Sex and the Widow Miles (The Women of Willow Bay) (11 page)

He rolled over.
“What just happened?” With one finger, he turned my face toward him, but I resisted.

“
That
bastard!
” I hit the mattress with one fist. “That goddamned son of a bitch. He cheated on me, Will. God knows how many women he was with. Hell’s bells, I could be crawling with STDs and not even know it.” Sitting up, I threw off the covers. “I need a shower. I gotta get tested.”

“
Whoa, hang on.” He reached for me, but missed as I hopped off the bed.

I ran into the bathroom with
Will hot on my heels. The harsh light damn near blinded me when I flipped the switch.

Will blinked too, squinting at me.
“Julie, slow down. Talk to me.”

Grabbing a clean washcloth from the rack by the shower, I twisted the knob. Water rushed from the double shower heads, soaking us as we stood by the open glass door. Tears burned in my eyes and my lower lip trembled before I caught it between my teeth.

All of a sudden, I let out a wail that would’ve woke the neighbors if Will hadn’t had his walls soundproofed for guitar playing. I bent over, arms crossed over my belly, and sobbed. I couldn’t even speak. I couldn’t find words to tell him how I’d gone into Charlie’s old email box and found those notes from his lover. Pain cut through me so sharply I couldn’t stop crying long enough to admit what had brought me to his bed.

He
reached down to lift my face to his. It was right there in his eyes. He’d figured it out. Will knew exactly why I’d knocked on his door and why I’d jumped him after pretending for so long that I wasn’t in the slightest interested. Now, he’d shove me away and probably never speak to me again. I’d used him. It was wrong, so very wrong. He gazed into my eyes, his own expression unreadable at first. But instead of fury, his face softened with sympathy.

“
Oh, baby… I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

Then he guided me into the steamy shower, closed the door, and wrapped his arms around me, rocking with me under the warm spray while I wept.

ELEVEN

“No. I don’t want you to fix it. Just get rid of it, okay?”

Less than twenty-four hours after I
’d had the worst news and the best sex of my life, Will and I were arguing. “Throw it off the balcony. Toss it in the lake. Put it in the street and let the damn garbage truck run it over. Get it out of my sight. Please?”

“
Julie, that’s dumb.” Will fidgeted with the mouse next to Charlie’s laptop. “A waste of a perfectly good and very expensive laptop. How about if I remove the email program and reinstall a brand new one?” His voice took on a coaxing tone which at that moment was irritating the hell out of me.

“
No.
”

I wanted the fucking thing out of the apartment and out of my life. I never wanted to see it again.

“You’re acting like a child.” Pulling the little optical thingy from the side of the computer, he fitted it into the bottom of the mouse.

“
You should know.” A catty thing to say, but he was missing the point entirely. And I knew for a fact he wasn’t that obtuse. Couldn’t he see that the laptop represented more than Charlie’s infidelity? That it mocked the last thirty years of my existence?

“
Jules, it’s not the computer’s fault.” He’d let my snarky retort go.

He was way too nice a guy—he only wanted to help me deal with the devastating discovery of Charlie
’s affair. Or
affairs
—who the hell knew? I was still so angry I could barely breathe, and dammit, the son of a bitch wasn’t around to scream at… or kick in the balls. At that moment, I could’ve knocked Charlie’s lights out if he’d been present.

“
I know that.” I paced the high-ceilinged kitchen in Carrie’s apartment, debating the wisdom of trying to explain my attitude to Will. How could I make him understand? “It’s that he used that laptop to talk to
her,
to be with
her.
” I swallowed hard, determined not to cry again. He’d certainly had enough of my tears last night.

“
So now… what? It has cooties?”

I couldn
’t help it, I burst out laughing. I hadn’t heard that word since I was twelve. He was right, of course, but I simply couldn’t bear the thought of ever touching the machine again. I held one hand out. “Tell you what, I’ll keep the mouse, it’s mine. The rest of it goes. Now, please.”

“
How about I wipe the hard drive?” he offered. “Reload the programs and start fresh and clean.”

I paused, staring at the laptop. Just the sight of it left a bitter taste in my mouth, but curiosity niggled in the back of my mind. If I was ever going to know the whole story, I might need the computer and the emails to figure out who she was. Did I want to know?
My head shouted,
yes, find her and kick her butt,
but my heart cringed at the very thought.

Before I could say anything, Will
leaned over to grab the leather bag under the table. “The bag, too?”

“
Everything.”

“
Do you want to check it and make sure there’s nothing in it you want to keep?”

“
Like what?”

“
I don’t know. Papers? Mail? Cash? Stuff you might need?” Holding the bag up, he shook it.

“
Oh, for the love of—” For the life of me, I didn’t want to touch Charlie’s laptop satchel. Frankly, it didn’t matter what was in it.

Will stared at me, one brow raised, daring me to take it from his fingers.

I reached for it, jerked the zipper on the front pouch, and emptied it onto the countertop. A roll of butter rum Lifesavers hit the granite, along with three pens, a flash drive, and a handful of change. In the slim side pocket was one of Charlie’s ten or twelve pairs of reading glasses—the rimless ones he’d told me he’d lost.

Another lie
. The bastard.

The cords for recharging the computer fell out of the main compartment and the larger pocket on the back held a
New Yorker
magazine, a brochure from Tuckaway Winery, six wine corks—also from Tuckaway—and two unused Band-Aids.

I tossed the bag and the cords to Will.
“No secret documents. No condoms. No tell-all journal.” I’d given up trying to keep the anger out of my tone.

“
You’re sure?” He stuffed the computer in the bag and zipped it up as I swept the rest of the stuff off the counter into the trash compactor.

“
Yes.”

“
Julie, listen.” Tucking one finger under my chin, Will lifted my face to his. “At some point, you gotta deal with this.”

Twisting away, I turned to stare out the breakfast nook window at the lake in the distance, my hands curled into fists at my sides. Will put his arm around me and tugged me back against him. I let my head rest against his strong chest.

Deal with it
.

Yep, that
was
what I needed to do. “I can’t, Will.” Voice quivering, I gulped back tears. “It hurts. Dear God, it hurts and now I’m such a mess again.”

“
Julie, come on—” His hand smoothed down my back, easing the tension in my spine. “You’ve had some bad news and—”

I jammed my elbow into his stomach, pushing him away from me.
“Bad news?” My voice rose to shrill on the words. “Seriously? That’s what you call it? I find out my perfect marriage was a nothing but a–a sham and you call that
bad news?
Jesus, Will. You have no idea what I’m feeling, do you? Can you even imagine what it’s like to find out the man you thought adored you was busy doing it with another woman while you were taking care of his house, his kids… his
life
?”

A torrent of words poured out of me as Will stood still as a statue. I couldn
’t stop them. “The bastard was screwing around with God knows how many women the whole time he was pretending to be this perfect husband and father. Oh, and don’t forget—
Dr. Wonderful
. Everyone in that damn town believed he was right next door to a saint.” I took a breath before continuing to seethe. “Oh yeah, Saint Charlie… works the soup kitchen in Traverse City every Thanksgiving morning, spends hours sitting with patients post-surgery, attends PTA events—even if it means he has to come in late because of an emergency—never misses a single goddamned anniversary or birthday. Not once.”

I snorted.
“Don’t think I didn’t wear
that
like a badge of honor when my friends bitched about their husbands forgetting special days. Hell, Charlie brought me flowers or jewelry or something on the anniversary of the day we met, for sweet Christ’s sake.”

“
Julie, take a breath. Come here.” Will crossed to me and laid his hands on my shoulders. “If you need to rant, then rant. But let me help you.”

“
How?
How can you help me?” Squirming out of his grasp, I paced the kitchen into the dining room, the living room, casting about desperately for something I could throw. Rage boiled inside me. “I just want to hit something, break something. To hurt someone. I’ve never been this angry in my life.”

“
Here.” He met me by the grand piano and handed me…
his shoe?

I gazed up at him.
“What?”

“
Throw it. Hurl it against the door. If it leaves a mark, we’ll get it fixed.”

“
It’s okay.” I managed a weak smile. “Thanks, but I don’t need to throw your shoe.”

“
Do it,” he encouraged, his head cocked toward the wood front door. “Just chuck it. You’ll feel better, I promise.” Obviously he sensed my hesitation because he toed off his other loafer. “Look. Over there. Isn’t that Charlie by the door? Let him have it.”

I hefted the shoe before I drew back and launched it with every ounce of strength I could muster.

Take that, you asshat.

The leather loafer hit the door with a very satisfactory whump.

“You got him. Right on his big fat head.” Will tossed me his other shoe. “Do it again. I think he’s still conscious.”

His grin was infectious. So with a wicked smile, I took a pitcher
’s stance, wound up, and threw the loafer as hard as I could.

“
And he’s out!” Will shouted with a raucous hoot. “Want to do it again? Take your shoes off.”

But I was exhausted and suddenly out of the mood to lob any more shoe grenades.
“Thanks, Will.” My voice cracked.

No
, goddammit, no more tears! I refuse to cry over that man, ever again.

Instead, I brushed past
him to the kitchen where I opened the wine fridge. “I’m thinking a big glass of wine would be good about now.”

“
It’s five o’clock somewhere.” Will agreed and took the bottle of wine from me. “Go sit on the couch. I’ll bring it to you.”

I flopped on the sofa as
he found the corkscrew and opened the pinot noir I’d pulled from Liam and Carrie’s stash. After filling two glasses, he joined me. I could tell he was trying unobtrusively to judge my frame of mind. I stared off into space as I sipped, shoving the hurt down.

I wanted to explain the mish
mash of emotions roiling inside me.
Betrayed?
Most certainly.
Hurt?
Beyond words.
Furious?
Absolutely. But as I sat there, I went from angry to sad to confused, and it must have shown on my face.

“
Talk to me,” he coaxed. “What’re you thinking?”

“
Who is she?” In one rather ungraceful move, I sat up, curled my feet under me, and faced him.

He shrugged and took a drink of wine.
“Who knows?”

“
No. Really. Who
is
she?”

Teeth worrying my lower lip, I stared at him, but I wasn
’t really seeing him. Instead, I was racking my mind, sorting through over thirty years’ worth of friendships, acquaintances, work colleagues—anyone at all Charlie might have been screwing.

“
Why do you need to know who she is? Who any of them were?” He slid over and tugged me into his arms without spilling a drop of wine from either of our glasses. “He’s gone. It’s over.”

I settled against his broad chest, drawing comfort from the warmth of his body next to mine.
“But… I think… I think he
loved
her. I read the emails. They were crazy about each other.” A long sip of wine and several deep sighs later, I went on, relentless in my examination. “I don’t know how many women there were over the years, but
this
one wasn’t a one-night stand, Will. Or even a fling. They were involved for at least two years that I know of. It could’ve been longer than that.”