking his face in her hands and kissing him.

  The weather was overcast and cool that weekend, and Laila was grateful to spend the time inside curled up with Blake.

  “I want you to know,” he said as they snuggled on the couch after dinner that first night, “that I don’t expect anything from you.”

  She looked at him, confused.

  “I mean,” he said, putting his hand on her knee, “there are plenty of bedrooms in the house. I would never be so presumptuous as to ask you to . . . you know,” he said.

  Blake’s confidence had finally faltered; the self-assured golden boy was practically blushing. It made Laila insane with want. She swung her leg over him and pulled herself onto his lap. Her skirt came up, and she saw that there was a bruise on her thigh from the night before. For a moment she feared that her body radiated with the memory of Cameron, that there would be other signs she couldn’t obscure. But he didn’t appear to notice anything.

  “Oh God,” he said.

  She pressed into him and could feel him getting hard underneath her. In one motion, he stood and picked her up. She thought there was no way they would make it all the way to the bedroom like that, with her wrapped around him, but he was surprisingly strong.

  “Are you going to keep carrying me like this?”

  “A tiny thing like you? Please.”

  He laid her down on the bed and stared down at her.

  “God,” he said, “you’re so beautiful.”

  She reached up and gently pulled him toward her, tugging his shirt over his neck and throwing it to the side. Blake appeared slender in his clothes but was surprisingly chiseled underneath, which thrilled her to no end: with the exception of Cameron, she’d become accustomed to the slight paunch of her older lovers.

  When they were both down to their underwear, Blake hesitated once more.

  “Are you sure?”

  Laila resisted her immediate urge to tell him to fuck her, fearing that it would shock him. If she was with Cameron she could say it, though she wouldn’t have to, he’d have already stripped her down and begun commanding her. She would have begun the encounter on her knees.

  “Please,” she said instead, “I want you so much.”

  He needed no further encouragement. He kissed the length of her torso and buried his head between her legs.

  Normally, she disliked the vulnerability of having new men go down on her. She always feared that she’d be just the wrong side of her last Brazilian, feared how she may smell or taste. But Blake’s tongue was on her most delicate skin before she could protest—and then protesting was the last thing she wanted to do. She entwined her fingers in his silky hair and lost herself in the sensations.

  Despite his initial caution, once released, Blake was fearsome in bed. Laila finally saw the man who had taken over a newspaper at the tender age of twenty-five, the man who took what he wanted. He gripped her hair as he slid himself inside of her, dug his fingers into the flesh of her hips as he pulled her on top of him, gently but firmly turned her over and told her he wanted to have her every way.

  Afterward, she curled herself in his arms, with his strong chest pressed against her back, and fell into a deep sleep of exhaustion and wonder.

  The next morning he got up early to surf, kissing her forehead before he left. She drifted back off to sleep and woke a couple of hours later to the sounds of his making breakfast.

  “Oh my God,” he said when Laila emerged in his sweater, “seeing you in my clothes is so hot. Come here.”

  She kissed him.

  “My dream girl,” he said.

  With those words, the real Blake came into view. He was a romantic. During the car ride, he’d also talked about his grandparents—how they’d been married for sixty years, how his grandfather had known his wife was the one the moment he laid eyes on her. And Laila suspected then that nothing about this weekend trip had been as spontaneous as it appeared. Perhaps Blake believed she was the one from the moment he’d seen her. What he thought he’d seen, exactly, she wasn’t certain, but there would be time to determine it, to become it.

  “Don’t say that,” she said, looking coyly away from him, as though overwhelmed by her own
feelings.

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m already falling for you,” she whispered. And perhaps it was even true.

  “Well, that makes two of us.” His hands were inside the sweater on her bare skin.

  “Do you mean that?”

  “Laila,” he said seriously, sitting on a nearby stool and taking both her hands in his, “I know we haven’t known each other long, so you’ll have to take my word for it. I know there are a lot of guys who will say whatever, but I’m not one of them. I take this stuff seriously. I’m no player, I’m a one-woman man.”

  She wanted to laugh; she was almost in disbelief over his earnestness. She felt herself struggling with her own skepticism. Who didn’t want to believe that they were good? That they could be loved? But she knew she didn’t have the luxury of simply being credulous. That was reserved for those who needed from their partner only love itself.

  “I’m glad to hear that. I am a one-man woman,” she said. I will be, she thought, exactly what you want.

  “Good,” he said, kissing her, “because I can’t handle cheating. I don’t want to compete with anyone else.”

  She knew he meant it. Cheating, for him, meant ruined lives. And suddenly, being faithful felt possible to Laila. Suddenly, she couldn’t fathom wanting anyone but him. She felt the emergence of a soul already half-saved from a day in Blake’s company. Was this what Cameron loved so much about Liberty? Did she purify him? Make it feel possible to be someone better?

  The sun finally appeared later that day, and they made the most of their afternoon at the beach: sprawling on an enormous oversize fluffy towel, naming the cloud shapes (“That one looks like a camel.” “That one looks like Donald Trump.”) between make-out sessions. On the way home, they stopped for an early dinner in one of the tiny seaside towns that dotted the route between Montauk and Manhattan; they ate in a charming, quiet, little diner that was sparsely populated in its off-season slumber. When they finally neared the city, it was late Sunday night.

  “I can take you home,” he had said as they approached the Queensboro Bridge, Manhattan coming swiftly toward them, ready to swallow them. “Or you can stay with me tonight,” he continued when she didn’t answer right away.

  “Okay.” She knew she should probably go home, have a good night’s sleep, give him some space, let a vacuum open to let the longing in. The strategic part of her said this was right. And yet . . .

  “I just have to get up superearly tomorrow.”

  “Do you not want me to stay?” Just like that, she was thrown. An early-morning wake up? Was this a brush-off? Was he the kind of man for whom a fling had to be romantic to be satisfying? Was that the extent of it? Leo was like this: there were torrents of love for the woman in his crosshairs; passionate obsession. But once he’d had her? On he went. It wasn’t that his affections weren’t real to him in the moment that he felt them, but his infatuations were like all-consuming yet swift-moving viruses: out of his system before any permanent damage was done.

  “Hey,” Blake said, reaching out to put his hand on her knee, “of course I do. I just didn’t want to wake you up so early. But of course I want you to stay.”

  Blake held her sweetly that night but was all business the next morning, taking a phone call the minute he emerged from the covers and barely breaking his stride to kiss her good-bye.

  Laila hurriedly got into a cab outside his Upper East Side town house before the tears pricking her eyes spilled over. The street felt too bright that morning. She croaked out the address of the twins’ town house then immediately started crying. She felt a little horrified at the sobs that burst forth, but she was relieved that she’d been able to hold them back until then. For some reason she couldn’t quite put her finger on, she was terrified that she would never see Blake again. She felt waves of vulnerability washing over her. If he blew her off, if she’d been wrong about how she fit into his romantic paradigm, then she might have just played her last card. She knew that if Nora found out, she’d never forgive her. She was exhausted from all of it.

  “Ah, don’ cry,” the cabdriver said. “It will be all right; don’ worry.”

  She sniffled, caught off guard by the cabbie’s deep, soothing voice. She looked at his license, which featured him smiling, his brilliant white teeth against dark skin. He was from Lagos; this detail struck her as romantic, though she couldn’t say why.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’ be sorry,” he said with a light laugh, “people, they cry in my cab all the time.” He shrugged. “All the time.”

  “Maybe they can tell that you’ll be kind.”

  He laughed softly, “Maybe so. You crying over love, pretty girl?”

  “Maybe so.” She herself had to laugh. For it wasn’t just the thought of her plans going awry that had upset her. Her whole year in New York had been a high-wire act; she was used to it. And somehow, here in this cab with Isaac from Lagos, she was able to let it out. Blake felt different. “How could you tell?”

  “That is the usual reason,” he said. “Everyone back home say, Ah, Isaac, people in New York, they so haad, but I say no. People in New York always weepin’ over love.”

  Love, Laila knew, should not even be making the list of her worries at the moment. Love, she thought, is for the rich and foolish. And yet.

  20

  * * *

  THAT EVENING, a convergence of feelings descended on Laila: anxiety, but determination too. She went to meet Cece at Rose Bar and arrived before her, which would normally send her scuttling off to wait out of sight until her well-connected friend arrived. Instead she gave the doorman, a handsome bearded gent in an expensive suit whose gaze was soaked with ennui, her ID and a self-assured smile, and he let her right in. Not even a question of the list. Was this the secret? Act like you belonged and suddenly you did? Soon Cece joined her, and they were absorbed into the warm glow of the amber-hued, rococo-style cocktail lounge, removed from the humid April drizzle outside.

  “Sorry, I have to check this,” Laila said as she pulled her buzzing phone from her handbag, “I told Liberty I’d keep an eye on my phone; she’s got this auction going, and she’s super anxious about it.” This much was true, though of course she was hoping it wasn’t Liberty.

  “No worries, girl; do your thing.” Cece did a quick scan of the crowd before turning to her own phone to scroll through messages.

  Laila looked down at her phone:

  Beautiful Laila, you made my weekend. I cannot wait to see you again. I have back-to-back meetings the next few days but I’ll call you as soon as I come up for air. Until then, I hope that thinking of me is making you smile even a little. It’s making me smile like a fool.

  She beamed and stared at the screen.

  “Not Liberty, I take it,” Cece said when she caught the look on her friend’s face.

  She knew she should be more careful, but now the whole story of her weekend in Montauk came burbling forth.

  “Cece, I honestly think he might be the one.”

  “The one? Wow, who are you right now?” Cece laughed. “But okay, if he is, I’m happy for you. He’s a catch—not my type, too clean-cut—but he’s definitely hot.”

  Of course, Laila told herself she did not mean the one the way other women did. What she meant was that Blake was the answer, or at least that he could be. Reconnecting with her family had not gone as she’d hoped. Now she would have to get where she wanted to be via the oldest trick in the book: marriage. With Blake she could be so much more than she could ever be alone. She could see herself like Petra, only with perhaps a more loving marriage. Her focus would be on throwing beautiful parties and on looking beautiful herself each day: on surrounding herself and Blake with only the best things. She was certain a man like Blake would want children, and she felt under the right circumstances that motherhood was something she could abide and perhaps even enjoy. After all, they’d be able to afford nannies. As long as she was not forced to change di
apers and drive carpools, she felt she could love a couple of little ones. Perhaps it would be the opportunity to be the mother she did not have herself.

  “I know, I fully sound like that girl right now,” Laila said. At that moment a waitress arrived with two glasses of champagne.

  “Excuse me, ladies,” she said, setting the glasses down next to their still-half-full cocktails. “From the gentlemen at the bar,” she added, quickly gliding away as though she couldn’t be bothered to explain any further. Laila and Cece glanced over, and there were at least three twosomes of men, all looking in their direction. They raised their glasses and nodded in the general direction of the men, neither of them interested in engaging with anyone they saw there.

  “Did that ever happen to you?” Laila asked, returning to their conversation.

  “What, like, love at first sight?” Cece asked, smiling.

  “No. Or, I mean, I guess? I don’t know. Where you just . . .” Laila put her hands up in frustration, lost for what she was trying to express. But Cece nodded.

  “Yeah,” she said, with a sad smile, “I felt that way with Steven.”

  “Gah, Steven who we hate?” Laila had heard all about Steven: the one serious boyfriend Cece had had that she knew of. He’d cheated on her with one of her roommates. Cece and Laila had seen him out one night at Marquee with some clients. They’d amused themselves by hiding in the corner of the bar and sending the girliest drinks they could think of to his table: he was the sort of master-of-the-universe type who would be embarrassed by a daiquiri—complete with an umbrella that the bartender had managed to find—showing up unbidden. Both the bartender and the bottle-service girl who’d ferried the drinks were on Cece’s side once they heard the backstory, and insisted to Steven that he’d ordered them. Not that anyone who worked in that place needed any more of a reason to hate investment bankers.

  “We didn’t always hate him, though,” Cece said now.

  “Well, naturally.”