The Adultery Club (37 page)

My body burns with need. I feel as if I’ve been awakened from a very long, deep sleep by a pornographic Prince Charming. I’d almost forgotten it could be this good.

He moves up my body, kissing my tummy, my belly button, my breasts. I taste myself on his lips as he reaches my mouth.

“I want you inside me,” I moan.

I reach for him, and he’s firm, but no longer hard; I’ve kept him waiting too long. I push him back on the pillows and slide down his body to take him in my mouth. I suck and tease and stroke, my fingers feathering across his thighs and balls, and after a few minutes I feel his cock spring to life.

I disengage myself and ease astride him, welcoming him home, drawing him deeper inside me. His thrusts grow harder and faster, and I feel my orgasm start to rise, the heat building between my legs. Before I can come, Nick spins me round and moves on top of me. I don’t mind the change in
position—but all of a sudden he isn’t thrusting deep inside me anymore. He loses his rhythm and slips out of me. I put my hand between our legs to help him back.

“Oh,” I say.

“I’m sorry,” Nick mumbles.

“Forget it. It happens. It’s not a big deal.”

He rolls away from me and stares up at the ceiling, head resting on the crook of his arm. We both know I’m lying. Whether I like it or not, sex is not just an important part of our relationship: It defines it. If it goes wrong in the bedroom then we are, forgive the pun, screwed.

Or rather:
not
.

I get out of bed and grab my red kimono. I suddenly feel very, very sick and very, very scared. “Just getting a drink of water.”

In the bathroom, I switch on the shower and stand beneath it, closing my eyes and leaning my head against the cool tiles. How has it all gone wrong so fast? Or—or was it always wrong, and I just refused to see it? Too busy enjoying the thrill and the secrecy and the danger and the unattain-ability to acknowledge the truth. Which is that much as I love him—and I do, oh, God,
I do
—Nick and I have nothing in common except the pleasure we share in bed, and without that, there is absolutely nothing holding us together.

Except that’s not quite true.

Instinctively, my hands curve protectively around my belly. Soft, squishy, still looking exactly the same as it always has.

But three and a half weeks late isn’t nothing, much as I’ve tried to tell myself it is. Three and a half weeks late is
something
. Morning sickness, glowing skin, lustrous hair, and heavy, tender breasts are all
something
. And it has nothing to
do with questionable takeaways or insufficient sit-ups or stress.

I can’t do this on my own. Alarm bells about Nick are going off in all directions, but
I can’t do this on my own
.

The hot water starts to run cold. I step out of the shower, and dry off. Knotting the belt of my robe, I pad back toward the bedroom.

He’s whispering, but the flat is very small, and very quiet. My footsteps don’t make a sound on the pale ash floor. And so I overhear my lover tell another woman—his wife—how much he loves her, as he begs her to take him back.

When he finally ends the call and looks up, I tell him.

I find Dad in
the greenhouse at the end of the garden, tenderly separating a tray of tiny seedlings into individual pots. Slumping onto a wooden bench out of his way, I watch him press each small plant in gently with his thumbs. He nods at me to show he’s noticed I’m there, but quietly goes on with his work for ten minutes or so, until the tray is empty.

Finally he straightens up, brushing his hands together to get rid of the loose soil. He surveys the neat row of pots with satisfaction. “Should do nicely this year,” he says. “Good and strong, this batch are. And the beds should be fertile, thanks to your mother’s compost. All those potato peelings and such.”

“Don’t let her hear you say that, Dad. She’ll have a fit if she thinks she’s helping.”

He starts to tidy his tools away. “Well, that’s your mother for you. Not likely to change now.”

I pick up a cloth rag and start to clean earth from a small trowel. Beside me, Dad rolls a length of green gardening
twine into a ball. It’s hot and humid in here; sweat collects beneath my breasts and trickles between my shoulder blades. The air is close and has the sickly sweet smell of rotting fruit. A fly buzzes against a windowpane, and Dad leans over me to open the window and let it out. The cooler outside air brings with it the familiar scent of freshly mown grass and blossoms from the may tree at the end of the garden. I’m reminded of all those summer days I spent cooped up indoors, frantically cramming for exams, while outside the rest of the world turned, carefree.

“If you could just talk to her, Dad,” I start.

He grunts. “Won’t make any difference.”

“I know it’s not what she would’ve chosen for me, Dad, but it’s my life. I love Nick, and he loves me. Can’t she just accept that and be happy for me?”

“She just worries about you, love. We both do.” He reaches up to hook the ball of twine on a nail in the wall. “When you have children, you’ll understand. It’s not a question of whether we approve or not. We just don’t want you to get hurt.”

I swallow a great big ball of guilt. I can’t tell them about the baby, not yet. Christ, they haven’t even
met
Nick; the last thing they need to know is that he’s already knocked up their precious little girl.

I fold the cloth rag neatly into squares.

“The only person who’s going to hurt me is Mum, if she keeps this up,” I mutter.

Dad looks at me for a long moment, then sits down heavily on the bench. He leans his hands on his knees, rubbing his palms gently up and down the worn corduroy. “Love, are you
sure
you’ve really thought all this through? I know you think you have, but it’s never that straightforward. This man,
this Nick, he’s not just older than you. He’s done so much more. A wife, a family—love, you’ve got your whole life ahead of you. You’re only twenty-six. The world’s your oyster. I hate to see your wings clipped before you’ve even had a chance to spread them.”

“He’s asked me to marry him,” I say defiantly. “As soon as his divorce comes through. And I’ve said yes.”

My father nods slowly several times.

“I do love him, Dad,” I say, crouching in front of him. “Please be happy for me.”

“He’s a married man, love,” my father says softly. “There’s no getting away from it. You’ll be taking on a man who’s already walked away from one family. What’s to stop him from doing it to you?”

After Emma quit as Nick’s secretary, handing in her resignation the morning our affair became public knowledge, he hired a new girl. Twenty-two years old, legs up to here, the spitting image of Scarlett Johansson. Nowhere near as efficient as Emma; she seems to require a lot of direction from Nick. A lot of hands-on, one-on-one attention.

“He wouldn’t do that to me, Dad. He
loves
me.”

Dad sighs, and pats the bench beside him. “Sit down, Sara.”

I do as he says. For a long moment, neither of us says anything.

Then, “When you were about three or four,” Dad says, “your mother and I went through a bit of a rough patch. Things were a bit strained at home. She’d just started a new job, and I didn’t much like coming home to fix my own dinner. Caused a few rows, I don’t mind telling you.” He smiles wryly. “Don’t forget, it was different then. A man had certain
expectations
. It was my job to put bread on the table, and
hers to make something out of it. I didn’t hold with her going out to work, and I told her so. But you know your mother. She went out and got herself a job anyway. Receptionist at some posh law firm in town.”

I stare at him in surprise.

“I didn’t know Mum had ever worked.”

“Yes, well, there’s a lot you don’t know about your mum and me.” He rubs his hand over his jaw. “I know the two of you don’t get on, and you lay the blame for everything that goes wrong between you at her door. She can be difficult to live with, I grant you that. But it’s not always been easy for her, either.”

A fieldmouse darts between the potting benches. We both watch it skitter down the center of the greenhouse and disappear beneath an upturned terra-cotta pot.

“Anyway. I used to get home earlier than your mother did, and I took to stopping by a neighbor of an evening. For a chat, sometimes a drink or two. She was married too, but her man was out late most nights. After a while, we got to be friends.
Good
friends.”

The words hang in the air.

“You had an affair!” I gasp.

“I suppose you’d call it that. Turned both our heads, for a while, I’ll admit. I was all for upping and leaving your mother, but she wouldn’t hear of it. Said she couldn’t do that to a little ’un like you. She was the better woman, I’ll say that. I was so head-over-heels, I couldn’t see straight.” He swallows noisily. “Went on for the best part of six months. I kept meaning to put an end to it, but I could never seem to find the right moment. And I was so angry at your mother. I never stopped to think of the damage I was causing.” He closes his eyes briefly. “And then, of course, she found out.

Caught us bang to rights—here, as a matter of fact, right in the middle of this greenhouse. Jan had come over—”

“Jan?” I exclaim.
“Mrs. Newcombe?”

He nods.

“Oh, Christ,” I say, covering my face with my hands. “Libby’s about four years younger than me. Please don’t tell me—”

“Of course she’s not mine! What do you take me for?”

“Well, I’m beginning to wonder,” I say bitterly. “I can’t believe all this, Dad. It’s too much to take in. What did Mum say?”

“She gave me a second chance,” Dad says simply. “And I took it. I’ve never regretted it for a moment. Yes, she gave me a dog’s life for a year or two, and she still has her moments, but we got past it in the end. And we’ve been stronger because of it. It taught us to value what we have, and look after it. She gave up the job, not because I asked her to, but because she wanted to show that she was willing to meet me halfway.” He takes my hands in his. “Sometimes a man makes a mistake, Sara. Gets carried away. And when there are children involved, you owe it them to think twice before you tear their lives apart. I know you love this man, and you believe he loves you.” He shrugs. “Maybe he does, I don’t know. But are you sure, are you really
sure
, that their marriage is over? Because if you’re not, Sara, you’re ruining an awful lot of lives for nothing, including your own.”

I pull the car
over and peer at my
A-Z
. Stapleford has to be around here somewhere, surely to God. I’ve gone up and down this section of the A36 for forty-five minutes. I must be missing the bloody turnoff.

Slamming the wheel with frustration, I move back into the flow of traffic. This is terrifying enough to do as it is, without getting fucking lost.

Nick asked me to marry him as soon as I told him I was pregnant. And despite the conversation I had just overheard, despite hearing him tell his wife he still loved her and wanted to come back, despite all my doubts and misgivings, I said yes.

I want this baby. I want his child, too. Maybe this one will be a boy. A son, someone he can take fishing and teach to play cricket or whatever it is men do with their sons these days. Giving him a child will make
me
just as important to him as
she
is. I won’t just be his mistress, I’ll be the mother of his baby. We can build on that, work at it, fashion a real relationship out of the bits and pieces we’ve got now. A child will make all the difference. He loves me, in his own way, I’m sure of it. With a little time and attention, that will grow.

But not if she crooks her finger and he goes running back. I can’t live like that. Can’t bring a child into that.

I have to know that the door’s closed for good.

Finally. I take the turning to Stapleford and sit behind a horse van, drumming my fingers impatiently on the wheel as we crawl along at fifteen miles an hour. As we stop altogether to let a herd of cows cross the road, I flip down the sun visor and study myself in the mirror. Great. A huge fucking zit, right in the middle of my chin. Just what I need.

I flip the visor back up. It’s not only a question of wanting to be sure of Nick. I never thought I’d say it, but—I need absolution. I can’t go forward otherwise. It may be impossible to turn the clock back and undo the damage Nick and I have caused, but if I know his wife is at least happy now, perhaps I’ll sleep better. Something my mother once said sticks in my
head:
You can’t build happiness on someone else’s misery
. I guess it’s a karma thing.

What am I talking about? Of course his wife is happy now. She’s got the thinking woman’s hottie to warm her bed. I just want her to promise she’ll steer clear of my man.

Yes. The irony is
not
lost on me.

I reach a T-junction, and turn into a narrow track leading up a steep hill. Twice I have to pull over to allow another vehicle to pass in the opposite direction. I open the window and breathe in the dusty, grassy scent of the hedgerows as I drive. A warm breeze dips the cow parsley in my direction, and I sneeze at the sudden downdraft of pollen. I know country life isn’t all bucolic vistas and pastoral idylls, I’ve seen abattoir footage, but it seems so beautiful and meandering out here—a world away from the rush and dirt of London.

Nick’s farmhouse is the only one for several miles, bounded on three sides by fields and meadows, and on the fourth by a small copse of young saplings. It looks old and picturesque, if—as I drive nearer—rather in need of some TLC and modern wiring. No wonder he could hardly bear to leave it.

The gate is open. I park in the wide gravel space at the front of the house. My heart thumps wildly in my chest as I get out of the car.
Oh, shit. Suddenly I don’t know if I’ve got the balls to go through with this
.

I can’t bring myself to ring the doorbell. Instead, threading my way around several outbuildings, I peer through the grimy kitchen window at the back. Inside, it’s smaller and messier than I expected: I’d had visions of some
Sunday Times
Nigella Lawson supplement kitchen—all gleaming surfaces and shining saucepan racks. She is a bloody celebrity
chef, after all. But the only things suspended above this ancient-looking Aga are some rather gray bras and several pairs of Bridget Jones knickers. The stone floor is covered with newspapers and what look like rabbit droppings, and dirty crockery is piled high in the sink. A few chipped pots of dead herbs line the windowsill.