Page 54 of Indulgence
Matteo
The hours ticked by withan unnatural slowness. Days felt more like weeks as I sat around alone, dealing with one of the biggest things that had ever happened to me.
I was confused and hurt and angry about the way Natalie was handling all of this.
I’d thought our love was unconditional. That there wasn’t anything that could tear us apart. Turned out I was wrong. One simple oversight—one that I wished with all my being I could go back and change—was all it took to burn it all down around us.
Things went too far.
Lines were crossed that couldn’t be uncrossed.
We had to find a way to fix this divide between us. There wasn’t another option. Living without Natalie was something I would never accept. Even with as angry as I was, two days without her felt more like an eternity. She’d stayed with Penelope last night. Communication had been sparse—in fact, the only time she’d answered any of my calls or texts was last night, and that was to tell me that she needed time.
If it weren’t for Adam, I would’ve gone insane with all the silence in the house. Yesterday, I busied myself with stripping the mattress and tossing it all in the garbage—wishing like hell that that was all I had to do to get rid of my problems. I bought new bedding and then scrubbed the house clean as if I could remove the memories with some Clorox.
But that only helped pass a fraction of time, and I needed something to keep me from hurling myself off a cliff. Hence, calling my best friend.
We sat out on the back patio, finished beers littering the table. Drinking probably wasn’t my best response, all things considered, but what else did one do when they could have impregnated a woman who wasn’t their wife and their wife left them all alone to deal with the potential fallout?
“She still hasn’t answered?” Adam asked, breaking the silence that had settled over us.
There may have been times before then that I wished for just a bit of silence when things got really crazy around here, but I didn’t think I’d ever ask for that again. I’d have given my left nut to hear Natalie yelling about dirty clothes left on the bathroom floor.
I shook my head as I stared out into the thick trees that lined the edge of our property.
“The video is legit?” he questioned once more, so I slid my phone to show him.
Brooke kept her word and sent me a video of her taking the morning after pill. She documented everything, opening the package, swallowing the pill, showing her empty mouth after. She was still wearing the same shirt as when she left the house. The woman covered all the bases for us. I had no idea if she had anything to lose like I did with Natalie, but she was equally invested in making sure nothing permanent resulted from Friday night.
“She said she was on the pill too?”
I nodded. She also told me that she was due for her period shortly and was certain we didn’t have anything to truly fear, but at that moment, I hadn’t been willing to count out any possibility. I took another pull on my beer bottle.
“Have you told Natalie that she did this?”
The video was sent yesterday, and the moment I received it, I called her. I wanted to tell her that Brooke did was she said, and I hoped it would help bring her home. She didn’t answer. I didn’t want to text that kind of thing to her and I wasn’t going to forward the video to her. That seemed cruel. Although, it didn’t seem like Natalie was interested in not being cruel because what she was doing felt exactly that.
“I tried,” I replied. My voice was dry and harsh.
Adam had the decency not to try to offer me some platitude about things working out.
We sat quietly, the rustle of the leaves on the trees in the breeze the only sound.
“I know this won’t make you feel any better at the current moment,” Adam said a few minutes later. “But at least the chances of this resulting into a child are slim to none.”
He was right. It didn’t make me feel better.
Nothing could have made it feel right except my wife coming home and being the rock I needed her to be.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Natalie
Matteo’s name flashed on thescreen as I exited the airport into the parking garage. I’d just landed in Seattle from a quick trip to Portland to handle some things for the gallery opening in two weeks.
I didn’t bother to tell Matteo I was heading out of town for two days. Based on his text messages and voice mails, he was getting progressively angrier that I wasn’t coming home or answering his calls or texts. Couldn’t blame him. I certainly wasn’t going to call him while I was in Portland. We weren’t speaking and I’d just hopped on the plane, which was childish and rude, but him knowing it would have just made things between us worse. After I snuck home for a change of clothes while he was at work and couldn’t get out of there fast enough, all I thought about was the idea that maybe a bit of distance between me and here would be helpful.
I’d have done anything if it meant finding a way not to want to crawl out of my skin every moment of the day. Anything to have those nightmares that were present whether my eyes were closed or not go away. All I could think about was Matteo and his new family. Adorable little Brooke and their sweet baby. Visions of their life danced in my mind like the goriest of all horror movies come to life.
