Page 41 of F*ck Marriage

Woods grimaces. “She’s not happy you’re back.”

“I don’t imagine so.”

He rubs his forehead. “She wants me to talk to Satcher. Ask him to let you go.”

Heat rises to my face and I feel a tightness in my chest. “Are you fucking kidding me? Rhubarb is my—”

“—was,” Woods says. “Itwasyours. You sold it.”

“I only sold because you fucking cheated on me. You and I both know I never would have left if I didn’t have to.” I’m practically standing now, ready to storm out.

He holds up his hands in surrender. “You didn’t have to go. I took your trust away, not your business.”

I’m so angry my vision blurs. “Do you have any idea what that did to me? You just pulled the rug out from under me. I had no idea there was even something wrong between us.”

“That’s exactly right, Billie. Because you were too busy to notice.”

“You’re not going to put this on me,” I fume.

But despite my anger, a familiar prickle of guilt works through me. Something I’ve already considered. Something he probably told our friends and family.Always working ... neglectful wife ... doesn’t want to start a family. Career-obsessed.I snatch my clutch from the table.

“You can tell Pearl I’m not going anywhere,” I say. I pause, a lie brewing in my mind. “I’m fucking Satcher, he’s not going to fire me.”

I enjoy the way the shock hits him, fills his eyes first with disbelief then anger. It’s so satisfying that I wish I’d recorded it on my phone’s camera so I could watch it again and again. I start marching for the door then remember my lemon drop, the one that just arrived at the table. I circle back to the table and drink it in three large gulps with Woods watching.

“Thanks for the drinks,” I say.

Igo straight to Satcher’s room when I get back to the hotel. He opens the door on my fifth pound, wearing only jersey pajama pants. I stare, I do. His chest is the eighth wonder of the world.

“We have to have sex,” I say, pushing past him into the room.

“Say what?”

“It’s freezing in here.” I stop at the thermostat and see that he’s set it on sixty.

“I like cold.”

I walk over to the window rubbing my arms.

“Woods met me for drinks. He told me that Pearl wants me gone. He’s supposed to talk to you about it.”

Satcher frowns. “Ah. So why are we having sex?”

“I told Woods we were fucking and I couldn’t be fired.”

Still holding the door open, Satcher shuts it. He takes a moment to close his eyes and sigh. “Billie…”

“I know, I know. I’m sorry, all right? I just didn’t want him to think he could sway you.”

“And what makes you think he could?”

I purse my lips and pull uncomfortably at the neck of my shirt. “Could he?”

“No.”

“Can we say we’re sleeping together then?”

He tilts his head back and squints at the ceiling. “Are you really asking me that?”

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