Page 119 of The Honest Affair

She leaned forward and buried her face in her knees, unable to say anything more. I could easily imagine what had happened, though I wasn’t sure it was entirely accurate.

“Nina,” I said carefully. “I need to know the truth. I understand if you can’t talk about it, but, baby, just nod your head, yes or no. So there is absolutely no misunderstanding. That day in the elevator…did your husband hit you?”

She bit her lip, then slowly, she nodded.

“Multiple times?”

Another slow nod.

I inhaled deeply and exhaled through my nose. Don’t kill him. Don’t kill him. Yet.

“Did he…” I shook my head as I reached down and fingered the rip in her dress. God, I could hardly think it, let alone say it out loud. But I had to. I had to in order to do what needed to happen next. “Did he rape you?”

She bit her lip. Two more tears fell down her porcelain cheeks. And then, so slowly it followed the crack in my heart, she nodded one last time.

“So it wasn’t claustrophobia that day, was it? That’s—that’s why you’re afraid of elevators. Because of what he did to you in one.”

It made sense, now. She wasn’t afraid of any other confined spaces. Cars, planes, trains. Crowded rooms, balconies. None of them made a difference. But it was elevators—especially that elevator, I realized—that made her jump into a terror because of this.

“I couldn’t get out,” she whispered. “Matthew, I couldn’t get out!”

It was then I finally pulled her under my arm, stroked her hair until she started to calm again.

“Was that the only time?” I asked. I had to.

Her face buried in my shoulder, she shook her head silently.

“And was it...was that the first time?”

She paused. And again, shook her head.

“The last?”

Another pause. One more shake, side to side.

“Usually…I would just let him take what he wanted. After a while, it was easier than fighting him. Except for the times I just had to.” She touched her wrist with one hand.

“And after you and I started—”

“No,” she interrupted vehemently, sitting up in a fury. “Oh, Matthew, please believe me. I never cheated on you—”

“Cheated?” I said with disbelief. “Do you really think that if your husband raped you, I’d consider it cheating? As if I, the other fucking man, even had a right to say it anyway?”

“You have a right,” Nina said, sniffing. “You have a right to what belongs to you. As have I, do I not?”

I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing even though my blood was boiling. Sure, there was a part of me that wanted to agree with her, say she belonged to me.

But it wasn’t quite right.

“I don’t make that choice, doll. You do.”

“Well, I did,” she said, her voice floating sweetly through the air. “Every day since I met you, my love.”

“And when you did fight him?” I asked, even though I already knew.

Every bruise I had ever seen on her beautiful body was flashing through my mind. The shadows on her delicate wrists. The fading marks on her thighs or neck.

I closed my eyes, not wanting her to see the strong urge to murder I knew must have been reflected in them. The anger I felt toward myself for not knowing, and yet somehow knowing. And never really acting on it.

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