The Red Bikini (27 page)

Although she knew he didn’t mean it the way she wanted him to, her heart kept an out-of-control rhythm for the next several seconds. Even just hearing the words from his lips—however unintended—was thrilling in a way she couldn’t give credence to.

While she closed her mouth, he studied her intently.

“Come with me,” he said.

She frowned.

“To South Africa.”

He met her eyes as a silence welled between them. Giselle caught her breath and studied the blues in his eyes. She would love to spend time in South Africa staring into eyes like this—over sand, over ocean, over sheets, over some exotic beach drink. She would love to have Fin’s hands on her every night in a hotel, would love to wake with him every morning, would love to hear him laugh, and get him to open up more.

But of course she couldn’t. She was a mother. She couldn’t just pick up her child and traipse off to South Africa like some kind of eighteen-year-old groupie. Coco didn’t have a passport. Giselle had no clothes for a trip like that. Plus, she had a job here in Sandy Cove that she had to finish for Lia and Rabbit. And she had her life back in Indiana, including the first day of school and Daisy Scouts, that she had to get her and Coco back to. . . .

Fin’s life was enviable, but it wasn’t something she could ever be part of. The reality settled like a yoke around her shoulders.

“Wouldn’t that be something?” she said, laughing it off—laughing off the fact that she felt old. Heavy. Tied down. And that the chasm between her and this sexy man just seemed to elongate about another ten years. . . .

He brought his chin close to the board. “I could picture you in South Africa. In this bikini, particularly. And, of course, out of this bikini.”

Giselle would never do it in a million years—would never leave Coco—but this fantasy, and the way Fin was looking at her bikini strings right now, would fuel her for the next several years. Like the kissing hand.

“I can’t,” she admitted. “I have Coco, and . . . I have to get her home, and . . . Well, you know, school will be starting. . . .”

He nodded. She could see the exact moment he reeled it all back in and shut down.

“Up.” He patted the center of the board.

She struggled to get on the board on her stomach—it couldn’t have appeared graceful—but Fin didn’t seem to notice. He already seemed a million miles away.

They paddled forward, found a wave closer to shore, and Fin found his footing and gave her a gentle push. “Last one!”

She struggled to pop up, holding the sides of the board until the last possible minute, then brought her feet underneath her and tried to balance. She wobbled like crazy, but managed to finish the wave all the way onto shore. She was only about two feet off the sand, but it still felt exciting.

Fin was laughing when he caught up with her.

They met up with Rabbit and Coco, and called it a day. Fin didn’t bring up the “L-word,” or South Africa, again.

G
iselle sat in Lovey’s kitchen, waiting again for Roy.

Coco splashed in the backyard pool with Lovey. At each giggle, Giselle glanced in their direction, then twisted her china cup in another three-sixty.

When she heard the door open, her stomach fell. She waited with trepidation until Roy emerged from the entryway.

“You’re here,” he said, tossing his keys on the countertop. He railroaded into the kitchen to get a glass of water. “I was expecting you to be late. Do you want to go to dinner?”

She’d been waiting for words from him for so long now—wanting to talk, wanting to hear his reasons why he’d left. She was excited to get answers, but half-horrified they wouldn’t be what she wanted to hear. Although she didn’t even know what she wanted to hear. That he’d made a mistake? That was it, in a nutshell. But now she realized hearing that from Fin was even more satisfying.

She regarded Roy’s thin frame, his beady eyes as they watched out the kitchen window, and was struck with how much he looked like a stranger. For the first two months, all she wanted, all she cried about every night, was getting her old life back. And she’d assumed that meant him, too. But now—now she could see that she wanted her old
life
, but not him in it. She wanted to be married. She wanted a father for Coco. She wanted basil on the windowsill, and neighbors who would come by for coffee. But she didn’t need Roy specifically. He’d failed.

“We don’t have to go to dinner. We can just talk here,” she said.

He nodded. “Good. Let’s go out front.”

Outside, Roy motioned toward a gazebo that sat on a green knoll in the center of Lovey and Joe’s front yard. A comfortable heat hung in the air between gentle breezes, warming up the jasmine that surrounded the yard and sending the sweet scent drifting toward Giselle in waves. Roy shoved his hands in his trouser pockets as they walked in silence across the lawn.

“Your hair looks interesting,” he said.

She sighed. She was tired of Roy’s non-compliments. She dismissed the comment and headed up the gazebo’s wood stairs. The planks creaked as Giselle took a few steps into the center and circled it. As romantic and pretty as it was from the outside, the floor was scuffed and rotting at the edges.

Roy leaned against the pillar next to hers. The paint was peeling, revealing exposed brown stripes. He crossed his arms.

“So where is this coming from?” he asked.

“Where is what coming from?”

“This new”—he waved his hand toward her—“you.”

She wasn’t sure what to make of that. Was he referring to her hair? Her minimalist makeup? Her more casual clothes? She’d found another pair of Lia’s jeans in a bottom drawer and had tugged them on today, remembering how Fin had checked her out when she’d worn a similar pair yesterday.

She shivered at the memory and decided not to answer Roy. It made her feel stronger.

“Perhaps . . .” he said, shifting against the railing, “this ‘new you’ is courtesy of Fin Hensen. Does he inspire this?” Contempt crawled across his face.

Giselle resisted the urge to feel ashamed. She hooked her thumbs in the pockets of the jeans and threw her shoulders back, knowing she looked kind of hot doing it. “I don’t think you, of all people, should be contemptuous about such a thing. I don’t imagine I need to remind you that you’ve had plenty of ‘friends’ who have ‘inspired’ you in a variety of ways. And you had them while we were married. At least I had the decency to wait until I was single again.”

“You’re not single.”

“Of course I am.”

“I mean, you’re not . . .” He frowned, studying the neighbors’ yards, trying to rephrase it. “I mean you’re a
mother
. You’re not like some single girl again. You have responsibilities.”

A laugh escaped her. “I don’t think
you
need to lecture
me
on responsibilities, Roy. Would these be the same responsibilities you’ve had for the last five years? They didn’t seem to stop you from acting ‘single’ even when you weren’t.”

He glanced up, seemingly surprised at her response. Or maybe just that she had one. He shifted against the pillar. “Giselle, you’re the one who wanted full custody of Coco.”

She frowned at the turn in the conversation. “Yes.”

“So if I’m going to grant you that, I need to know that you’re not going to have her around dangerous men.”

Giselle’s casual demeanor evaporated. She stiffened against the peeling paint. “Are you saying you don’t want me to
date
?”

“I’m saying I don’t want you to date anyone
dangerous
.”

“And you’re going to be the judge of that?”

“I think I can tell.”

Her mouth dropped open. While she was trying to formulate a sane response to a clearly insane train of thought, he shook his head.

“Listen,” he said, shifting uncomfortably. “Let’s not make this a crazy conversation. I’m just saying I don’t want you to date Fin Hensen. And after this, back home, you need to be more careful about who you choose.”

“Or what?”

“Or I won’t give you full custody.”

Giselle gasped. He was
blackmailing
her? And over
Fin
? What was his strange obsession with Fin? And would he really inspect her dates? Was he
crazy
?

She pressed her shaking hands against the rail so Roy wouldn’t see. Was this her life now? Negotiating with a man who used to be her loving husband but was now some shell of a man with beady eyes who was emotionally blackmailing her?

Even though it shouldn’t be a difficult decision to agree to not see a man she wasn’t going to see anyway after his plane took off for South Africa, she still hesitated. It was the principle of the thing. She hated that Roy was still controlling her.

Yet if all she did was agree, she’d have full custody of Coco, and Roy out of her hair. Without the shared custody, she wouldn’t have to run things by him, like moving or switching Coco’s schools. She could even come back to California and be near her family again.

She peered at him from under her new bangs. “I’ll consider your offer.”

Roy took a deep breath and loosened his shoulders. He just wanted to make this easy on himself. And maybe she wanted it to be easy, too. But this wasn’t what she came to talk about.

“I need a few answers, though,” she said.

His spine straightened. He shifted against the rail and crossed his arms. “I thought you might.”

“I need to know why you left.”

He nodded. The cypress trees across the lawn demanded his attention while he seemed to think that over.

“I know this isn’t helpful,” he said, “but I don’t have a firm answer for you. I was just feeling . . . like my needs weren’t being met. . . .”

“Are you talking about sex?”

“Among other things.”

“What are you talking about, Roy? I was by your side for every—”

He held up his hand. “Listen. I don’t want to get into a big discussion about it, Giselle. It’s not going to change anything. That’s why I didn’t want to talk to you these months. I feel how I feel. It’s not going to change.”

She shook her head. “That’s not good enough for me.”

“I’m not in love with you anymore.” He peered up at her through his eyeglasses, over the top of his birdlike nose.

She let out an expulsion of breath and searched his hollow eyes, his set eyebrows, his stranger’s face. And, much to her surprise, she realized she didn’t
care.

After four months of wanting to talk to him, wanting to catch him on the phone, wanting to hear four simple words, she realized—as she stared at this stranger—that the words she’d wanted to hear weren’t “
I still love you.
” The words she wanted to hear were “
It’s not your fault.
”

“But why?” she tried again. Her voice was strangely strong.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It does to me.”

He shook his head. Roy was not interested in making her feel better. That much was clear. The most she could hope for was to step around the rubble they’d left and get to the other side. Maybe just find a path of civility that would at least help Coco.

“Even if I have full custody, I need you to visit with Coco,” she added. “She misses you. She needs to know you love her.”

“I can do that.”

She stared at him and was struck by how much she just wanted to be away from him now. This strange new man was not her Roy. But her Roy was not coming back. There was no going back. This was her new reality. He was just Coco’s father now; there would never be any good answers.

She pushed up from the pillar. “I’m going to go.”

“Do we have a deal, then?”

His question was laced with enough nervousness that Giselle peered at him. Maybe he didn’t want custody of Coco at all—it would be very difficult for him, given how much he traveled—and maybe this thing with Fin was just a perk for him that he knew he could work into the deal.

“I’ll think it over,” she said.

“No seeing Hensen.”

“I said I’d think about it.” She was surprised at the snap in her voice.

His neck jerked back, as surprised as she was. “Did you sleep with him? Wait. Never mind.” He shook his head. “I don’t think I want to know. Or . . . yeah, I do.”

“Roy, stop.”

“I think I want to know.”

“No, you don’t.”

He squinted at her. When she looked away, not planning on answering such ridiculousness, his frown became sharper. A vein appeared in his forehead. “
Damn
him,” he whispered.

“First of all, this is very hypocritical of you, I hope you can see. And second of all, you and I were divorced when I made my decisions. We weren’t when you made yours. Yours was out of disrespect. Mine was moving on.”

“He’s dangerous, Giselle.”

“He’s not dangerous.”

“You know he was accused of all sorts of things around here—drugs; abandoning his own lover in the ocean. Her name was Jennifer Andre.”

She let out a breath of agitation. “I know about Jennifer, and he doesn’t do drugs.”

“Not what I heard.”

“And she wasn’t his lover.”

Roy’s head jerked up. As confident as he’d seemed about everything else, his eyebrow raised in uncertainty on that one.

“Of course that’s what he told you,” he said.

“He was a friend of hers. And—speaking of whom—why didn’t you tell me you knew her?”

“That has nothing to do with anything. She was a friend of my father’s. But the issue is, Giselle, she was drugged with a kind of date-rape drug. He was
with
her at the time. He’s bad news.”

Giselle’s thumb slipped to the space where her wedding ring usually was. And where the turquoise ring had been those two nights.

“He said it was Xanax,” she said, despite the clenching in her gut.

“He lied.”

“He wouldn’t lie about that.” Her voice, however, was dropping to almost a whisper. Did she really know that for sure?

She shook her head. She’d try another tactic. She wasn’t here to defend Fin. She was here to get answers from Roy. And he’d given all he was going to give.

Without another word, she pushed up and headed down the gazebo steps, across the lawn, and into the house to get Coco. She could feel tears prickling the backs of her eyes—tears for the life she was leaving behind. She had thought she was giving Coco everything she needed—an ideal life, an ideal childhood—but now, at this glimpse of all the rubble at her feet, these concrete blocks she was now forced to step over, she knew she’d been a fool. It had all been a sham.
She
had been a sham. She wasn’t a perfect wife, or a perfect mother. And she never would be.

She wiped an errant tear and glanced around the kitchen for Coco and Lovey. She couldn’t get out of here fast enough.

As she was pulling away from the curb in her rental car, Coco finally in her seat belt and Lovey waving from the curb, Roy leaned into the driver’s window.

“If you see him again, no full custody,” he said.

Giselle squealed away from the curb. She was exasperated and exhausted and wanted to take Coco away forever. She hated having to plead, hated having to defend herself against something she shouldn’t have to, hated feeling like she’d found something she’d wanted—although it was still elusive, but vaguely in the shape of Fin—and Roy was managing to take one more thing away from her.

She sped out of the neighborhood and took a long, deep breath. But her mind wandered, immediately, to the uncertainty of what she had been doing, and what she wanted, and what she would do from now on. Instead of feeling like she’d pulled herself together by coming out to Sandy Cove, her life felt ever more in shambles.

“Mommy, what’s black and white and goes ’round and ’round?” Coco asked.

“Um . . .” Giselle sniffed and wiped the back of her hand across her eyes. “I don’t know, baby. I give up.”

“A penguin in a revolving door,” Coco said, giggling before she could even finish the entire line.

Giselle tried to smile, but she was concentrating on her life falling apart instead.

 • • • 

As soon as Giselle got home, and got Coco settled into a coloring book, she called Fin.

“Did Jennifer die from Xanax or a date-rape drug?” she whispered.

A long silence stretched on his end. “Xanax.”

“Roy said it was a date-rape drug.”

“Roy is wrong.”

Another silence. Maybe she should have looked it up online first, but she wanted to hear Fin’s answer straight from him, give him a chance to correct it.

“You can look it up,” he said quietly.

Guilt swept over her. . . .
What had she just done?
Had she just brought this up to throw it back at him like everyone else in his life?

“It’s online,” he said, quieter still.

She could hear the disappointment and heartache seeping from his voice. But she needed to cut things off. “I’m not going to be able to make it tonight, Fin.”

The silence elongated.

“What did he say?” Fin asked tightly.

“It’s not because of that. I believe you. But he thinks you’re unsafe, somehow, and . . . I don’t believe that at all, Fin, but he said he won’t grant me full custody if I continue to see you.”