The Wives of Beverly Row 1: Lust Has a New Address (3 page)

“I want you to meet your new neighbors,” Zola said.

Zola brought Ariel over to the patio table where everyone was seated. It was a lovely iron table with a big canopy over it. Large, red Mandevilla flowers hung from the canopy.

“Everyone, this is the newest addition to our little neighborhood. Ariel, this is Veronica Roycroft and her husband Hank.”

The Roycrofts looked like a perfectly respectable couple, the type that Ariel had expected to find in a community like Beverly Row. They were both in their mid to late forties. Veronica had stunning, rich red hair that flowed down over her shoulders. Her husband had a little bit of a belly and was wearing a Ralph Lauren polo shirt. He seemed like the kind of guy who played a lot of golf.

“It’s a pleasure,” Hank said.

Ariel took his hand. She caught him glance at her cleavage in the bikini.

“And this is Trudy Luxton,” Zola said, introducing the woman sitting next to Veronica. “She’s divorced.”

“Is that the way you define me?” Trudy said, extending her hand to Ariel.

Ariel shook it.

“Sorry, no, of course not,” Zola stuttered, “I just thought—”

“You just thought that since we’re both divorced that we could bond over it,” Trudy said, laughing.

Ariel laughed. “I could see that happening,” she said.

“Sure, anytime,” Trudy said. “Whenever we’re feeling morose and lonely we’ll open a bottle of wine together and drown our sorrows.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Ariel said, taking a seat.

She looked around for Becky. She was sitting on the diving board with a very attractive young man about her own age.

“That’s Veronica’s son, Kyle,” Zola said with the same mischievous grin she’d had earlier. “I told Becky this party would be fun.”

V

Z
OLA SAT NEXT TO JAKE
and made sure her guests were looked after. Everyone had brought food so the party really didn’t take much effort. Ariel seemed to be fitting in nicely, making small talk with Veronica and Trudy. Everyone was laughing and having a good time. Becky and Kyle seemed to be hitting it off over by the pool.

Jake squeezed her knee. “Honey, go make me a plate would you?”

“Sure,” she said.

She looked around the table. She really hated when Jake spoke to her like that in front of people. It made her feel like a maid. She hated it when he spoke to her like that in private too but at least that didn’t humiliate her as much. She had a feeling he did it in front of guests on purpose to put her in her place. He was cruel like that sometimes. But what could she do about it? She wasn’t about to start standing up to him, not after two years of treatment like this.

She just accepted it and got up and went to the kitchen. Jake liked meat so she gave him some of the delicious looking ribs that Ariel had brought. She also got him steak and potato salad and a little of the pasta salad she had made. She’d used one of her mother’s recipes.

She brought the plate out to Jake and sat back down.

“Oh, and a beer,” Jake said.

She looked around the table again. Veronica averted her eyes. Trudy looked away too. They both knew that Jake could get like this sometimes. Ariel seemed a bit more surprised. She’d get used to it soon enough, Zola thought. Everyone else had. Jake liked throwing his weight around, showing everyone he was king of the hill.

She got up from her seat again. “Anyone else want anything?” she said.

Everyone had everything they needed but Ariel got up. “Here, let me give you a hand,” she said.

Zola smiled at her. “No need, honey,” she said. “It’s just a beer.”

She went in and got the beer. The cool air from the refrigerator felt soothing on her face when she opened the door and she stayed there for a minute to let it cool her down. Her heart was pounding in her chest and she took deep breaths. She just prayed that Jake wasn’t going to make one of his scenes. He’d done a few things before that had really humiliated her and she just hoped he didn’t get it in his mind to do anything like that again.

When she got back to the table, Jake had switched seats and was sitting next to Ariel.

“Over here, honey,” he said to Zola, like she was a waitress.

She put the beer on the table and he slapped her butt as she passed him. It wasn’t a soft slap either, but firm and it made a loud clap.

Zola smiled but on the inside she was mortified. She knew this wasn’t the way a husband was supposed to treat his wife, especially not in front of company. She knew she was being demeaned. And what really made it worse was that she knew everyone else knew what was going on, and they knew that she didn’t have the courage to do anything about it.

She took her seat and watched Jake as he tried to flirt with Ariel, right there in front of her. He was eating the meat and potato salad but of course he didn’t touch the pasta salad he’d seen her making earlier. She didn’t understand what made him treat her so badly. She tried to be a good wife to him.

“So,” Jake said to Ariel, “where’s your ex? What does he do?”

Zola could tell Ariel was uncomfortable with the attention she was getting from Jake. What woman wouldn’t be? He was sitting too close to her, leering at her breasts and body in the skimpy bikini,
her
skimpy bikini. Zola told herself that no matter what happened, she wasn’t going to blame Ariel for it. It wasn’t Ariel’s fault that her husband was a cheating pig.

“Well,” Ariel said, “he has an art gallery in Santa Monica. He lives down there.”

“What kind of art?” Jake said.

Zola rolled her eyes. She knew Jake had less than zero interest in art. He was flirting and he was doing it shamelessly right in front of all their guests.

“It’s actually very interesting,” Ariel said. “It’s hyper-realistic painting. So basically paintings that are so real they look like photographs.”

“Anyone I might have heard of?” Jake said.

“Sure,” Ariel said, “Robert Bechtle, Don Eddy, John Salt, Ralph Goings.”

“Interesting,” Jake said.

Zola wanted to scream. Jake was about as interested in paintings as he was in opera.

“Honey,” she said. “Come sit next to me.”

Jake looked at her and then turned back to Ariel, ignoring her.

“I’d love to go check it all out some time,” he said to Ariel.

Ariel nodded and smiled politely. Then she got up from her chair. “Excuse me,” she said, “Zola, is there a washroom downstairs?”

“Sure, honey,” Zola said. “Right off the kitchen.”

Zola was surprised when Ariel touched her. She just put her hand on her shoulder as she passed but Zola found it surprisingly comforting. It made her feel that everyone wasn’t ganged up against her. She knew that Ariel had only excused herself to get away from Jake. She appreciated the fact that Ariel didn’t want to flirt with her husband. So many women would have been pleased for any attention from a man, especially if they’d just gone through a divorce, but Ariel had more manners than that.

VI

A
RIEL WENT TO THE WASHROOM.
She didn’t need to pee. She just sat on the toilet for a second and gathered her thoughts. Jake was so pushy. She hated sitting next to him. She wished he would just go back and sit with his wife like any decent guy would.

While she was in the washroom she heard some more people arrive. Men’s laughter filled the hallway outside the washroom and she waited for it to subside before going back out.

When she got back to the patio she met a group of four men who all introduced themselves as Jake’s business partners. They were brash and cocky and rude.

“You can call me Honcho,” one of them said.

“And who do we have here?” another said.

Zola introduced Ariel as her new neighbor.

“Not bad,” the man said, eyeing Ariel’s breasts in her bikini. It was clear the men were arrogant pricks.

Ariel felt embarrassed. It was like they were at some frat party and all the girls were fair game, just hanging out in bikinis hoping to be taken by the boys. That was the atmosphere that had taken over the party as soon as these new guys had arrived. Ariel wondered what kind of business Jake was in if these were his partners. They were all muscular, good-looking hunks with California suntans and more confidence than they knew what to do with.

“So what do you all do?” Ariel said, trying to be polite.

The men all looked at each other and then laughed. Ariel looked at Zola but she just shook her head as if the topic of their business was out of bounds.

Jake had taken his shirt off and came over to get Zola. He wanted her to get in the pool with him. He grabbed her by the front of her bikini bottom and Zola had to rush forward toward him before everyone got a view down it. Ariel hated it. She hated everything about the scene. Jake was showing off for his four buddies and they were all laughing at everything he did like a bunch of high school jocks.

“Come on, babe,” Jake said, pulling Zola toward the pool.

“Not now,” Zola said. “Please, Jake. I’ve got to look after our guests.”

Ariel hated when men acted this way. Jake was being pushy and a show off and he was treating his wife like a prize pony.

“Come on,” he said again, pulling the front of her bikini.

If he pulled it any harder the strings would open and it would come off. That would have given the men something to laugh at.

Jake pulled Zola down toward the pool. Ariel could tell that she was trying to resist him but she gave up. She had no choice. He looked like he was going to rip her bikini bottom off if she didn’t do what he wanted. She let Jake pull her and they both fell into the water with a splash.

The four colleagues all laughed. The way they looked at Ariel, she thought they might pull her into the water next. She prayed none of them tried to lay a hand on Becky. If that happened, she didn’t know what she would do. One of them was taking his shirt off and looked like he was going to get into the pool. The others went over to the patio table and joined the Roycrofts. Ariel made eye contact with one of the men and immediately regretted it when he winked at her. Who were these guys? She felt vulnerable in her bikini with them around. She decided that if any of them tried anything with Becky she’d call the police. She didn’t care about the scene it would create. She wasn’t going to be bullied into anything like a freshman at a college frat party and she wasn’t going to let her daughter be taken advantage of either.

Ariel looked at Zola over in the pool and saw that her hair was all messed up and her makeup was running. Zola didn’t look too happy about it but she was putting on a brave face. Ariel recognized that face. It was a look people had when they were trying to act happier than they felt. Her own fourteen years of marriage had taught her all about that.

Jake pulled Zola toward him and kissed her hungrily on the mouth, showing all his friends what a willing, happy wife he had. It made Ariel sick that everyone was just watching, letting Jake treat Zola like a possession. She thought Hank Roycroft might say something but he didn’t look like he was going to do anything. He just sat there looking foolish, sipping his beer.

When Jake finally stopped ramming his tongue down Zola’s throat she began to climb the steps out of the pool. She looked a little shaken up.

As she was climbing the steps, Jake grabbed her by the back of her bikini bottoms and pulled her back into the water. He sounded like a petulant boy as he did it, laughing stupidly.

Zola was coughing when she resurfaced. She caught Ariel’s eye and Ariel knew exactly how she felt. She felt powerless. To a casual observer it might look like Jake was just being playful, splashing around with his wife in the pool, but Ariel could tell that there was more going on. He was bullying Zola, showing her that he was the boss and using his strength to push her around. He was the kind of rich guy who liked to marry poor women so that he could lord it over them and treat them like he owned them. He was also doing it in front of an audience which made the whole thing doubly humiliating for his wife and he knew it.

While Zola was still coughing on the water she’d swallowed, Jake grabbed her and started kissing her again. He reached up and grabbed her boobs and squeezed them. It was awful to watch. Ariel looked at Hank Roycroft. The man was a coward, he wasn’t even looking in the direction of the pool. He seemed to be studiously ignoring Jake’s display. Veronica and Trudy were watching but with a sort of meekness that told Ariel everything she needed to know. They were as scared of Jake and his buddies as Zola was. They weren’t going to stand up to him. This was his house and he held all the power. The way his buddies were strutting around the patio made it clear they felt the same way.

As Zola was climbing the steps out of the pool for a third time, Jake did exactly what he’d done before. He grabbed her by the back of her bikini bottoms and again yanked her back into the pool with a splash. His laugh grated on Ariel so badly she wanted to punch him.

Ariel looked across the pool. Becky was still sitting on the diving board with the Roycroft’s son and she was watching everything. Ariel didn’t want Becky to think this sort of thing was okay. She didn’t want her daughter growing up thinking men could act like pigs around women, treating them however they wanted for their own amusement. For her daughter’s sake, Ariel knew she couldn’t just stand by and watch this display any longer. She didn’t care if it meant being ostracized from her new community of neighbors. She didn’t care if it meant mortally embarrassing herself and her daughter. She didn’t even care if it made Zola hate her. She knew what she had to do.

In Ariel’s view it was important to stand for things, it was important to stand up for yourself and for others, even if it was socially awkward, and that’s what she did.

“Hey,” she said, calling across the patio to Jake. “Stop that.”

Jake stared back at her, a look of complete surprise on his face. All his friends looked at her too and the humor in their faces vanished. Ariel actually felt intimidated by them.

“What did you say?” Jake said.

“Yeah,” one of the buddies said. “What did you just say?”