SWNOVELS Enter The Black Oak: Chapter 2
“BABY? HELLO?”
The rich, deep rasp of Jack’s gravelly voice pummels my eardrums like an inconsiderate car horn sounding off right beside me. I wince at the clatter of keys in a bowl and the thump of a bag being dropped onto the floor, such banal sounds now vibrating through me roughly, shaking me to my core.
Footsteps on the stairs.
My body quivers as I summon up the strength to confront my husband in a move that will surely signal the end of my marriage.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
Shit.
As he takes the final step on the hardwood stairs of our apartment, I do something that I can’t fully comprehend and couldn’t possibly explain if I tried: I climb into our bed, pull the covers over me and lie as still as I possibly can, as if some cloaked assassin is about to enter the room and if I just stay quiet enough, he may pass through and not see me.
The bedroom door creaks open and a dark presence fills the doorway. I sense eyes gazing in my direction. Inside I’m screaming, yet there are no words.
Why am I even lying here, for God’s sake? Why aren’t I shouting at him, crying, demanding to know why the pig I married is screwing other women?
What’s wrong with me?
I flinch as a weight depresses the side of the bed next to me and my skin crawls as Jack’s strong fingers brush the skin on my face and tuck loose strands of my long brown hair behind my ears. His unwanted touch injects a surge of rage-induced adrenalin into me and I picture myself sinking my teeth into his fingers until I hit bloody bone.
How dare he?!
With Lydia? A woman I know! He couldn’t at least have had the decency to fuck someone I’ve never met?!
“Baby? Are you okay?” The warm concern in his raspy voice cuts through me like a blade slicing skin.
I keep my eyes clamped shut and my jittery body as still as possible, despite my heart beating so violently I feel sure he could hear it from across the room. I’m a second away from losing it, from screaming at him at the top of my lungs and calling him all those names we swore we would never say to each other during fights. But I can’t. I can’t move. Some invisible, blood-sucking entity has clearly teleported into the room and drained the life force from my limbs.
As I lie still for long, skin-crawling moments, the image of Lydia’s lips on Jack’s light golden skin blazes into my mind in a cloud of fiery ash and sheer outrage forces my eyes open. Pulling the covers off me, I sit up to face him.
“Jess, are you okay?” he asks, a frown casting a dark shadow over his impossibly beautiful face.
Don’t you dare!
Don’t you dare play that game with me—the perfect innocent-husband game.
I steel myself to unleash bloody hell that would put the grizzliest video game to shame.
The meek word that comes out of my mouth makes no sense. “Hey,” I whisper, my voice so tiny I barely recognize it as my own.
“You okay, angel?” he asks, peering into me, his brow furrowed.
The word Okay suddenly sounds like the most ridiculous word I’ve ever heard. I mean, who came up with such a word? O-KAY. No, I am not okay. And I’m going to prove it to him right now…
Right now…
“Yeah. I’m just a bit tired,” I manage, heat rising in my cheeks. “My leg’s been hurting a little today. I’m fine.”
Fine? What the hell?
Why aren’t I screaming, crying, demanding to know why the pig I married is screwing other women?
I flinch as he leans towards me and gives me a strong, unrequited kiss on the mouth. Feeling the same lips now kissing me so tenderly after having devoured me so mercilessly this same morning makes me want to weep, to break down and dissolve into the ground, to find some hole that no one in Manhattan knows about and crawl into it until I no longer remember his name or my own. I stiffen, my eyes burrowing into his, as he glides a firm hand up my neck, scrutinizing my face intently as his thumb glides over my flushed cheek.
“Jessynia, what’s wrong? You don’t seem yourself.”
As I attempt to calm the rabid fury playing havoc with my body, my gaze floats across his, and despite everything, the ferocious, breathtaking masculine beauty of his incomparable face leaves my breath shallow. His intense steely-blue eyes wander over me curiously as I study every inch of his rugged, treacherous features as if seeing him for the first time—his thick, dirty-blond hair with ends stained sandy by the sun; his strong, wide jawline and forehead; his high, sharp cheekbones punctuated by dimples, and the perfect light-pink mouth that has ravaged every inch of my body.
His strong, tall, powerful male presence weakens my resolve and in spite of the crippling sting of his betrayal, I find myself scrutinizing one of the most exquisite men I’ve ever known—studying him as if this may be the last time I see him. My eyes pan down the lines of his thick, golden neck. His dense, muscular arms and broad shoulders are unmistakable even under the crisp white tailored shirt he wears on Wall Street, and the image of a body so savagely virile it shouldn’t be allowed imprints itself onto my mind. Few of his banking colleagues could imagine the perfectly sculpted, bulky mass of hard muscle under his clothes—the result of years of boxing and weight training in grimy gyms in Brooklyn. It is a body that should not be legal.
As I peer into the adoring face that I know so well, I could swear I feel my heart stall in my chest. I fear that if he keeps studying me, he’ll see inside me and know what I know. And in this moment, I realize that I’m not ready to say what needs to be said. Maybe as long as I’m the only one who knows, things can stay somewhat in my control, right? Once he knows that I’ve learned his sordid secret, that look that we used to share when we stared into each other’s eyes and laughed and glowed and floated will be gone forever and the heady magic that I’ve felt for the last three years of my life will drift away and become only a memory.
“I’m okay,” I mutter, finally managing to take a lungful of air. “I just need to take the weight off my leg for a while. It’s been hurting a lot today.”
His eyes search mine as I scour his face for signs of something different, signs that he’s hiding something. I see nothing.
How can my radar be this off?
“I’m sorry, beautiful.” He kisses me on the cheek tenderly. “Do you want me to get you anything? Call Dr. Peterson?” The concern etched in the exquisite lines of his face makes me ache.
“No, I… I’ll be fine. I just need to sleep.” My breath is bated and my voice choked, as though something is stuck in my trachea, strangling it and taking my usual sassy—as Jack calls it—personality with it.
“Sure. Whatever you need,” he replies, unable to mask the perplexed tone at my uncharacteristically icy welcome.
As the sun slides lower over Upper Manhattan, turning the sky heavenly shades of warm peach, lighting up the bedroom in a perfect orange glow, I think back to this very morning when I awoke to find Jack lying next to me, watching me with a hungry smile around his dangerous, glistening eyes.
He made me laugh until my sides hurt before I’d even got out of bed, then joined me in the shower, running shampoo through my long hair and soap over my slim body. His experienced fingers wandered across my glossy skin, over my breasts and down my taut waist, before tenderly exploring the soft folds of my sex, teasing and caressing until I was left gasping in pleasure. My nipples hardened under the cool water as Jack knelt down and used his tongue, in a way no man I’ve ever been with has known how to do, to kiss and lick and tease the tight bundle of nerves between my legs before spearing his tongue inside me until I begged him to fuck me. Always willing to give me whatever I want, he carried me out of the shower, pushed me facedown onto the bed, climbed on top of me and speared his large sex inside me carefully, filling me up an inch at a time. He thrust in and out of me rhythmically, expertly, angling his hips so that I could feel him in exactly the right spot as his lips skimmed my ear, whispering erotic threats that made me lose all rational thought and give myself completely to him. One hand was around my throat and another gently teased my sex as I trembled and moaned at being taken by such a powerful and unabashedly masculine man who, as usual, didn’t come until he had made sure I had, turning me over and gazing at me with devastating force as he came inside me. The groan he let out as he orgasmed almost left me climaxing again and within seconds he was holding me against him tightly, kissing my neck and mouth tenderly and proclaiming his eternal love for me, a feeling I reciprocated with every fiber of my being.
And now this… just ten hours later? It just makes no sense.
As his dominant fingers brush against my hand, I’m jolted back to the reality of two strangers trying to converse. It’s alien and awkward, like scanning the unsuspecting eyes of someone whose mask has just fallen off and they don’t know it. I don’t recall ever looking at Jack and feeling anything so damn phony between us. His gaze flits from my turquoise eyes to my mouth as he leans toward me and kisses me hard on the lips, closing his eyes while I keep mine open, my impassive face not reflecting the swirling mass of destructive emotions I’m brewing.
“Okay. I’ll leave you to rest, beautiful,” he whispers before getting to his feet. “Let me know if you need anything, okay?”
“Okay,” I nod. “Thanks.”
Thanks? Come on, man…
As I lie back down and pull the covers over me, Jack goes into his closet where I hear him shuffling stuff around. He heads back to the bedroom door where I sense him pause for a second before closing it behind him. As he does so, a mammoth gasp of air that I’ve been holding in to steady my breathing is ejected from my body in a rush. I lie immobile, trying to calm myself down, terrified of how out of control I feel. I barely recognize this new person I’ve become in the space of half an hour—this angry, vicious, wounded animal with acid for blood just ready to attack. The composed, loving, strong person I thought I was, the person who listens, who makes people laugh (or tries at least), the person who keeps the peace and tells people to live in the moment, how can that person have just dissolved away?
Minutes drip into hours as I hide in bed. I hear Jack come in and out from time to time but don’t move, keeping my eyes shut despite feeling more painfully awake than I’ve ever been as I replay the messages I saw on his phone over and over in my mind, reliving each agonizing word and each sordid image until I come to understand that every trip, every kiss, every goddamn thing I’ve shared with my so-called husband in the last six months—if not more—has been a lie.
Images of Lydia play before my eyes, tormenting me, poisoning my mind. I imagine Jack’s tongue teasing her lips, caressing her breasts, venturing inside her. I know what Jack’s like in bed; there isn’t an inch of a woman’s body that he’s afraid of, and he doesn’t stop until you’re a quivering mess, devoid of all reason or self-control, willing to do anything and everything to please him. There’s no doubt that Lydia is physically stunning—a short, curvy brunette with always-piercing chocolate-brown eyes and thick, wavy shoulder-length hair to match. But there’s something wrong—something you don’t realize right away. Despite her beautiful physical shell, she is narcissistic and cold, almost robot-like. The idea that Jack could want a woman like that, could screw her over and over again, makes we want to tear the skin off my flesh. She must have felt so freaking smug the last few times I saw her when the affair was already in full swing. I can still picture her beady eyes studying my face deliciously, still see that creepy smile on her face.
The first time she arrived at the investment bank my husband and I work at as part of the public relations team the bank hired, several of my colleagues warned me that there was something off about her. There’s a reason women feel every shade of uneasy around Lydia: she’s the type of woman that exists only for men. It’s not just about the stupidly low-cut tops, the inability to relax around women or the fact that when she smiles at you, her eyes don’t move. Lydia’s goals in life are advancement, money and power, and in her mind, men are the only vehicles that can give those things to her. She had been rumored to have had an affair with more than one prominent Wall Street investment banker, but I would never in a million years have believed that a man as smart as Jack would have fallen for her blatant shtick. He told me several times that the woman gives him the creeps. It makes no sense at all, damn it.
As night starts to fall and murky darkness seeps into the room, I lie in the gloomy grey, sleep evading me as I contemplate getting up and running out of the apartment. And I would if I didn’t feel like my legs would give out from under me if I attempted to stand up.
Vivid crimson numbers sting my eyes in the dark. 11.03 p.m.
As I stare at the alarm clock, the bedroom door opens with a click and Jack enters the room, closing the door behind him. My body is still a storm of volatile energy and my throat feels like it’s been injected with Lidocaine by an overzealous dentist. The stranger heads to the en-suite bathroom and washes up before pouring into the bed next to me, leaving me cursing inside as my body tenses up, feeling as brittle as dead winter leaves. I stiffen, praying that he just closes his eyes and falls asleep. Instead, he slides close to me, pressing his hard, naked, sculpted chest gently against my back. He brushes my hair to the side, puts his lips against my nape and glides his strong hand over my slender waist in a once-loved gesture that now makes my skin crawl.
A shudder of fear enters me as he breathes me in and I feel the outline of his naked erection beneath the curve of my butt, separated from my sex by just the thin cotton of my sweatpants. It doesn’t help that I can recall what happened two nights ago so vividly—how I awoke in the early morning hours to find Jack on top of me and hard, caressing my lips with his, his tongue dancing against mine, his erection near the entrance to my body. I’d barely woken up before he pushed himself inside me, slowly pleasuring himself with my sex in what was then the most delicious wake-up call imaginable. Awakening to find the gorgeous mass of muscle and power on top of me, his intense, lustful eyes watching my sleepy face as he entered me gently, unable to resist my body, was one of the most erotic experiences of my life. That idea now fills me with abject horror.
Just as the thought hits me that he could try something like that again, I feel him shift even closer and lean his lips against my ear, caressing the soft shell.
“I love you, baby… so much,” he whispers before relaxing his athletic body as if ready to slumber.
Despite everything, Jack’s tender words melt some of my wrath, leaving in its wake the deepest heartache. I could swear the pain is physical, like some hefty stone pressing on my chest, suffocating me, allowing despair to burrow deep into my bones. As Jack’s possessive arm relaxes and I breathe in his exquisite musky scent, it hits me that this may be the last time I ever feel this man I have loved so much against my skin. A lump forms in my throat as I stare into the eerie semi-darkness, my eyes unable to focus as I try to bat away untamable tears that end up trickling slowly down my cheek.
Long hours crawl by as Jack sleeps beside me, holding me as if protecting me from the night like a warrior keeping his girl safe from the world. I flit between wanting to keep his arms around me forever and wanting to rip the covers off him and unleash hell on his sorry ass. But most of all, I want to run away, to escape to some new world where Jack is just a memory. I want to disappear. I want the darkness to make me invisible so that I can sneak away into the abyss of night and never come back. As images of Jack and Lydia taunt me and torturous thoughts send me back to the day of our wedding and the marriage that Jack begged for every day for months and months, I close my eyes.
No more.
I don’t want to think. I don’t want to remember. As I try to empty my mind of its self-destructive thoughts, exhaustion overwhelms me and I feel myself drifting.
Before I fall asleep, I put my hands together and say a prayer that this is all just a bad dream and I will wake up tomorrow to find that none of it is real.
Daylight greets me in the form of rays of warm sunlight beaming through gaps in the thick pewter curtains that cover the large bedroom windows overlooking an ochre apartment block on West 86th Street. For a glorious split second, I forget about yesterday and take a deep breath, inhaling fresh new air and soaking in the soft streaks of gold lighting up the bedroom.
The oblivion is short-lived.
As I sit up, a blinding pain wraps itself like a vice around my temples and my sore eyes bring the memories of yesterday back with grim clarity.
I peek at the clock. 10.28 a.m.
Shit.
I’m not usually a late riser. I must have passed out sometime around 5 a.m. I turn over and glance at Jack’s side of the bed and see a note.
Gone to work, baby. Call me if you need anything.
Yours, always.
Jack.
The tender words sting.
I pull myself out of bed, leaning on the thick wooden headboard to steady myself as blood rushes from my head, leaving me momentarily woozy. By the time I hit the shower, a surge of adrenaline is fueling my every move, leaving me wide awake and determined to get the hell out of this apartment. I scrub myself furiously and brush my teeth clumsily before shoving a comb through my dripping hair.
As I exit the bathroom, a thought hits me: the gym bag.
As if to check whether what I saw yesterday was real, I head back to Jack’s closet and reach up to grab that wretched bag, only to find that it’s been pushed to the back of the shelf and out of reach. Rivulets of water trickle down the curves of my naked body as I pull the teal armchair standing next to the mirror across the closet, stand on it, grab the bag and zip it open. I feel inside for the phone as well as for that golden broach I saw, frantically checking every pocket. Nothing.
“He must have taken them,” I mutter. My voice is hoarse, but it’s a relief to find that my shock-induced selective mutism seems to have come to an end.
I sit studying the empty bag, wondering what he’s doing with the phone. I’m somewhat comforted that this source of poisonous energy is out of my apartment, and yet the thought of my husband having access to that phone, of him using it to text those women—if you can call them that—sends a surge of jealous rage through me.
I throw the bag back onto the shelf, pacing around the bedroom restlessly as I think about calling my friends. My friends love me enough not to judge me, but the thought of letting someone else know about Jack’s infidelity makes me despair; once I say the words out loud to someone else, there’ll be no going back. My friends would never forgive Jack. Kevin might have some compassion and Maddie too at a push, but certainly not Stella. I’d never hear the end of it if I were to take him back after him cheating on me so many times. I’m supposed to be the strong, take-no-prisoners gal, not some pathetic moron wife who sticks her head in the sand out of fear of being alone. The reality is that I can’t shake this insidious fear I have that I won’t have the guts to do what I should and leave the man that I have loved so deeply.
I dial Maddie’s number with shaky hands as I steel myself to cross the point of no return.
She picks up. “Hey, sweetie. How’s my girl doing?”
Desperation tears words from my throat. “Mad, I… I need help.”
Her voice darkens instantly. “What’s wrong?”
“Something’s happened… with Jack. It’s bad. What time do you finish work? I need to stay with you tonight.”