With or Without You (22 page)

‘Where are we going?’ Jamie asked at last, when he could stand it no longer.

Martha glanced towards Charlie and raised her eyebrows. ‘I’m not sure, actually. Charlie, where are we going?’

From his position in the back seat, Jamie could see Charlie’s expression soften as he looked at Martha. ‘I thought I’d take you to the Four Seasons. We were booked in there
anyway, so they’ll presumably still have availability . . .’ He tailed off and deliberately caught Jamie’s eye in the mirror again. Jamie couldn’t be sure but he thought he
detected a glint of triumph in Charlie’s gaze this time.

So, Jamie thought jealously, Charlie Simmons had booked himself and Martha into one of LA’s swankiest hotels. It didn’t take a genius to work out that he was obviously trying to get
her into bed – assuming he hadn’t already. Immediately, he wondered if Charlie had booked one room or two. He couldn’t imagine how he would feel if they arrived to find it was
one.

‘OK, this is it,’ Charlie said, after about thirty-five minutes, as he pulled onto the paved driveway of the Four Seasons hotel, which towered above them in pink-gold splendour.
Jamie suddenly felt scared about getting out of the car. The hotel looked grander than anywhere he had ever been before, with a wall of bell-hops ready to open the doors of the cars pulling in and
help their well-heeled inhabitants with their expensive luggage.

But he didn’t have time to worry, as both his and Martha’s doors were swung open simultaneously and he was invited to get out of the car by one of the bell-hops, who was dressed
smartly in a black suit and white shirt.

‘It’s OK.’ Charlie leaned over Martha to speak to the bellhop. ‘I’m just dropping someone off.’

The man nodded. ‘No problem, Mr Simmons, sir.’

Jamie’s feeling of inadequacy grew as he grabbed his shabby bag and clambered out of the car, looking back at Martha, who was talking to Charlie.

‘Call me if you need anything.’ Charlie was looking at her in a way that made Jamie’s insides curdle. Martha nodded and leaned over to kiss Charlie on the cheek. ‘I
will,’ she said. ‘Thank you so much.’ She swung her legs to the right to get out of the car and Jamie put his hand out to help her down. She pointedly ignored it and climbed out
herself, giving Charlie one last lingering look and a quick wave before she turned and made her way into the palatial lobby of the hotel, escorted by a bell-hop who pulled her suitcase. Jamie
trailed nervously several steps behind her, struck by how well suited she already seemed to this kind of lifestyle – unlike him, who felt awkward and out of place.

To his relief, when they checked in, he discovered that Charlie had booked two rooms. ‘We’ll be needing both after all,’ Martha told the smiling receptionist, putting an end to
Jamie’s short-lived jubilation.

As they walked towards the lifts, Jamie threw Martha a sideways glance, to try to gauge her expression, but her face was impassive. The bell-hop pressed the button and the lift doors swished
together. Jamie suddenly felt terrified at being in such close proximity to Martha. ‘This is
ridiculous
,’ he muttered, trying to lighten the mood with a slight laugh. ‘I
feel so nervous.’

Martha’s lip curled slightly and she looked away.

‘You look amazing, by the way,’ Jamie added, wondering where she had got the blue dress. He was fairly sure he’d never seen it before.

‘Shame you didn’t think so earlier . . .’ Martha muttered.

Jamie’s eyes shot towards the bell-hop, whose face remained neutral. He must have seen it all before, he thought. Especially in LA.

They arrived at the room and the bell-hop let them in. ‘Wow!’ gasped Jamie, looking around him and again feeling a stab of discomfort as he realised that this was the sort of luxury
that someone like Charlie Simmons would be used to. ‘It’s fantastic!’

‘I suppose so,’ Martha replied, looking pointedly at the man who had just deposited her bag on the luggage rack.

Jamie followed her gaze for a few seconds before realisation dawned. He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a bundle of dollars, tearing off first a five, then adding a ten.

‘Thank you, sir,’ the bell-hop smiled, discreetly pocketing the money and leaving.

Jamie and Martha stood awkwardly for a few seconds, before Jamie spoke: ‘Great room,’ he croaked.

Martha looked around dispassionately, before putting her handbag on the floor and kicking off the wedge sandals she was wearing. She padded over to the mini bar area of the suite and poured
herself a glass from the bottle of still water provided. ‘Do you want one?’ She finally looked at Jamie, who was still clutching his holdall as he stood in the middle of the vast room
looking lost.

‘Don’t suppose they’ve got anything stronger?’ he tried to joke, before seeing from Martha’s face that she was in no mood. ‘Er, yes, water would be
great.’ He dumped his bag down and slumped onto one of the plump beige sofas.

Martha brought the glasses over to the coffee table and put them down carefully. Then she sat on the other sofa and curled her feet underneath her. ‘So,’ she began, fixing him with a
cold stare, ‘what do we do now?’

Jamie picked up a glass and took a long, thirsty gulp. ‘I know what I want to do,’ he said, when he felt that his throat was no longer too parched to speak.

‘Let me guess. You want me to forgive you and forget that it ever happened. Forget that you slept with some whore behind my back while our children were at school and I was working hard to
provide a roof over our heads. Am I right?’

Jamie shook his head, unable to bear her cold assessment. ‘Don’t . . .’ he pleaded.

‘How would you rather I put it? Because I’m right, aren’t I, Jamie? That’s what you’ve come here for, haven’t you?’

Jamie took a deep breath. ‘I’ve come here because I couldn’t handle another second of being apart from you. I couldn’t cope with you being on the other side of the world
hating me. I don’t blame you for one minute. But Martha, I promise you one thing. However much you hate me right now, it’s only a fraction of how much I hate myself. I will never, ever
forgive myself for what I did, but equally, I will never, ever stop trying to prove to you that I love you . . . and I . . .’ He stopped for a second as the tears threatened to overwhelm him.
When he felt that they had subsided enough, he continued, ‘And I love our two gorgeous kids so much. It will never happen again.’ He finished speaking and leaned forward, beseeching her
with his eyes to understand how much he meant what he was saying. ‘Please, baby . . .’

Martha put her hand up to stop him talking. ‘Shut up!’ she cried. ‘The only reason you’re in such a state is because you’ve been caught. If you hadn’t been
caught, you would have carried on the minute my back was turned. If you really loved any of us, you wouldn’t have dreamt of cheating on us.’

‘It just wasn’t like that!’ Jamie protested, shaking his head.

A giant shudder passed through Martha’s body and she hugged herself as she started to shake.

‘You’re cold!’ Jamie leapt up and pulled one of the sumptuous cashmere throws off the bed. He draped it around Martha’s heaving shoulders and sat down beside her, leaving
one arm across her back. When she didn’t shake him off, he ventured further and pulled her towards him in an embrace.

They sat for almost half an hour, both lost in their own desperate thoughts, each of them crying sporadically, before Jamie spoke again. ‘I am so, so sorry, Martha,’ he said.

Martha nodded sadly. ‘I know. But I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to forgive you, Jamie.’

Jamie’s spirits, which had risen slightly when she had allowed him to hug her, now dropped again. ‘I know I’ll never be able to forgive myself. But if there’s
anything
, anything at all that I can do to put this right, please tell me. Because I am going out of my mind and I just don’t know what to do.’

‘The only thing you could do to put it right is to not have done it in the first place,’ Martha replied. She looked up at Jamie and her expression hardened with contempt. ‘I
bet you and her were laughing your heads off at stupid old me, weren’t you? I bet you were—’

‘No!’ Jamie gasped, squeezing her shoulder. ‘It wasn’t like that at all.’ But this time Martha shook his arm off angrily and moved away from him, pulling the throw
around herself protectively.

‘I feel like such a fool! I’ve read all the stories in the magazines I write for, about husbands who spend their days shagging anything that moves behind their wives’ backs,
and yet never once . . . never once,’ she repeated, ‘did I think it might apply to you. Oh no . . . not wonderful Jamie who’s so helpful down at the school. Christ, I bet
you’ve even slept with half the mums on the PTA!’

Jamie jumped up, alarmed at the way she was working herself into a frenzy again. ‘No!’ he shouted, loud enough to make Martha stop talking mid-sentence. ‘There have been no
other affairs! I’m not trying to dodge what I have done, Martha, but I’m not going to take the blame for things I haven’t done either.’

‘Think about it, Jamie. What you’ve done has shattered my confidence far more effectively than if you’d beaten the shit out of me. I can’t look at my face and body now
without thinking about how it wasn’t enough for you. About how you weren’t satisfied with our sex life, so you chose to go out and find someone else to have sex with . . .’

‘But you
were
enough for me!’ Jamie cried, desperate for her to believe him. ‘I think you’re the sexiest woman alive. I love what we do together . . .’

‘Well here’s the thing,’ Martha said in a cold voice. ‘Men who think their wives are the sexiest women on earth don’t sleep with other women behind their backs. Men
who are happily married and satisfied with their sex life, don’t sleep with other women behind their wives’ backs. Men who—’

‘OK!’ Jamie cut her off, too weary to fight any more. ‘I can’t explain it. I am more ashamed than you will ever know, but you have got to believe me that it had nothing
to do with you.’

Martha snorted. ‘Nothing to do with me? I think it had something to do with me, Jamie, that I caught you red-handed having an affair.’

‘I meant that it was nothing to do with the way you look or how I feel about you. It was separate. It was as if I was able to disconnect from reality. But the truth is, I am as crazy about
you as the day we first met. I think you’re beautiful, funny, sexy and clever. I am a shit for ever putting what we have in jeopardy, but it will never, ever happen again and I am going to
spend the rest of my life proving that to you.’

Martha reached over and pulled his hands away from where he’d placed them over his eyes, so that he had to look at her. ‘Aren’t you just sorry that you’ve been
caught?’ she said, blinking away the last vestiges of tears.

Jamie looked into the dark pools of his wife’s eyes and tried to find some kind of solace or hope there, but all he could see was despair. ‘I’m not sorry I was caught,’
he said, meaning it. ‘I’m glad.’

As he spoke, a giant wave of grief seemed to pass through Martha’s body and escape from her mouth in a strangled moan. She curled into a foetal position as dry, painful-sounding sobs
racked her whole body. Jamie moved towards her again and wrapped his arms around her. She was too distraught to shake him off and he gently rubbed her back as he rocked her. Gradually, her crying
became less violent until she was just sniffing quietly.

‘I’m not glad,’ she said in a small voice, ‘because I thought we were the real thing and now I know for certain that we’re not. We never were.’

Jamie desperately wanted to lie down on the floor and cry himself, but he knew it was important that he held it together. ‘We
are
the real thing,’ he whispered urgently.
‘We’ve been so happy together, Martha. We love each other . . .’

As he felt her stiffen, he continued quickly, ‘Since the day I met you, I have never loved anyone else and that hasn’t changed.’

‘But I don’t believe any of it any more. I feel as if our whole life together’s been a sham.’

‘Believe it,’ Jamie said urgently, giving her a squeeze. ‘Remember all the good things. Please don’t dismiss all those happy years as if they didn’t
happen.’

Martha pushed him off gently and sat back as she looked up at him, her dark eyes still swimming. ‘I do remember the good things, Jamie, and it only makes it worse. I was so sure that we
would grow old together, look after our grandchildren together, travel the world . . . We had so many dreams and now they’ve all just . . . gone.’ She clicked her fingers together as
she spoke. ‘Just like that.’

‘They haven’t gone!’ Jamie cried, kneeling in front of her and grabbing both her hands, as he looked up at her beseechingly. ‘We’ll still do all those things we
dreamed about. We’ll still grow old together, Martha. I want to be with you for the rest of my life. Please, we’re too good to let it all go.’

Martha shook her head sadly. ‘How can we, Jamie? How could we ever pick up where we left off? Everything we had, every memory, is tainted now.’

‘Don’t say that! Nothing can destroy our beautiful memories. We’ll always have those.’

Again, Martha shook her head and sighed. ‘No, we won’t. It’s like a photograph that been torn in two. We can mend it but the tear will always be there.’

Exhaustion and misery overwhelmed Jamie and he slumped down onto the floor, resting his forehead on the thick, soft carpet. She was right. Whatever happened from now on, the scars would always
be there to remind them. But he had to find a way to make her give him another chance. He might as well be dead if she didn’t. He got up and sat beside her, prepared to talk all day and all
night if necessary. Sleep could wait. His marriage couldn’t.

Liv was in her office speaking to her mother when she heard Charlie calling out to her. ‘I’d better go, Charlie’s here.’

‘Charlie?’ her mother, Mariella, spluttered. ‘
Your
Charlie?’

‘He hasn’t been
my
Charlie for a long time,’ Liv replied wearily.

‘Well, what’s he doing there? Has he come to collect Felix?’ Mariella persisted.