Commitment (56 page)

“I’m wearing brown.”

Riley turned at the sound of his voice. Shawn was standing at the door holding up a shirt. She shrugged.
“Okay?”

“In case you wanted to wear something that . . .”

She smiled. “That matches? Are we coordinating colors now?”

S
hawn said nothing. S
he suspected that it was his way of checking out her outfit to make sure it wasn’t too revealing
. Taking a quick scan, she pulled out a pale yellow Donna Karan maxi dress with a halter neckline. There was a slit that ran up to her mid-thigh, but no one could accuse her of showing too much skin in this number, not even her ridiculously jealous husband.

“How’s this look?”

“Good,” he nodded, satisfied and walked out. “I’m about to jump in the shower.”

Normally, he would have asked her to join him.
Normally
, she would not
need
to be asked. Riley instead headed for the kitchen where she fixed herself a quick snack of crackers and brie. It was going to be a long, long
night
.

g

She couldn’t remember ever having been this angry.
Ever
. Riley twirled her champagne glass between her fingers and tried to concentrate on what Chris was saying but couldn’
t. Her gaze was drawn repeatedly to the other end of the great room where a woman with a creamy chocolate complexion and long, glossy jet black hair was taking every opportunity to touch her husband.

Shawn would say something and she would laugh, reaching out to strok
e his lapel or squeeze his arm.
Shawn would turn to speak to someone else, and she would rest her arm, oh so casually, on his shoulder. Shawn headed for the bar an
d she followed. Not immediately—
becau
se that would be too obvious
—
but shortly thereafter. For an hour now, ever since dinner, this woman in the elect
r
ic blue dress had been hanging on to him and Shawn didn’t seem to want to do anything about it.

“Who is that?” she asked Chris now, interrupting something he was in the middle of saying, something she hadn’t been listening to in any event.

Chris glanced in Shawn’s direction. “Stephanie something. She’s an Arista executive.” Then he smiled. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

Riley determinedly turned her back so that she was no longer looking in Shawn and Stephanie-Something’s direction.

Chris shoo
k his head and stifled a smile.
“This is nothing,” he said. “You should see when he’s just gotten done performing.”

Riley took a swallow of her champagne. “Thanks,” she said. “Thank you for that.”

Shawn had been ignoring her all night. On the ride to the party, he’d answered every question she asked with monosyllables until she started feeling a little
desperate and
humiliated for trying so hard to get him to
speak
to her. Finally she’d just turned away and looked out the window at the city lights whizzing by. The drive out to Long Island seemed to take forever, like the silence.

Once or twice, she glanced at Shawn out of the corner of her eye but he was answering email, or texting. He may as well have been in the car alone.
Earlier, when she’d come out of the dressing room fully dressed, he’d looked her over as though he was checking for compliance with some unspoken standard. Apparently, she’d met the standard, though just barely.

“Let’s go,” he’d said. “I called a car. They should be downstairs by now.”

Dur
ing dinner,
was when Stephanie-Something had made her first appearance. Their host, the corpulent head of Sony Music, had followed the Emily Post
guideline
of not seating
couples
together
,
so instead Shawn was seated next to Stephanie-Something. All through dinner,
the woman had
ogled
him
and totally ignored the person sitting on the other side of her.
Once
,
she’d reached out for his bread instead of her own and
broke
off and ate
a
piece
of it before realizing her mistake. And when she did, she held his arm as she apologized, and somehow, her hand stayed where it was, on his arm, all through the salad course.

At that point,
Riley
might have been
inclined to chalk it up to being
just a case of
yet
another flirty woman trying to get Shawn’s attention, but he seemed to enjoy it. He smiled and oriented his body toward her
when she spoke to him
. And there was the
subtle way he leaned his head in her direction.
He seemed to know her, Riley thought. They weren’t new acquaintances, she was almost certain of it.
She could feel the pace of her heart increase.

And now, she was being forced to suffer through the after-dinner cocktails, watching Shawn being pawed and followed around by this tramp in heat.
Riley emptied her glass and handed it to Chris.

“Could you get me another one of these?”

“You sure?” he asked. “You’ve had a few, haven’t you?”

“What are you, the drink police?” she asked. Even she could hear that she slurred a little that time.

Chris looked at her and nodded. “Okay, I’ll get you one more.”

Riley watched as he crossed the room in the direction of the bar. On his way there, he paused and said something in Shawn’s ear.
Whatever it was, Shawn looked at her, really looked at her for the first time all night. For a moment, their eyes met and in that instant, he looked like himself. He looked at her the way he always did, like she was the most important person in the world; the
only
person in the world.
And just as her anger dissipated just a smidgen, Stephanie-Something leaned in to recapture his attention.

Instead of waiting for Chris to bring her the drink, she headed for the bar herself, brushing by Shawn as she went. Before she could get there, he held her arm and leaned in, his lips pressed against her ear.

“We’re leaving,” he said. “You don’t need another one of those.”

That tiny contact, his lips on her ear, softened her and
Riley turned to look at him
but
his face was so hard
and cold
, it made her want to cry. One minute pissed and now she wanted to cry.

What the hell was wrong with her?

She opened her mou
th to tell him she wasn’t ready just to be difficult,
but honestly,
by then
she
would
have done just
about anything to get him away from that woman who
even now seemed to be
simply biding her time until Shawn got rid of his troublesome little wife.

“
Fine
,” she said. “Let’s go.”

She turned on her heel and walked away.

The drive back seemed longer than the one that got them there.
Riley
sat still and quiet for as long as she could, but they
were now minutes from
home, and
she
had a feeling Shawn would retreat immediately to his den. And tomorrow, he would be leaving. If she wanted to address everything that had happened this evening, now might be her best
chance
.

“Do you know her?” she asked, trying to maintain control of her voice.

“Who?”

“Th
e
devil
in
the
blue dress.”

Shawn gave a short laugh.
“
Riley, you
had
too much
to drink
.
You’re trippin’
.
”

“I asked if you knew her,” she said
, her voice rising
.

Shawn turned to look at her, and his face was obscured in the dark of the car.

“Yeah,” he said. “I know her.”

Something about the way he said it made it clear that he meant he
knew
Stephanie. In the biblical sense. Riley felt her face
—
no
, her entire
head—
grow
warm. Before she could stop herself, she swung at him, but Shawn grabbed her wrist, his eyes wide and surprised.

“What the . . . Riley!
”

Then they were pulling up in front of their building and Riley pried her hand lose, opening the door and running inside, past Javier
, the evening doorman,
and toward the elevator
s
. She was relieved when the doors opened for her right away and she got upstairs
well
ahead of him.

In the bedroom she peeled off her dress and tossed it across the armchair, sitting on the edge of the bed in her underwear and beginning to unst
r
ap her
overpriced, silver designer
high heels.
Stupid fucking
shoes
that she only ever wore to events like this, because she was trying to be a good wife and trying to fit in . . .
a
nd what was the thanks she got? Complete humiliation; first at Cameron’s party and again tonight.

“Riley!”

She jumped at the sound of Shawn’s voice. Shouting. He was
shouting
at her now. Riley’s heart raced, and she could feel something building inside her, intensifying to what was sure to be a terrifying crescendo.
When he appeared at the bedroom door she looked up at him.

“What the fuck was that?” he demanded.

“You’re a hypocrite, that’s what
!
” she said. “You spent the whole night with that woman hanging on
to
you like  . . .”

“She works for Arista, Riley.
She’s in . . .”

“Don’t you dare
stand there and pretend that was a business relationship
!”

“Okay, yeah,”
Shawn ran a hand over his head.
“I fucked her once.
So what? It was b
efore we were married.”

“Hypocrite!” Riley grabbed one of her stilettos and launched it at his head.

Shawn ducked and it crashed instead against the bedroom door. Undaunted, Riley grabbed the other shoe and threw that at him as well. That time,
her missile made contact with its intended target, hitting Shawn in the bicep. He looked at her as though she was a complete stranger, his mouth open in shock. Then before she knew what was happening, Shawn had crossed the room a
nd pushed her back onto the bed,
holding her down by her arms, his legs straddling hers.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asked.

He actually looked concerned, as
though
he suspected she’d lost her mind but Riley was too
enraged
to stop now. She thrashed beneath him, trying to shake him off her, but he was too strong and all she succeeded in doing was exhausting herself
. He
held her fast until she stopped
fighting him and instead
lay there, helpless
, her
chest heaving, her heart feeling as though it might jump right out of her chest.

“Baby,” he began.

“Don’t ‘baby’ me!” she snapped. “You were with her all evening! If I ever paid that much attention to any man,
no,
to
any
person
other than you . . .”

Shawn
blanched
as her words sunk in.
For an instant, he looked almost ashamed
. Riley, taking this as a possible
moment of weakness and an opportunity
, tried again to
break free
but
still,
he held her in place. Then he lowered his head so his forehead was pressed against hers
and despite working to hold on to it, she could feel her anger begin to dissolve.

“I don’t understand what’s going on with you,” Riley said, her voice trembling a little.
“Or why
you
’re
treat
ing
me
this
way
.”

Still he said nothing. Riley tried
once
again to get away but he wouldn’t release his grip.

“Stop, Shawn,” she said
, frustrated
. “Just l
et me go.”