CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN
“I’ve missed you so much, sweetheart,” Richard says.
At the love and tenderness filling his voice, something in my chest twists.
My ex-husband stands not nine feet from me. He returned from Chicago a few hours ago and stopped by his place to change into jeans and a polo shirt before arriving here, at Emma’s apartment.
I am crouched down, staring through an old-fashioned keyhole in her bedroom closet. It is the only place that gives me both cover and a vantage point into the room.
Emma sits on the edge of her bed in sweatpants and a T-shirt. A package of Sudafed, a box of tissues, and a cup of tea rest on her nightstand. I thought of those touches.
“I brought you chicken soup and fresh-squeezed orange juice from Eli’s. And some zinc. My trainer swears by it to kick summer colds.”
“Thank you.” Emma’s voice is feeble and soft. She is convincing.
“Can I get you a sweater?”
My insides clench as Richard’s form fills my vision, blotting out the rest of the room. He is approaching my hiding place.
“Actually, I’m too warm. Could you bring me a cool washcloth for my forehead?”
We didn’t practice those lines; Emma improvises well.
I don’t exhale until I hear his footsteps reverse themselves as he heads to the bathroom.
I shift slightly; I’ve been kneeling for several minutes and my legs are aching.
Emma hasn’t looked my way even once. She is still reeling from my revelation; she doesn’t seem to completely trust me. I don’t blame her.
“You don’t get to orchestrate my life any longer,” she’d said to me yesterday as I stood in her hallway, by the elevator. “I’m not going to end things with Richard on the phone just because you told me to do it. I’ll decide when to call my wedding off.”
But at least she is allowing me to remain close by tonight with my cell phone in hand. Watching him. Protecting her.
We both predicted Richard would insist on visiting when Emma told him she was sick. Faking illness solves a multitude of problems. If Richard is tracking Emma’s movements, it would explain why she skipped her yoga class. Why she wants to sleep at her own place. And why she can’t even kiss him, let alone have sex with him. I wanted to spare her that.
“Here you go, baby,” Richard says, coming back into the room.
I glimpse him bending over the bed, then his back blocks me from seeing his movements. Still, I imagine him holding the damp washcloth to Emma’s forehead and smoothing back her hair. Looking at her with so much love.
My kneecaps feel as if they are grinding against the hardwood floor. My thighs are burning; I am desperate to stand up and shake out my legs. But Richard might hear.
“I hate for you to see me like this. I’m a wreck.”
If I didn’t know the truth, I would be certain she was innocent of any ulterior motives.
“Even when you’re sick, you’re the most beautiful woman in the world.”
I still know Richard so well. He genuinely means every word. If Emma expressed a craving for a strawberry sorbet or cozy cashmere socks, he’d scour Manhattan to get her the best. He’d sleep on the floor next to her if she said it would make her feel better. This is the part of my ex-husband’s nature that is the most difficult to expunge from my heart. At this moment, just like his profile through the keyhole, it is all I can see.
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Then I immediately force them open. I’ve learned the danger of failing to observe the things I don’t want to behold.
If Emma didn’t live up to Richard’s expectations—and it was inevitable that she would fail to—there would be consequences. If she wasn’t the wife of his fantasies, he would hurt her, then give her jewelry to smooth it over. If she didn’t provide the family or create the kind of home he desired, he would systematically assault her reality and twist it until it became unrecognizable even to her. And worst of all, he would take away whatever or whomever she loved the most.
“I’ll tell Maureen you need to cancel tomorrow,” Richard says to Emma.
Perfect, I think. This delay could buy us some more time to figure out how to best extract Emma.
But instead of agreeing, Emma says, “No, I’m sure I’ll be better if I just get some rest.”
“Anything you want, my love, but the most important thing is you.”
Even through the closet door I can feel the magnetic pull of his charisma.
I was holding on to the hope that Emma would begin to create distance between her and Richard tonight. But after only a few minutes in his presence, she seems to be wavering.
Through the keyhole, I can see their clasped hands. His thumb is gently stroking her wrist.
I want to leap out of the closet and wrench them apart; he is swaying her. Luring her back to him.
“Besides, Maureen has to come over so I can show her my wedding dress.” That dress is now hanging six inches to my left; Emma tucked it in here so Richard wouldn’t see it. “Plus we have those fun wedding errands. You don’t think I’m going to let you do the cake tasting alone, do you?” she continues in a playful voice.
This is the opposite of what should be happening. The Emma of right now is a completely different woman from the one of twenty-four hours ago who asked me, as we stood in this same room, how Richard could be so wonderful yet so brutal.
I cannot hold my position any longer. I slowly lift my right knee off the floor and plant my foot gently down. I repeat the motion with my left leg. Inch by agonizing inch, I rise. Dresses and shirts engulf me, silky fabrics sliding across my face.
A hanger clinks against the metal rod, the sound as delicate and precise as a wind chime striking a single note.
“What was that?” Richard asks.
I cannot see anything.
His citrus scent surrounds me, or am I imagining it? I suck in a shallow inhalation. My heart pounds violently. I am terrified I will pass out, my body thumping against the closet door.
“Just my creaky old bed.” I hear Emma shift, and miraculously, the bed squeaks. “I can’t wait until I only sleep in yours.”
Again, I am stunned by her lightning-quick subterfuge.
Then Emma says, “But there is one thing I need to tell you.”
“What’s that, sweetheart?”
She hesitates.
I sink back down to peer through the keyhole again. I wonder why she’s drawing out their conversation. She knows how clever Richard is; doesn’t she want him out of the apartment before he figures out she isn’t really sick?
“Vanessa called me today.”
My eyes widen and I barely suppress a gasp. I can’t believe she has set me up again.
Richard barks an expletive and violently kicks the wall next to Emma’s dresser. I feel the vibrations through the floorboards. I see his fists clench and unclench.
He stands facing the wall for a few moments, then he turns around to look at Emma.
“I’m sorry, baby.” His voice is strained. “What bullshit did she tell you this time?”
Emma has chosen to believe Richard. The act she has been putting on was to trick me. I can call 911, but what will the police think if Emma and Richard tell them I broke in here?
Emma’s clothes are suffocating me. There’s no air in this small closet. I’m trapped. I feel the grip of claustrophobia descend as my throat tightens.
“No, Richard, it wasn’t like that. Vanessa apologized. She said she’s going to leave me alone.”
My head is swimming. Emma is so far off any script I could have anticipated that I can’t even guess at her intentions.
“She’s said that before.” I can hear Richard breathing heavily. “But she keeps calling and coming to my office and writing letters. She won’t stop. She’s insane—”
“Honey, it’s okay. I really believe her. She sounded different.”
My legs feel as if they’ve turned to liquid. I have no idea why Emma created this pretense.
Richard exhales. “Let’s not talk about her. I hope we never have to again. Can I get you anything else?”
“All I want to do is sleep. And I don’t want you to get sick. You should go. I love you.”
“I’ll pick you and Maureen up at two tomorrow. I love you, too.”
I stay in the closet until Emma opens the door a few minutes later. “He’s gone.”
I bend and unbend my legs and wince. I want to ask her about the unexpected turn in her conversation, but her face is so expressionless that I know she only wants me out.
“Can I wait a few minutes before I leave?”
She hesitates, then nods. “Let’s go into the living room.” I catch her sneaking appraising looks at me. She’s wary.
“What are we going to do next?”
She frowns. I can tell my use of the word we chafes her. “I’ll figure it out.” She shrugs.
Emma doesn’t get it. She doesn’t seem to feel any urgency to call off the wedding. If Richard can be this compelling in a brief visit, what will happen when he feeds her bites of cakes, his arm wrapped around her waist, and whispers promises of how happy he’ll make her?
“You saw him kick the wall,” I say, my voice rising. “Don’t you see what he is?”
This is so much bigger than just Emma. Even if Richard lets Emma go—which I’m not convinced he’ll do—what about all the many ways in which Richard hurt me? And the woman before both of us, the dark-haired ex who couldn’t bear to keep that gift from Tiffany’s? I am now certain he hurt her, too.
My ex-husband is a creature of habit, a man ruled by routines. Whatever stunning piece of jewelry that glossy blue bag contained was his apology; his attempt to literally cover up an ugly episode.
Emma does not know that I intend to save any woman who could become Richard’s future wife.
“You have to end it soon. The longer it goes on, the worse it will be—”
“I said I’ll figure it out.”
She walks to the door and opens it. I reluctantly step past her.
“Good-bye,” she says. I have the distinct feeling she plans to never see me again.
But she’s wrong about that.
Because by now I know I need a plan of my own. The seed of an idea was planted as I watched Richard’s explosive flash of anger at the mention of my name, my fictitious call. It takes shape in my mind as I walk down the blue-carpeted hallway, following the path Richard took only minutes ago.
Emma thinks Maureen is coming over to see the wedding gown tomorrow, then they’ll go cake tasting with Richard.
She has no idea what will really happen.