She swallowed, wiped at her eyes. Her fingers came back wet.
Her husband didn’t want this baby. Spence wouldn’t want it either. And he wouldn’t want her if she kept it.
It. That was the problem: the baby wasn’t an it.
The door in from the garage opened, Keith’s briefcase slapped on the floor just inside his office, then his dress shoes beat a rhythm along the hardwood hallway.
She waited a beat, gathered herself, then turned. “I’m not getting an abortion.”
The muscles seemed to hang on his face. His shoulders slumped. He looked years older than he had only a week ago. “I can’t tell people it’s my child.”
She sighed. “I know. I’ll move out.”
He held out a hand. “Zoe, can’t we—”
She shook her head. “We made a mistake. This whole hotwifing thing wasn’t a good idea. Sex for me is about the emotion as well. I can’t take a stranger to bed and get what I need out of it.” She swallowed, her throat hurting. “And I need sex. It’s not a marriage without it.”
She didn’t even talk about the baby. Or Spence.
He shook his head, his eyes bewildered like a little boy’s. “Why didn’t you tell me that in the beginning?”
“I only just realized it with—” She shrugged, unable to finish the sentence, unable to hurt him that way.
He heard the unspoken name anyway, his lips moving slightly, his cheeks rippling as he clamped his teeth. “Are you in love with him?”
“I’m not leaving you for him. I’m leaving you for the baby.” She didn’t bother to say that Spence wouldn’t want the child any more than Keith did. He’d never signed on for that. No, he was the other man, the one who made her come, who touched her, kissed her, licked her, made her crazy. Then sent her home to her husband. She was Keith’s problem, not Spence’s. She would never see him again. He would never know about…
She ground the train of thought to a halt before it brought her to her knees. “I’ll pack a bag tonight. Get a hotel room. We can figure out the rest later.”
“If I agreed to take the kid, would you stay?” He said it so softly, she almost didn’t hear. Maybe it was her imagination. Something she conjured, wanted, needed.
But they’d gone too far.
“That wouldn’t work, Keith. Things are different now.” She loved him. But she wasn’t in love with him. She wasn’t sure when that had ended. With Spence? Three years ago when Keith said he wanted her to take other lovers? Or long before that? “It’s best if I just go tonight,” she said. “Get a hotel room.” She’d figure out where to go from there.
He stood half in and half out of the kitchen, his hand on the doorjamb. His knuckles whitened but that was the only outward sign of emotion. “Yes,” he agreed. “That’s best.”
A part of her wanted him to get angry. Shout. Beg. This was too damn civilized. For God’s sake, she was having another man’s child. But their marriage was dying the same way their sex life had died, with a radical change that neither of them had been prepared for. He couldn’t have sex with her so why not let other men do the job? And he hadn’t wanted a child, so why not just let her have one with another man?
Problem solved.
* * * * *
Spence had no rational reason for tagging along on the debugging process. Farris wasn’t attending. It was just Paul, the production planner, and their MIS guy. Spence said he was going to Bay Metals because he’d been the originator of the idea.
They’d purchased enough targets to fill the five cathodes in their sixty-inch coater. If anything went wrong, the production run was small and would minimize losses. Not that they would pay for it; the test run was on Bay Metals’ dime. Unless, of course, it worked perfectly.
First, there were a couple of issues to resolve with the system interface. Spence didn’t have a thing to do with it, but he was going anyway. He hadn’t seen Zoe in two weeks. Hadn’t called. Hadn’t emailed. Hadn’t texted. And it was the worst two weeks of his life since he’d lost Fiona. He’d never used the word love. He’d never needed to. But he knew damn well what it was, how it felt, how it ripped you apart on the inside when you knew it was impossible.
He wouldn’t beg. Or cajole. Or pressure. He wouldn’t even try to seduce her. He just wanted to see Zoe. That was all. He wouldn’t ask for anything. He just wanted to look at her.
For a man who’d professed he’d never fall for a woman, he’d fallen hard. Except that he hadn’t told anyone. Not even Ward. He wasn’t into sharing his inner thoughts. Unless they were about someone else.
They were set up in a computer room in MIS, which was the hub of the debugging process. Don, Bay’s programmer, linked into both systems on two different terminals. Zoe showed up ten minutes into the process. She stopped short just inside the door when she saw him. Obviously, she hadn’t anticipated his involvement.
“Hi,” he said, smiling big. Yeah, he wanted to make her uncomfortable. He wanted her to be aware of every moment she was near him.
He almost laughed. What the hell happened to that bit about all he wanted was to see her?
“Things are actually going well,” he informed her, needing to engage her so she couldn’t run away. “There haven’t been a lot of problems. But we don’t want to go live without covering all the bases.”
“That’s great,” she said. “Looks like Don’s got everything under control. I’ll just—”
Don waved a hand at her. “Zoe, look at this.”
She had no choice but to fully enter the room. She was all flowery shampoo, body lotion, and woman. God, she was beautiful. Her skin seemed to glow, her hair to shine a glossier black. Her breasts beneath the fine silk made his mouth water. He imagined they were fuller, more tempting. He could almost taste her on his tongue.
She leaned over, one hand on the table to brace herself as she scanned the terminal Don sat in front of.
He’d warred with himself these past two weeks. Leave her alone or ride in on his white charger and steal her away from the wastrel husband? His gut wanted the battle; his head told him he’d only make things worse for her. His heart simply asked, Why the hell didn’t you tell her you loved her?
Her cell phone rang. She’d been holding it in her hand, and she raised it to read caller ID. Her lips thinned, her jaw tensed. And she glanced at him.
Then she punched a button and turned her back to answer. “Hi,” she said softly, followed by a pause as she listened, then, “Here?” her voice rising. Her shoulders rounded, her arm went across her abdomen. “Okay,” she finally answered. “I’ll be right there.”
Turning back, she studiously avoided Spence’s gaze and pointed to the screen, discussing a couple of items with Don. Then she excused herself. Waving her phone in the air as she exited, she said breezily, “Call me if you need me.”
It was her husband. Keith was here, in the lobby or out in the parking lot.
“I’m going to the men’s room,” he said, rising, following her fast. She disappeared around a corner at the end of the hall. He made it to the turn in time to see her exit through a side door.
He didn’t ask himself what the fuck he was doing. Her husband sent her out to have sex with other men so he could jack off with videos and phone calls. He didn’t deserve her, didn’t appreciate her. She needed a man who would cherish her.
Spence was that man.
* * * * *
Why today, of all days? Zoe’s stomach churned. It wasn’t just morning sickness. It was seeing Spence. It was his scent in that room. She’d read that a woman’s sense of smell went into overdrive with pregnancy. It was all she could do not to lean down and put her face in his hair, nuzzle the skin of his throat, breathe him in.
God, she didn’t need this now. Not with Spence here. Alison was out in the parking lot, and she was not leaving. Zoe rounded the building and found her stepdaughter’s Toyota parked under a tree. She was standing outside, her hand on her extended belly, fanning herself with a stiff reusable gro
cery bag.
She turned on Zoe. “Dad said you were pregnant.” Her voice rose. “Pregnant.”
If she was queasy before, she was ready to lose it all now. Damn Keith for doing this without her. “Alison—”
“First, neither of you say a word about splitting up for two weeks. Two weeks,” Alison echoed with emphasis. “Then he says you’re pregnant”—her voice dropped to a harsh whisper—“and it’s not even his.”
God. She couldn’t do this, not out in the freaking parking lot. But there wasn’t a choice. “Alison, let me explain.”
“And the worst?” Alison said, as if Zoe hadn’t said a word. “He knew all about your affair. He even told you to do it.” Alison threw her hands wide to cover all the sordid details she hadn’t said aloud.
At least Keith hadn’t laid all the blame at Zoe’s feet. “I know it sounds strange.” Exactly how much had Keith told Alison?
“Strange?” Alison’s eyes brimmed with moisture. “I don’t get any of this. What’s happening? Everything was fine when I was there.”
“We didn’t like to air our dirty laundry,” Zoe said. “Especially not with you…” She trailed off, waving a hand at Alison’s belly.
She and Keith should have talked about this, how to tell Alison, strategized, come up with a plan. Of course, they hadn’t really talked about anything at all. She’d left that night with a small bag, come back a couple of times for more clothes. She was staying at a hotel near work. They didn’t talk about divorce or attorneys or anything. They were both on hold. And they’d left Alison on hold, too.
Alison paced by the trunk of the car. “I don’t get it. This is too whacky. First he says you’re pregnant, then he says he encouraged you to have an affair. Because, well”—she put her hands over her ears as if she didn’t want to hear her own words any more than she’d wanted to hear Keith say them—“you and he can’t have sex anymore.”
It was the kind of discussion a father and daughter should never need to have. Zoe didn’t know how to explain the unexplainable any better than Keith had. “It was just something that happened. Your dad, me, we…” Yeah. Totally unexplainable.
Alison turned on her heel, almost tripped herself, and Zoe put out a hand to steady her. “Be careful.”
She jerked back. “Don’t touch me.”
“Sweetie.”
Alison’s chin trembled. Moisture brimmed in her eyes. But she didn’t castigate Zoe for the endearment.
“I can’t give your father what he needs anymore, and he can’t give me what I need.”
“Like sex? Is that all that’s important?”
“No.” They were missing a normal love life. Intimacy. Sensuality. Desire. A child. “We don’t share anything anymore.” Talking dirty about her exploits with other men wasn’t sharing. Even Keith licking her after she’d been with Spence wasn’t.
“Look, you’re upset now. Why don’t we get together, you, me, and your dad. We’ll talk about it.”
Alison shot her a steely glare. “You never said anything to me. Not even a hint. Then you just expect me to accept that?” She pointed at Zoe’s belly, flat in comparison to her own.
Zoe had never discussed her relationship with Alison. “It wasn’t appropriate and you know that.” She put a hand on the car to steady herself, just the way she’d tried to steady Alison. She hadn’t eaten, and the queasiness wasn’t just in the mornings. “I can’t say nothing will change between you and me, Alison, but I still love you and care about you.”
“Then how can you do this?” Alison gave a pitiful moan. “You know my mom’s no good about the baby. She’s all flustered and weird. You’re the only sane one I can talk to.” Ah, the narcissism of a pregnant woman. It wasn’t about her dad or her dad’s marriage; it was about her and her baby and what she needed. Zoe understood completely.
“I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. You can come over whenever you want.”
“How can I do that if you’re having some other guy’s kid in my dad’s house? And who the hell was he anyway?”
Who was he? Zoe didn’t know how to explain. He was nothing to her, yet he was everything. He was the other man, yet he was the only man.
Alison’s brow furrowed, and fresh moisture pooled in her eyes. She didn’t wait for an answer, as if she didn’t expect one. “I don’t get any of this. It’s just too weird.”
“I didn’t mean to get pregnant. It’s weird for me, too. And for your dad. Ultimately, this”—she put her hand on her stomach—“is my problem, not his. So we split up.”
Alison stared at her. “He said you wouldn’t get an abortion.”
Zoe didn’t know what Alison wanted to hear. “Could you have done it?”
Their gazes locked. Alison’s eyes spoke volumes. She said the words. “No. Never. Not for any reason.”
“So you see, Alison, that is my explanation. Nothing else matters.”
Alison tipped her head, looked vacantly at something over Zoe’s shoulder. Then she came back. “You’re right. When you’re going to have a baby, there’s nothing else.” She held Zoe’s gaze. “And you always wanted a baby, didn’t you.” Of course, it wasn’t a question. Alison had known the truth even if Zoe never admitted it to herself.
They’d talked about it only once, when Alison was getting married. Zoe had said simply that her life was good without children.
“Let’s talk about everything later.” Zoe patted her shoulder, and this time, Alison let her. “Why don’t you go home now and rest? I’ll call your dad. We’ll come over when you’re ready and talk. Okay?”
“I hate this,” Alison said, her voice weepy again. “It’s worse than when he left Mom.”
“I know, sweetie. I’m sorry.” Of course, for Alison, it was all about her, and why they were doing this now, when she needed them.
She helped an acquiescent Alison into the car, closed the door on her, and waited until she’d rolled down the window. “Now drive carefully, okay? It’s going to be all right. No one’s deserting you, I promise.”
“I just don’t want things to change.”
When she’d married Keith, Alison, even at the age of ten, had been her only supporter. “And I don’t want to lose you.”
Alison backed out, made a sad face at Zoe, then rolled up the window.
Zoe waited a long moment, watching the retreating vehicle. It could have gone much worse. It still could go badly when she and Keith finally talked it out with Alison together. At least today’s confrontation was over. She wiped a hand down her face, turned and headed back around the building, almost colliding with a man standing right there.
Her stomach simply dropped to her knees, everything went blurry, and she clung to the wall.
Spence was so close she could smell the salt on his skin.
Chapter Twenty-One
Without even touching him, Zoe could taste his salty skin. His body heat flowed over her like a warm breeze. She wanted to touch him so badly she ached.
“Who was that?” Not an ounce of emotion leached from Spence’s voice.
“My stepdaughter.”
“You left him?”
The second question didn’t follow the first, but she knew what he wanted. “Yes. I left Keith.”
He was still so long she thought he was done with her, but his voice came again, softly, deadly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I’ve barely worked things out myself. I couldn’t just call you up and say, ‘Hey, I’ve left my husband.’”
“I meant the baby.”
God. He’d heard everything. Of course he had. Alison had started out near hysterical. Who else had been out in the parking lot listening as her whole life was stripped bare? “You don’t need to worry about the baby,” she told him. “I’ll take care of it.”
“How?” His voice was glacial, so unlike the sexy, seductive bedroom voice he’d used on her.
“I won’t ask you for anything. This is my problem.”
His hand shot out. He grabbe
d her wrist, held her. “I asked you how you’ll take care of it.”
She trembled beneath the look in his eye. “I’m not exactly poor. Even without my husband, I can support a child on my salary.”
Something shifted in his green eyes. “So you’re not going to get rid of it?”
The question made her think he hadn’t heard the most important part. “Of course I’m not. But like I said, it’s my problem.” She shrugged. “It was an accident. The pill, I was sick a couple of days, right before you and I”—she hesitated, changed the words on her tongue—“before that night. I couldn’t keep anything down, and I probably lost the birth control pills before they were absorbed. That’s what the doctor thinks.”
His grip on her loosened, but he didn’t let go. “So you weren’t going to tell me at all.”
“I saw no reason to burden you.” She lowered her head, rubbed her eyelid.
“You thought I’d tell you to get rid of it. Maybe I’d even offer to pay for the operation.”
She noticed he didn’t call it what it was: an abortion. The truth was she hadn’t wanted to hear him reject her and reject her child.
He pulled her arm up, tugged her closer. “Is that what you thought?” he asked again.
She let her gaze shift from his left to his right eye. Color changed with emotion, the eyes spoke. They narrowed, they softened. It was why people didn’t look at you when they lied, as if they thought you’d read the lie right there in their eyes. It was why really good liars looked right at you, because they knew how to make their eyes lie, too.
“Yes,” she whispered.
His eyes were shaded with brown now. Deep, soulful, sorrowful brown flecks amid the green. “You don’t know me at all,” he answered with the equal softness.
This time, her heart really did break. Right in two. It broke for him.
The Other Man (West Coast Hotwifing) Page 18
