My Wife's Li'l Secret (15 page)

“What the hell, Liefie?” The endearment slipped out. Habit. “He did this to you?”

I had no reason, no right to be horrified at her injuries. Not after what she had put me and my girls through. But I was livid at the sight of her physical abuse. Cruikshank had to be a monster to beat her like that.

“Turn off the fucking light!” she cried, shielding her eyes with her hands.

My blood started to boil. “Where is he?” I asked, as I slapped at the light, turning the room dark again.

“Gone with Aristov."

“Why the fuck would you let him hit you like this, Olga?”

She gave a dismissive wave, got up and started to limp away, vodka bottle in hand.

“You’re limping?”

She stopped and peered at her ankle.

“So this is the life that awaits you? Sure you’re going to be happy with it?”

She spun around. “It’s better than the life you expect me to live!”

“Day in and day out the same bloody thing! Load the dishwasher, empty the dishwasher, load the dishwasher, empty the dishwasher, drop the kids off at school, pick up the kids from school…it’s monotonous. A Hamster’s life.” She spun her hands in the air in a rolling motion. “Treadmill. Where’s the fun in married life?”

I sighed. “We are parents, Olga. Our lifestyle
had
to change. It’s normal for that to happen. You want to be a teenager your whole life? What happens when you get older? Huh? What happens when you get too old to hang around in bars? When you have no money for cocaine and booze? Huh?”

She rolled her eyes. “Lecture! Lecture! Lecture!”

“I was a good guy. I allowed you to visit your family three times during our marriage, I –”

“Allowed…” Her voice was sneering.

“Yes, I
allowed
your parents, or those people who
pretended
to be your parents, to live with us. I paid for their fucking flights, Olga. I paid for your ‘brother’ to come over to Australia, being the sucker I was, I
even
told him to make himself at home. That’s a good guy, but you’re …you’re so warped, you can’t see that. You’re happier when you’re with human traffickers, your sleazy drug dealers, and your cokehead friends, right?”

She pointed the vodka bottle at me. “The human trafficking charge was dropped!”

“That makes it better? You have two children; don’t you care about them?”

She shrugged, opened the bottle of vodka, and took a swig from it.

“Did you
ever
love me?” The question just slipped out like a burp.

Instead of answering, she took another gulp of her vodka. After she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, she looked me up and down and shook her head from side to side, a cruel smile on her face.

Her response knifed me, but I had asked for it.

“Not once?”

More shaking of her head. To me it looked like she was enjoying herself.

“But you pretended you did. Wow, what an actress you are, Olga! Really convincing, I have to tell you.”

She chuckled and raised her almost-empty bottle of vodka to the heavens. “As you said, I’m a
damn
good actress! Gimme an Oscar! Or another bottle of vodka. That’ll do nicely.”

“Yeah. Oscar-worthy for sure. But I just want to tell you that I wasn’t lying. I
did
love you.”

“No you didn’t.”

“I did. I really did.”

“No, you didn’t!” she spat. “I was dull, plain, a bore! Nobody can love someone like that, you hear?”

Her fury at my confession confused me. Shouldn’t she be happy to know that I once loved her? I wondered.

“Well, I did. I loved you. Deeply. I didn’t find you a bore. I thought you were beautiful, sweet, and someone I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. You really were
it
.”

For a few moments she glared at me, then she chuckled. “Aw, poor Ritchie! Nice guys finish last, didn’t you know?”

“Yeah, poor Ritchie,” I said in a bitter voice. “Nice guys…guess I was guilty of being that.”

“Are you going to cry?” she asked in mocking voice.

I looked at her. What a piece of garbage she had turned into.

“What is it you like about him?” I asked. “That you love so much, you’d give up everything that was once precious to you?”

“You won’t understand,” she muttered, wiping her brow with the back of her hand, her mouth turned down.

“Tell me, Olga. I would love to know how you’re
really
wired. Why him and not me? I mean, I’m good looking, women chase me all the time. He’s a bum, an unemployed druggie who beats women.” I pointed at her face. “Who punches a woman in the face?”

“You don’t understand,” she said, thumping her chest with her fist. “I’ve been with Cruikshank since I was fourteen! We are soul mates! I can’t live without him!”

“Oh, please!”

She turned her whole body to look at me, her eyes hardening. For a few moments we looked at each other in silence.

“I don’t want to be with you anymore,” she said, breaking the silence. “I don’t love you. I
never
did. I’ve always loved Cruikshank, not you. You were just good for the money, that’s all.”

I absolutely did not want her, but rejection is still rejection, and her words, along with her angry and adamant tone of voice, sliced through my heart. My hurt compounded at her unambiguous desire to
want
to hurt me, to want to destroy all our past memories.

It’s over now, but we had yesterday.

Clearly, we didn’t have yesterday.

“And he feels the same way about you?” I asked. “You love him that much, yet he pimped you out to me? Made you marry me, fuck me? I would never do that to my woman. I would protect her, cherish her, keep her safe and most of all, I would
never
share her.”

She touched the back of her neck, touched her chest, then shrugged.

“Guess what? While you were working here, trying to do your job with me, he was probably banging some other Ukrainian chick the whole time. While you were being a mum and taking care of the house, having my babies and playing nicey wifey, he was getting some young pussy in –”

“No, he wasn’t! Cruikshank would never do that to me.”

“He would, trust me.”

She took another swig from the bottle, then she shook her head. “He wouldn’t.”

“Oh, yes he would. Right now, he’s probably with some young, fresh thing who is snorting coke off his thigh before they fuck like dogs. All men want excitement. He’s no different. Probably bored with you for being in his face 24/7. You’re his
old
lady right now. Emphasis on old. Same ol’ same ol’. He’s as bored with you as you are with me.”

“He wouldn’t do that to me,” she shrieked. “If he did, I’d stab him in his sleep. Really, I would.”

Again, that cold, detached tone of voice that made me want to sleep with one eye open.

My fear of her must have been transparent, because she laughed and pointed at my face, her body swaying.

“You laugh, bitch. When all this is over, you will never see my children again. I don’t want them to know that their mother is always high and sleeping with a human trafficker. A thug who sells girls to make money.” I shot her a look of disgust. “You are a disgusting piece of shit, and I will ensure the courts are made aware –  ”

“
Your
children?” She flopped into a nearby couch and laughed. “Your . . . children!”

The tone of her voice, coupled with her words, caused me to freeze.

“Jokes on you, Ritchie Rich!” she slurred as she threatened to pass out. “Ha! Ha!” She closed her eyes and leaned her head back.

I rushed over to her and knelt in front of her, my heart slamming in my chest. “Wait! Wait! Wait! Olga, wha…what are you saying? The children, Olga?”

She opened her eyes and looked at me. “You wanna fuck me?” she asked, sitting forward and opening her thighs wide.

After what I saw her to do Cruikshank, I wouldn’t touch her with
any
pole, let alone a barge. She was garbage, filth.

She reached for my pants. “Want me to suck you off? Cruikshank wouldn’t mind. He wants me to keep you happy. So you give us whatever we –”

“Tell me about the children, Olga!” I snapped as I brushed away her sordid hands, my breath in spurts. “What do you mean? Tell me, Olga. Please…tell me.”

With a sigh, she dropped her head back, closed her eyes, and mumbled. I was unable to catch any of her slurred words, to my frustration.

I smacked her on the cheeks, lightly at first, then harder. “Olga, tell me! Olga!”

She opened one eye and peered at me.

“Olga are the g…irls?” My voice actually broke. “Olga, are you trying to tell me something?”

No answer.

I shook her. “Olga, wake up! Olga! Olga, tell me!”

She attempted to shake her head from side to side. “Becky…” was all she said before her eyes shut for good.

All my yelling, face slaps, and pleading could not awaken her.

I stared at her, not knowing what to do. What did she mean?

Becky’s not mine?

Becky
is
mine?

Only
Becky is mine?

It had to mean
something
, I told myself. Olga wouldn’t say something like that unless it was significant.

A thousand oily eels stirred in my stomach and my legs became wobbly.

Could Becky be fathered by someone else?

I slumped into a crouch and covered my head with my hands.

Becky, my baby…oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, God!

Then I jumped up and took the stairs two at a time, ran to the bedroom my girls slept in, and looked at Becky, beautiful and angelic, with her blonde curls framing her face and her rosebud lips puckering as she slept.

Gently, I lifted my daughter’s sleeping body and squeezed her to me.

Please God, if she’s not mine, I don’t want to know, ’cause…cause God, she is mine and always will be.

I kissed her cheeks over and over again until her pretty face scrunched up. Then with a heavy heart, I put her back in bed and dragged myself to my room.

After just learning that my kid, whom I loved with all my heart, may not be mine, how could I possibly sleep?

I may have drifted in and out, but I gave up on sleep at 5 a.m. Once again feeling like I was jetlagged, I stumbled to Becky’s room to look at her, and as I did, I felt a vice grip around my heart.

Please God…

Up till then, I was prepared to fight back. But learning that Becky may not be mine sapped all the fight out of me. I worried that I was at the breaking point and fought to hold it together. For my girls, I had to.

If I had trouble concentrating or focusing on work in the past because of my topsy-turvy life, I had even more trouble focusing after Olga’s insinuation. I reached for Becky’s photo on my desk and stared at it.

My beautiful daughter, the world’s biggest tattletale. As I looked at her big, shiny blue eyes and her angelic smile, my vision blurred.

She has to be mine, I told myself as I held the photo to my chest. She’s my daughter. There’s no way she could belong to another. No fucking way!

As for Olga, I planned to talk to her the moment I got home. Confront her and demand she tell me the truth or threaten her with a paternity test.

But in my heart, I knew that her answer would not matter to me. What mattered to me was Becky. I was her father, her dad, and I wanted her to be my baby. Nothing else mattered to me anymore.

Bear poked his head around the corner and looked into my office. “Wanna grab some lunch?”

“Got some stuff to do for the kids,” I mumbled. “You go ahead.”

After a moment of staring at me, he stepped into my office. “You okay, Big?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah!” I said, reaching for some files on my desk.

“Sure?”

I nodded and stared at the files with feigned interest.

After a slight hesitation, he backed out of the room, even though I could tell he didn’t believe me.

In the past, I would have shared and discussed everything with Bear and Arena. But the issue with Becky was so painful, it was impossible for me to deal with it, let alone say it out loud.

As time went by, practical issues surrounding Becky’s paternity played on my mind. My marriage was over, and if I was not Becky’s father, then I would have little say over my little angel. Who would? Olga?

Not a chance, I told myself. Not a chance in hell.

I would protect Becky with my life if I had to. I would die before I let them take her away from me.

Bear returned and tossed a brown bag at me. “Ham and cheese,” he said as he placed a Coke next to the bag.

“Thanks.”

To please Bear, I tried to eat it. But after taking a bite out of it, I couldn’t even swallow.

At 3 p.m. I left the office and headed home to talk to Olga.

“Where are the kids and Girly?” I asked when Ally and Becky didn’t run out and crash into me.

“Arena’s,” Olga said, looking like yesterday. Her hair was messy, her mascara streaked, her eyes bleary. She gulped at a can of Coca Cola. “Arena picked them up and took them to the park.”

I nodded as I noticed her Ford was not around. That told me that Cruikshank was riding solo again. Good. She and I could have a private conversation.

“Olga,” I said, removing my tie and flinging it on the couch. “What did you mean…when you said…Becky wasn’t mine?” My tone was calm, my expression unthreatening, and of course, I was embellishing a little. But I hoped she couldn’t remember all that she said.

She froze, can in mid-air. “Wha…what do you mean, Ritchie?”

Why did she seem so scared? I wondered.

“Last night, Olga, you told me that Becky wasn’t mine. It doesn’t matter, you know; I just need to know.”

It mattered. It mattered badly, but I was trying my best not to frighten her off with accusations and blame. They would come later.

“That is not true, Ritchie!” she cried, attempting to maintain eye contact with me and failing. “You are just crazy, Ritchie. What is wrong with you? How can you say such a thing, Ritchie? Of course she’s your child. Look at her, Ritchie!” She jerked her chin toward a picture frame above the fireplace.

My eyes remained glued to Olga’s face.

For someone who barely used my name, you sure are wearing it out.

I think my stare unnerved her because she started to pace. “I…I was drunk, Ritchie. Maybe I said stupid things, that’s all.” Her eyes, slowly and with great difficulty, rose to meet mine. “Seriously, Rit…chie.”

I had my answer.

As my eyes bored into the woman I once loved and trusted, who thought nothing of slowly and deliberately spinning a web of deceit, I had to wonder why she was so scared of me knowing the truth.

I had footage of her and Cruikshank in the car and in the house talking and discussing things. But they conversed in Russian. I could get an interpreter, sure, however, I risked the interpreter knowing some dirty secrets I wanted to keep hidden at that moment. He may talk later on, and my plans didn’t warrant such exposure.

Yes, I had plans. Big ones.

“Ritchie, please, you must believe me.”

“Of course I believe you Olga, because she does look like me,” I droned.

I too could act.

Her shoulders dropped from around her ears and her head bobbed.

“You want a drink?” she called as I climbed the stairs and walked toward the spare bedroom.

You must be very scared if you’re offering me a drink.

“Eh, no thanks,” I said, continuing my climb.

After shutting the door, I lay on my bed and stared at the ceiling, my heart shredded, my spirit crushed.

Becky, my baby.

I didn’t want to know. She was my child either way.

When I closed my eyes, I saw her lovely face, her shiny eyes, her arms outstretched for me to carry her, the way she would listen intently when I read her a story and would let nothing and nobody interrupt until the story was finished. I swallowed a sob.

Becky, my precious baby.

****

When I awoke, it was 5:45 a.m. I had slept from 4 p.m. that afternoon!

I showered and got dressed for work.

But I didn’t go to work. I sat on my bed and stared at the carpet, a cup of coffee going cold in my hand.

At 10:45 a.m. I was still at home.

Finally, I walked downstairs to Olga. “Let’s talk divorce,” I said in a calm voice.

She looked at me, her eyebrow raised.

“We have to end this. I can’t handle this anymore, Olga.” I meant it. Everything about this situation was draining me, physically and emotionally, and I wanted to end it all.

“I’ll sell our assets and split the money. You can pay Aristov with your share of the money. That is your debt after all.”

My plan was to buy full custody of the children from her. Knowing that she was coming into heaps of cash should put a smile on her dial, I reasoned. I braced myself for her whoops of excited shouts, her smug smile, her eagerness to end things swiftly.

“Wait! Wait! Wait!” she said, shoving her hands into her hair. “We can’t get divorced.”

That was not the reaction I expected. “Why not?” I demanded, confused and disappointed by her behavior. She seemed almost stressed about my suggestion. “You’ll be getting heaps of cash, Olga?”

“Cruikshank and I have to go to Ukraine first,” she said, trying hard to control her voice. “Business. And…I need money for our tickets.”

“What? You expect me…?”

“It can come from
my
share of the money.”

“Olga, our divorce isn’t going to materialize tom –”

“Take a loan against the property in the meantime! You can do that.”

“Okay.” I nodded. “Look, if we get attorneys, they are going to swallow most of our money. So I’ll ask Bradley Murdoch to draw up an agreement for
both
of us and we can settle this whole –”

“After I come back from Ukraine, not before.” Her voice was adamant.

I peered at her. “Olga, why?”

“It’s…it’s…I just need time, okay?
After
I come back from Ukraine.”

“But, Olga …”

“After. I. Come. Back. From. Ukraine!” Her voice was uncharacteristically firm and did not entertain further discussion. “I want to keep this whole divorce bit quiet for now.”

“Why?” Maybe it had something to do with Aristov, I thought. Maybe he wanted her to remain married to the cash cow I had become.

“I have my reasons,” she said, her hand on her chest. “But we can announce it
after
I come back from Ukraine. If you do as I say, if you wait, you can have your divorce.”

As I stared at her, the question gonging in my brain was: why
after
she came back from Ukraine?

It was then and there that I realized,
I
wanted to go to Ukraine.

Needed
to go.

Instinct was telling me that the answers I sought were in Ukraine where I had met Olga. Sure, it could be wrong, but my instinct seldom was.

Let me put it this way; I trusted my gut more than I trusted my whoring wife.