Hex and the Single Girl (20 page)

William said, “You have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.”

And she came against his hand. He leaned in to kiss her mouth as soon as it started. She couldn’t help closing her eyes with the quake, and a series of images crashed into her head. Stars and spinning planets, a slash of orange, red, and yellow across a black sky like the aurora borealis. Emma herself wearing a pointy hat, zooming on a broom across the moon, a trail of fire in her wake.

Eventually, she returned to earth. He stopped kissing her and said, “I hope that felt as amazing as it looked.”

She said, “How did it look?”

“Cosmic,” he said.

“That is exactly right.”

They lay hugging on the bed. He brushed hair off her forehead. “Now tell me,” he said, “what is bigger than sex, love, art, and religion?”

“Magic,” she said.

“As in, hocus pocus?”

“Mysticism, the unknown, what we feel but don’t see, what we can’t understand and don’t question. The forces of the universe that have no reasonable explanation,” she said.

He continued toying with her waves, using a strand to stroke her cheek. “Interesting. I will give that more thought,” he said. “But not right now. I have an urgent concern”—which he proceeded to urge into her thigh—“that has drained all the blood from my brain.”

She gripped him and he filled her hand like a bat. They both moaned. She couldn’t help smiling at her own hunger for it. She thought she’d be hungry forever. Emma crawled on top of William. She rubbed him against her and then, slowly, eased him inside. He moaned again and his eyelids lowered. Emma almost asked him to open up, but then she figured, let him go. She’d watch him.

She rocked, squeezing him as she moved. Before too long, she closed her eyes, too. Instantly, her temperature went up five degrees. William turned to liquid beneath her and started making noises, a melt of alarm and abandon. She opened her eyes and concentrated on his face, his chest, glistening with sweat.

“Look at me,” she said.

He opened his eyes, grabbed her thighs, cried out, and came. Like an electrocution, he came, and Emma had to hold on or be thrown from the bed.

She lay flat on top of him, filled to the brim with relief and pride. She’d done it. She’d had sex. Hadn’t burst a vessel.

The man hadn’t fled in terror. In fact, he seemed quite content, as she was. Sex was suddenly spread out before her like an all-you-can-eat buffet. She had years of starvation to make up for. She wanted seconds, and thirds. And fourths.

“That was the most fun you can have with your clothes off,” he said.

She would have laughed, but instead she wondered, Had William said the same line before? To Marcie, perhaps? To any of the other women he’d been with? What about Daphne and her comment, “William wants me.” Had he pressed

his urgent concern against her thigh too?

And just like that, in a flash, Emma’s bliss and joy were gone.

She felt herself spiraling downward—not the direction she wanted afterglow to go. The shift wasn’t caused by jealousy alone. Even as she lay on top of William, his penis still inside her, Emma detected the odor of a swindle. She’d gotten a full dose of pleasure, true, but she felt cheated out of what she’d hoped sex would bring—love, a relationship, satisfaction of the soul. She’d faced her fears. That was good. She’d had a physical release. Also good. But she and William hadn’t become intimate (as if sex was how you got to know a person). The sad truth was, nearly everything he thought he knew about her was a lie.

A tinny taste in her mouth, Emma rolled off William, climbed off the bed, and searched the floor for her clothes.

He sat up and said, “You’re getting dressed?”

Emma said, “I had a wonderful time, William. Thank you.”

“That’s it?”

“I’ve really got to go.” She put on her shades.

William said, “After what just happened, you’re going to disappear?”

She said, “Like magic.”

And so Emma fled from William’s bed—confused, rocked, and guilty—just like the dozens of men who’d fled from

hers. She ran from the room, her clothes half-on, leaving William with all the sadness of all the times she’d been left.

Chapter 21

S
he rushed back to room 512. After Hoff admitted her, she sank into an armchair and buzzed from the inside out.

Emma’s thoughts were on a spinning wheel (relief, pride, joy, anxiety, sadness, excitement, back to relief, etc.). Her legs were shaking. Her hair tangled and wild. Her skin flushed.

“You look different,” said Hoff.

“You do,” agreed Armand, glancing up from baseball on TV. “Can I call room service? I’m hungry.”

“You haven’t done anything but watch TV,” snarled Hoff. “And I hate sports.”

“I only watch to divert my mind,” said Armand. “Otherwise, I’ll think about the fragility of human existence. We’re tissue paper. Our bodies are as flimsy as what we use to wipe our…”

“The room service menu is next to the phone,” said Hoff.

Emma asked, “Has Armand always been so morbid?”

“He says it comes from working at a hospital.”

“He’s right, about the fragility of human existence,” she said. “But courteous folk keep that to themselves.”

“Back to why your hair is such an unholy mess,” said Hoff.

“You say I look different?” Emma thought about adolescent claims that good sex changed a woman’s face. “Different how? Glowing? Radiant?”

“I was going to say ’upset’ or ’crazed.’ But radiant works,” said Hoff.

Armand said, “Does anyone want a cheeseburger, too?”

“Wait a minute, Armand,” said Hoff. “Now that Emma’s here, I won’t need you. I’m sure I can manage on my own

anyway.”

“You never know,” said Armand. “You could fall in the shower, crack your skull. I’m a trained professional. I know what to do in those situations.”

“What would you do?” asked Emma.

Armand said, “I’d check for a pulse. Then dial 911.”

Hoff said, “For this wisdom, I’m paying fifty dollars an hour? And, incidentally, I’ve taken two showers a day since I was twelve and I haven’t slipped yet.”

“Two showers a day?” asked Emma. “Every day?”

He said, “None since the mugging, and it’s making me nuts. I’m three showers behind.”

“One bit of advice,” said Emma. “Save the news about your compulsive showering until after the wedding.”

“Where is Susan, anyway?” asked Hoff, wincing as he sat upright. “God that smarts. I think it’s time for a pill.”

“She’s stretching her legs,” said Emma, watching Hoff sympathetically. He moved like a ninety-year-old. “We’ll have to keep Armand for the rest of the evening though. Susan and I have plans tonight.”

“Plans?” he asked with pretend casualness.

Emma wasn’t sure it was a good idea to tell Hoff about the rendezvous with Jeff. He would object for sure. “Don’t worry,” she said placatingly. “You have nothing to worry about. Susan is completely dependable, reliable, and upstanding.”

The door swung open, crashing against the wall. In the threshold, Susan Knight hiccupped and giggled, her arms around the neck of a tall man in a brown suit. She slurred, “I’m in love with Seal! He’s the sexiest man alive. He kissed me, on the lips. I got the Seal of approval!”

“Oh my God,” said Hoff, rushing toward the door with the sudden agility of an elf. He ignored Susan and offered a hand to her companion. “Mr. Dearborn, it’s an honor. Hoffman Centry. I’ve been speaking with your staff all week.

About a book project with Ransom House. I’m an editor there.”

“Vice president!” slurred Susan.

William gallantly deposited drunken Susan on a nearby chair and shook Hoff’s hand. Emma tried to make herself invisible.

“Is that you, Emma?” asked William. Her invisibility skills failing her.

“We can’t seem to get away from each other,” she replied.

“Only one of us wants to,” said William. He sounded hurt. She couldn’t believe it. Wasn’t an afternoon of hotel sex with a near stranger what he did every Wednesday?

Hoff looked from William to Emma and back again. He said, “I’m a close friend of Emma’s. Your doing a book with me was her idea, actually.”

“If Emma thinks I should write a book, I’ll write a book,” said William. His cell chirped. “Excuse me,” he said and answered it.

Emma whispered to Hoff, “I suggested no such thing.”

“You slept with him!” declared Hoff. “When?”

William hung up, frantic. “Someone at the party upstairs is choking on a crab cake!”

THUD. Armand stood up so quickly, his chair fell to the floor. “The threat of death, always lurking. Which way?”

demanded Armand with confidence and authority.

“Upstairs,” said William.

Armand and William raced up the five flights, leaping three at a time. Emma ran behind them. They took the flights in about sixty seconds and burst into the penthouse suite. Armand steamrolled toward a woman on the couch, her lips a ghastly blue. He grabbed her around the middle and Heimliched her. A glob of pre-digested crab cake flew out of her mouth, but she didn’t start breathing. Armand threw her on the floor and began CPR. It was both terrifying and exhilarating to watch. In about twenty seconds, she looked pinker. She began coughing aggressively. Armand helped her sit upright and patted her on the back.

When she stopped hacking, with her pallor normal and eyes no longer bugged, Emma recognized the woman instantly.

William kneeled down beside her. He said, “Chloe? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” said Ms. Sevigny. “I saw a tunnel of light. And then someone pulled me away from it, back to earth.” The princess of independent film looked into Armand’s black eyes. “It was you,” she said. “You saved me. I owe you my life.”

“You might feel differently in a couple of hours,” he said, bashfully.

“I want to repay you. What can I do?”

Armand said, “Donate blood every year to the hospital or blood bank of your choice.”

“I’ll start tomorrow,” she promised. “Will you help me get home?”

“Okay,” said Armand.

“Hey, what about Hoff?” asked Emma.

But Armand was lifting Chloe Sevigny into his arms and carrying her like a sack of laundry out of the penthouse suite and into the hallway. Chloe pushed the elevator button with the toe of her shoe.

She said, “My apartment is only a few blocks from here. Should we get a cab?”

Armand shifted her to his other shoulder and said, “I prefer to walk.”

After that scene, the party was done. What could follow? The beautiful and fabulous headed for the door. As they filed out, the newly divorced host accepted congratulations. Emma was pushed to the middle of the crowd. Somewhere

behind her, William said, “Emma? Are you still here? If you can hear me, please wait for me outside.”

She did no such thing. She rode a crowded elevator to the lobby. On a house phone, Emma called Hoff’s room. “All is well,” she told him. “Choking victim’s fragile human existence intact. Armand is no longer at your service. And please tell Susan I’ll see her at seven.”

“Susan is passed out, face down, on the bed.” Hoff sounded kind of pissed off.

Emma said, “At six, throw her in the shower and wake her up.”

“Like I can lift her with a broken rib? And what if she falls in the shower and cracks her skull?”

“Check her pulse and dial 911.”

“Yes, of course,” said Hoff. “Someone’s at the door. Got to go.”

Emma hung up, sighed with relief. Nothing like witnessing a near death to make a girl realize what life was really about: self-preservation. She’d flown high in bed with William. Couldn’t deny that. But if sex with him was always going to end in a crushing crash landing, just the one encounter was enough. Victor had often theorized that successful sex would puncture Emma’s protective bubble. How wrong he’d been. If anything, the bubble was thicker because of it.

With money in the bank and sex behind her, Emma could return to doing what she did best. Assisting other women in finding their bliss. Starting with Susan, tonight. She’d help her friend eradicate the last traces of Jeff Bragg from her consciousness.

This was one case Emma was looking forward to closing.

A couple of hours and three wigs later, Emma sat on a stool at Nancy’s Whiskey Bar, a dive that held the stench of fifty years of cigars smoked inside its greasy walls. Emma checked herself out in the mirror behind the mahogany bar.

She wore one of the scariest wigs in her collection: a mousey brown shoulder-length mullet, long in the back, short on the top and sides. The dishwater-gray aviator glasses and nude lipstick went perfectly with her ratty flannel shirt and black high-rise acid-washed jeans, a keychain hanging from the belt loop. On her feet, Timberland boots. Emma was going for a New Jersey bar dyke look, and she was pretty sure she nailed it.

No man would notice her. Or, if he did, he’d pretend he didn’t. In keeping with her outer toughness, she ordered a whiskey on the rocks.

“What kind?” asked the bartender, an older man, shaved head, with deep wrinkles in his forehead, big shoulders, and knotty knuckles.

“What do you recommend?”

“For you, Black Bush.” The seedy drunk a few seats down snickered.

Emma grinned inwardly. Her disguise was a success. “My favorite,” she trilled. “And let me buy you one. Old Grand Dad?”

The drunk snickered again. The bartender poured their drinks and drained his glass before Emma lifted hers. She put a twenty on the bar and waited.

Ten minutes later, Susan walked in, freshly showered, hair in a pony but damp on the ends. She glanced around at the room and its three patrons—two drunks with few teeth and the New Jersey dyke—before sitting by herself at a stool two down from Emma’s. As she walked past, Emma made a kissy sound at her. Susan’s petite nose crinkled and she looked away, uncomfortably out of her element.

This pleased Emma. If Susan didn’t recognize her, Jeff Bragg couldn’t possibly. She swiveled on her stool toward Susan intending to identify herself, but Jeff Bragg chose that moment to show up. Emma immediately swiveled back around, hugged the bar, keeping her mullet low.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Jeff, the wild card. He seemed cool and calm. Relaxed and confident. This was not the same man she’d seen at the Four Seasons. It was almost as if he had multiple personalities. A paranoid schizophrenic? Emma was ready to dial 911 at a moment’s notice. She hoped Susan’s five minutes wouldn’t drag to ten. Emma looked, but she couldn’t tell if Jeff was carrying the gun.