“No,” he answered. “Never.”
“Really?” I was intrigued. “What’s she like in bed?”
“We don’t do much anymore. I have more fun with other girls.”
Other girls? Was there one besides me? Tension shot down my back, straightening my spine. “Oh, you have other girls?” I said, in a teasing voice. “Why don’t you ask them over so we can party together?”
“I’m not seeing anyone else right now. Just you, Lacey.” It was probably as close to a declaration of affection as I’d ever get from him.
“But there have been other girls, before me?”
“Sure.” Harris lit a cigarette and lay back.
“What happened to them?”
“Sometimes I get tired of them. Sometimes they meet someone else. And sometimes...” His eyes looked hazy, as if he were working on a puzzle. “Things just don’t work out.”
Who wouldn’t want to take your calls? I thought. “Have you ever thought about breaking up with Meredith?”
“Sure”
“But you haven’t done it.”
“I did once.”
“Really? What happened?”
“There was this other girl who I... well, I fell for her, and Meredith... well, Meredith was being Meredith.” He dragged on his cigarette. If only it could have made him more articulate. “But it didn’t work out. The other girl... changed.”
“Changed how?”
Harris stared at the ceiling. I repeated my question, but he wouldn’t look at me. “It just didn’t work out,” he said finally.
“So Meredith moved back in?”
“Yeah. She makes my life... well, not easy, but it’s... familiar, I guess. Even though I kind of hate living with her.” He took a long drag. “Sometimes I think she likes it that I sleep with other women, so I don’t bother her. My own wife doesn’t want me.” His eyes were watery.
“You mean she doesn’t work at pleasing you?” I leaned over and kissed him.
“She’s not like you, Lacey. You work really hard at making me happy.” He was staring at me intently. “If she moved out would you move in?”
“Are you asking me to?” In spite of everything, I was still eager. I wanted to live in that apartment.
“Yes.” His voice was quiet, almost shy. “I don’t like to be alone. If she moves out, you’d have to move in immediately.”
“I think that could be arranged.”
“It would be fun, having you here all the time.” He crushed his cigarette. “You wouldn’t travel all the time and leave me here, would you?”
“Never,” I promised, tempted to cross my fingers.
“I bet we’d have a lot of fun together,” he said.
“Oh, we would.”
“I’ll think about it,” he said.
I wanted to slap him. The way he sounded made it seem entirely his decision, not mine. His job at the hedge fund and his money had made him incredibly arrogant. Still, that money was what I wanted.
“I’ll make you happier than she ever has,” I said, going on to argue my point without words.
When I left Harris’s apartment after that extended visit, I was pleased with myself. But as I stepped outside, into the sunshine, it hit me that he hadn’t so much as given me cab fare back to Flatbush.
It hit me then what a sweet deal Meredith had.
There I was, standing on the street with my overnight bag, crammed full of little luxuries I’d pilfered from Meredith’s dressing table. Perfume, skin-perfecting serums and creams, luxe makeup, and a pair of silver earrings that she must have deemed not important enough to lock up. I’d picked up her leavings and kept her husband occupied while she was off in a tropical paradise.
She didn’t want Harris, but she wasn’t going to divorce him, either. The fact that he was sleeping with me actually enabled him to stay with her.
That realization hurt. I wandered, dazed, to the subway entrance on Lexington, but I couldn’t make myself walk down the stairs. It wasn’t that I was afraid of the subway, but I dreaded the moment when I would have to return to my crappy apartment in Flatbush. The thought of turning all three locks and stepping inside a room that stank of mold and mu shu pork was more than I could bear just then. Instead I wandered south, found myself in front of a church, and was drawn inside.
It had been years since I’d stepped into a church, much less a confessional. I wasn’t ready to go that far now, but I reflexively dipped my hand into the font, then slipped into a pew. There were a few other people sitting in the church, and they stared ahead, almost as if the priest were performing Mass. I opened my bag and extracted the Post-it note: Hands off Hedge Hog. None of this belongs to you.
How many times had Meredith written notes like that to the different women Harris had cheated with? I was just the latest in a long line, and suddenly, it didn’t seem worth it. It wasn’t as if I loved Harris. I adored his apartment and craved his lifestyle. But I didn’t even like him, and I shuddered to think of the life ahead of me, with Harris pawing at me and then shoving me aside. I was doing wrong, and it wasn’t even getting me anywhere.
Stop now, I told myself. Move on. There are plenty of other rich guys out there. I decided then and there that I wasn’t crawling after Harris anymore. And I was going to run the other way if he came after me. There had to be someone better.
My resolution lasted almost three months. That was long enough for me to have the satisfaction of blowing Harris off the next several times he tried to get me to sleep with him.
“But why not?” he asked me, once he realized I was serious. “We have a good time together, Lacey. I thought you cared about me.”
“You’re married, and I’m not interested in a married man.”
The wounded expression on his jowly face was priceless. Better yet, I met Nigel, another hedge-fund manager, but one who was a handsome triathlete with a sexy South African accent. For a month, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven, until I actually almost died. Nigel had flown me — on a private plane — to Bermuda for a weekend.
“What I love about you, Lacey, is that you don’t have any inhibitions. You don’t, do you?” he asked.
“None at all,” I’d answered. His hands caressed my neck, and then he started to throttle me. I tried to scream, but no sound came out of my mouth but a choked gurgle. His green eyes were wide with excitement, and the more I panicked, the more they gleamed. Then I blacked out. When I woke up, Nigel was sipping champagne and smoking a Cuban cigar. I was on the floor.
“That was lovely, Lacey,” he said. “You do bruise up terribly, though.”
There were marks on my throat where he’d gripped me, a necklace of black and blue. After that, Harris started looking pretty good again. Especially since he was pursuing me. There were flowers and plaintive phone calls. He bought me a bracelet from Tiffany & Co., and when that didn’t work, a necklace from Harry Winston. He couldn’t understand what had happened, but he’d do anything to get me back, he said.
“Then get rid of Meredith,” I told him.
He did, and I moved into his apartment the next day. It was even more gorgeous than I remembered. Meredith hadn’t smashed any glass or done any damage. Instead, she’d packed up her jewelry and some clothing and personal items and left. Harris didn’t know where she’d gone. Her clothing was still on hangers and most of her shoes were there, but the luxurious toiletries and makeup were gone.
But there was a note on her dressing table: Hedge Hog is all yours. Enjoy it while it lasts.