Page 86 of Submissive Lies

“Hi! I have a reservation. Jennifer Boyd. Party of two.”

The hostess smiled, glancing down at the log. “Oh, yes. Right here. 2:30, party of two, reserved table outside on the deck.” She looked up at me. “If you’ll follow me, please.” I walked behind her, moving past tables crowded with guests. She led me out onto the deck, and then down and around the corner. She strode the short distance to the last table, but I’d stopped.

Steve rose from where he’d been sitting, waiting.

He’d beaten me here.

Sonofabitch.

“Hello, Jen.”

“Hello, Steve.”

He stood while I seated myself. Once I settled into my chair, he returned to his own, motioning towards my side of the table.

“I ordered you a glass of wine.”

I spotted a glass I hadn’t noticed. A rosé, slightly chilled, beads of condensation sweating on the surface in the warm sun.

“Thank you. That was very kind.”

“You probably don’t remember, but that night at dinner in Chicago… I had to have the sommelier make all our wine choices for us.” He leaned in slightly, motioning towards the front of the restaurant. “I kinda let the waitress choose for me this time. I hope it’s okay.”

Biting down on my lower lip, I grinned. I picked up the glass, nodding.

“I remember.” I took a sip of the wine. “It’s very good. Thank you.”

“Good.” His voice sounded relieved, but there was something else about it too. The tone was reserved. Not cold, nor distant, but it wasn’t the voice of the Steve I remembered. Not even from that first morning on the show floor. It was… different.

-Well, what did you expect? That he was just going to show up here and be all warm and friendly with you? After what you did to him?-

No.

I pressed my lips together for a second, and then took another sip of my wine. We sat across from each other, together and yet alone, in silence.

I heard him take a deep breath.

“So, I’m not going to waste time here. I asked for an hour, and I don’t expect anything more than that, Jen. So, I’ll just cut right to the chase.”

God his voice sounded so… clinical. It wasn’t the harsh voice he’d used that morning after Samantha had outed me, but neither was it the voice he’d used the day we’d first met. The one traced with mirth. The one filled with pride when I’d pulled that Starbucks cup back in surprise for his getting it just the way I liked it. This was a completely new voice. Detached. Collected. Military precise.

I almost wished he’d be angry. I deserved that. That I could deal with. This… this I wasn’t sure what to make of.

“I won’t lie, Jen. I’m really not good at this sort of thing.” His eyes locked onto mine. “I’ve spent a great deal of time going over what I wanted to say, but right now…” He gave me a tight smile. “Right now I’m having a hard time remembering a fucking word of it.” The expletive was harsh, but his voice was low enough that I doubted anyone around us would hear.

“So, I’m going to go with my gut here.” He paused, and his eyes flicked from me to the tabletop and then back again.

“You lied to me, Jen. You lied to me, and that’s what hurts. It hurt back then, and it hurts sitting here right now. You told me all sorts of things, and I believed you. Trusted you. But when that woman started going on about your boyfriend back here, and how she’d heard so much from him about how wonderful you were, I knew that everything you’d said to me was bullshit. A lie. It hurt, and it made me really fucking angry. And so I did something I never do. I bounced. I walked off a job. I made up that shitty excuse about suddenly needing to get back home. And I’ll tell you why. Because right then I couldn’t deal with the idea that a woman as incredible as you had lied to me so casually. So fucking easily.” He’d maintained a neutral voice to this point, but now I heard anger. As slight as it was, there was no mistaking it. A tightness to the jaw. The ember that flared in his eyes.

And suddenly, even though I’d said different a moment ago, I didn’t want him to be that way. I wanted the other Steve back. Because this hurt far more than I expected.

He paused, and I could see in the way he stiffened that he was collecting himself. Pushing the anger down, reverting to the composed demeanor he’d had when I’d first sat down. His face went smooth, the jaw unclenched, the eyes cooled. He reached for his glass, took a sip, and then continued.

“I was honest with you. I answered your questions. I did not hide anything from you or lie to you when you discovered who I was, and what I was about. I could have made up some bullshit story about this…” He turned his wrist up at me. The wrist with the triskelion tattoo upon it. “That this was just some crappy little ying and yang symbol I’d gotten tatted up with when I was a Marine. But I didn’t. I told you the truth. And you responded. God damn did you respond so perfectly. And I swear to God I could not believe what was happening. I told you back then. Shit like that does not happen to me. It was incredible, Jen. It was incredible, unbelievable, and too good to be true. And that’s just it. It was too good to be true. I don’t know what your fucking deal was, or how much of what you said to me was really you, or if it was all just some weird, fucked up act you were putting on. Doesn’t matter. You had me. You had me right up until the moment when it all came tumbling down. I walked off that convention floor, and I’ll be goddamned if even then, as angry as I was, I couldn’t stop thinking. Why? Why? I asked myself that fucking question about a million times on the way back to Denver. I’ve probably asked it about a million times more since. Why? Why did you do it? What was in it for you? Why did you need to lie to me?”

Steve looked down for a moment, and then back up at me. His eyes were hard, that intense grey that had made me shiver the night he’d picked me up at the hotel in Chicago. My knuckles went white as my fingers gripped the wine glass in my hand, and yet I didn’t move a muscle as he continued.

“I was not lying to you when I wrote that letter, Jen. There has not been a single day since I walked out of that booth that I have not thought about you. And not just to ask why. But about you. As a person. The person I wanted to believe you were. So, here’s the thing. I asked you for an hour of your time. I know I’ve burnt up a little bit of that, but I’d like an answer to that question. I’d like to know why. Why did you do what you did? Why did you lie to me?”

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