48:Mrs. Foster

“I’m gonna guess you didn’t know she’s married?”

Jon struck contemptuous eyes at his brother.  The only point in his favor was the timing of that stupid ass question.  He at least waited until they were sequestered alone in the backseat of the SUV that was taking them back to the hotel. 

“No, I didn’t fucking know!” Jon spat as the lights of oncoming traffic flickered past.  “Did you? Did motherfucking psychic Lilah know?”

“I…”  Matt shook his head and lifted helpless hands.  “I can’t speak for Lilah, but I had no clue.  She doesn’t wear a ring, and the way Luke was talking…  Hell, he acted like he was ready to welcome you into the family.”

Precisely.  Something weird and fucked up was going on here.  If she was his wife, she would goddamn well wear his ring.  Any woman who married him would, he appended the thought.  Not just her.

“And maybe it’s just me, but I can’t picture her with that guy.”

That guy was a valid explanation for why Chiara sang the praises of a real dick over a vibrator that first time.  She didn’t have sex with her husband – or anybody else.  The night against the house, she was starved for the physical contact, and Jon had been with enough women to know they couldn’t fake that level of enthusiasm.  Not without sounding like a cheap porn star. 

Chiara hadn’t sounded like a cheap porn star.  Her cries of desperation and satisfaction were the most authentically erotic thing he’d ever heard.  It’s part of why he’d gone back again.  And again.

“She’s out of his league,” Jon muttered. 

“No kidding!”

There was something else weird, he thought as they turned yet another corner - her bedroom.  That room, with its foofy white bed and Disney artwork, was pure woman.  There was no sign of a man at all, much less a husband.  If he lived there, they had to have separate rooms.

Maybe he snores. 

Jon had slept – actually slept – with Chiara twice now, so he knew it wasn’t her.

All this stewing and speculation was only heaping irritation on top of anger.  He was going to make himself crazy if he didn’t cut loose on someone soon, and he was tempted to wake Luke’s ass up at – he flipped his wrist around to check the time – two-thirty in the fucking morning.  Stupid son of a bitch, saying that Chiara needed Jon in her life when she already had a motherfucking husband in her life.

As ticked as he was at her brother, the brunt of this deserved to land squarely in her lap.  She was the one who was going to be getting a wake-up call as soon as Jon showered and had a drink.  She was the one who had to answer for this bullshit.

“You know Lilah’s gonna shit when she finds out,” Matt remarked as the car pulled to a stop outside the hotel’s side entrance.  “Then again, maybe this is the ‘problem’ she was talking about.  Who knows?”

The only thing that had the power to piss him off any more than he was right now would be his interfering family getting up into his business before had a chance to work through it.  A serious rift would be torn in the family if that happened, because he wasn’t going to passively listen to their shit this time.  Things were going to get ugly if they stuck their noses in it.

Clamping a fierce hand onto his brother’s forearm, Jon stopped him from exiting the vehicle.  “Matthew.  You’re not to tell a motherfucking soul that Chiara’s married.  No one.  Not Tony, not Desiree, not your fucking dog.  I’m not playing around this time.  I’m not threatening your job, I’m not dangling a paycheck over your head.  I’m reminding you that when your family asks you to, you step up, and I’m asking you.”

Maybe he went a little too Godfather with it because Matt’s face contorted into a façade of confusion.  “Jesus, man.  You slept with her a couple times last week.  So what?  It isn’t like you started a relationship with her.”

Not technically.

A new wave of anger washed over him at the thought it was headed that direction just today.  He called to apologize for not letting her know Des was the one letting her into the studio.  Well, her marital status “would’ve been nice to know”, too.  Where was his apology?  She owed him ten times that and, if Jon was anyplace within a reasonable distance, he’d be pounding on her fucking door to demand it.

As it was, even if he had plane in the air within the hour, he wouldn’t make it to New York before nine in the morning.  That was too long to wait.  Besides, it would give him a perverse thrill to wake her out of a dead sleep for the ass-ripping she deserved.

“Just keep it under your hat, Matthew.”

J J J J J

“Mmff!” 

The ringtone that she sometimes couldn’t hear during the day was equivalent to an air raid siren in the middle of the night, and Charlie pushed the hair from her face as she scrambled to orient herself.  She’d been dreaming about flying to Neverland with Peter Pan and the clouds were still swirling around her head. 

Through those clouds, the bedside clock revealed that it was three in the morning, and her heart beat painfully against her ribs.  Middle of the night phone calls never brought good news and a million horrific possibilities raced through her mind. 

Her parents were getting up in years, and one of them could’ve fallen and broken a hip on the way to the bathroom.  Vince worked crazy hours with NYPD and could’ve been injured on duty.  Luke in a car wreck.  Dom with a heart attack.  Caleb or Noah in a campus shooting.

The longer she thought, the worse the options became, and she sent frantic prayers to a wide-array of saints while squinting at the screen to find…  Jon’s name as the caller. 

Okay.  The chances that Jon was the bearer of news about someone’s untimely demise were slim, but still. 

Her fingers were shaking from the adrenaline as she tapped the button and abruptly demanded, “What’s wrong?” 

At this time of night, polite greetings were tossed out the window in favor of the logical first question. 

“What’s wrong?” he scoffed rudely in her ear, sounding as alert as though it was the middle of the afternoon instead of night.  “I’ve been fucking a woman who didn’t bother telling me she’s married.  That’s what’s wrong, Mrs. Foster.”

The grapefruit-sized lump that lodged itself in Charlie’s throat tasted of fear, pride, regret and disappointment.  The combination was almost enough to gag her, but she somehow found a way to push down the nausea and asked around it, “How did you find out?”

“I met him!”

Oh, this was not good.

“Where in the hell did you meet him?”

“Don’t you take a goddamn attitude with me, Counselor.  You’re not the one who had to suffer through that… that… guy’s simpering appreciation for my hospitality toward his wife and family!”

Oh, God.  She could only imagine Owen tripping over himself to thank Jon.  Knowing him, he’d also mentioned some random, farfetched musician connection that the two of them had – to put himself on the same “professional musician” level as Jon Bon Jovi.  It was all Charlie could do to not cringe with embarrassment.

“At the risk of having you bellow at me again, how did you meet?”

“He was backstage at my motherfucking show tonight with your boys!  Here I am, a frigging dumbass, thinking their dad is your ex.  Then I see the wedding band and he starts in on how he’s sure that ‘Charlie would love to have a snapshot of her guys with a rock star’.  I felt like a fucking moron!”

“I’m sorry.” 

Rather than appeasing him, the quiet apology only sent him off on another tirade. 

“Why in the goddamn hell didn’t you tell me?”

She flopped back onto the mattress to stare at the black ceiling with a muffled sigh.  “When exactly was I supposed to do that?  When you had me pinned against the guesthouse wall?  In the pool?  In the damn trailer?”

“Any of those would’ve sufficed!  Goddamn you!”

“Oh, for God’s sake!  Stop being so outraged!  It’s not like you never cheated on your wife.”

“Maybe I did, but every one of those women knew I was motherfucking married!”

“Fine!” she spat.  “I admit that I’m the world’s sluttiest whore who took advantage of an innocent, unsuspecting fifty-three year old man.  I’m sure I’ll go to Hell for my wicked ways.  Feel better now?”

“Grrrrr….”  The growl was low and deep in the back of his throat.  “You’re goddamn lucky we’re not in the same room.”

He always brought out the devil in her when they argued and tonight was no exception.  Charlie couldn’t have stopped herself from taunting him if her life depended on it.  “Why? You’d just fuck me again, even knowing that I’m married.”

“Stop being a fucking bitch!”

“Stop being a condescending, holier-than-thou asshole!”

“I’m not the one who’s wrong here!”

Charlie was reaching the limit of her patience.  Yes, he was entitled to be angry.  Yes, he was entitled to take it out on her, but she felt as though she’d been tolerant enough in enduring his temper tantrum.  She was nobody’s doormat and the line had to be drawn somewhere. 

“Okay, I get that you’re mad.  You have a right to be, but if you don’t stop screaming at me, I’m hanging up on your ass!”

“Don’t you dare!”

“Then stop screeching and act like a damn grownup!”

“A grownup like you?” he asked nastily.  “Who hides behind fairies and fantasies instead of facing motherfucking reality?”

“Last warning, Bongiovi.”  Her cautionary words were low and carried a threat that she wouldn’t hesitate to execute if he didn’t cram his Mr. Hyde in a closet.  “I don’t care if I am in the wrong here, you’re going too far.”

All went silent for long seconds that seemed even longer in the darkness of night.  She was starting to speculate that he was the one who hung up when a huff blew over the line.  “Gimme a goddamn minute.”

Charlie hummed her agreement without actually speaking and rubbed at her eyes.  It wouldn’t be a bad idea to take a couple deep breaths to calm herself down. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?”  This time, the question was presented in a much more reasonable tone this time and, as such, she would answer it.

She hadn’t told him because she didn’t want to lose out on the best sex of her life for she’d done a long time ago.  Because she wanted to indulge for once in her responsible life.  Because she coveted going to a damn Peter Pan play. 

“I never thought we’d see each other again after the Hamptons.” 

His mumbled words were hard to make out, but she thought it was something like, “Me either, and it’s too damn bad it didn’t work out that way.”

It stung, but she accepted the pain as her due.  She’d done this to herself, she supposed.

“You don’t wear a ring.  You don’t use his name.  Your brother is trying to hook us up.  Wanna explain any of that?”

She had no trouble understanding those statements and the following question, which she feared was rhetorical.  If she told him she didn’t want to answer, he was going to lose his mind all over again, so she swallowed her lack of desire to do so and came up with the simplest explanation possible.

“Luke doesn’t like Owen.  I can’t say I much like Owen either.”

“Then why the fuck are you still married to him?!”

Right now, she didn’t have a choice, but since that only invited more questions…

“It’s complicated.”

“Thank God I called across the goddamn continent,” he declared with heavy sarcasm.  “I never would’ve figured that out on my fucking own otherwise.”

“Listen, you sarcastic son of a bitch.  My marriage is none of your business.”  There was no heat in the soft words, but there was also no room for argument.  Or so she thought. 

“You made it my business the day you spread your legs for me.”  The accusation was crude and the tone was hostile, but he wasn’t screaming.  For that, she cut him some slack, and managed not to raise her own voice.

“We’ve already established that you cheated on your wife.  Did your marriage become the business of the women you slept with?  I highly doubt it, and since that precedent has been firmly established, it will be uniformly applied to my marriage as well.” 

“Christ Almighty, Perry Mason.” His huff reeked of sheer disgust.  “I never saw those women again, and I sure as fuck didn’t go on dates with them or invite them into my private life.  You’re very much in my private life, in case you missed that memo.”

“Only because of Lilah.  You would’ve forcibly removed me if it wasn’t for your family.”

With an insolent snort, he disavowed, “Nuh-uh.  That’s bullshit.  I invited you to look inside my Hamptons house – a house that has remained blissfully anonymous from the outside world.  I personally took you through my bedroom, my bathroom and my kids’ rooms.  It doesn’t get any more private than that.”

That totally wasn’t how she viewed the tour of his house.  Charlie had taken it as a roundabout payment for services rendered, or a polite way to put up with her in front of his family.  When put in terms of willingly sharing his privacy…

“So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying that if you wanna stay in my private life, you tell me what the deal is with the piece of fuck I met tonight.  Who I can’t believe you ever slept with, by the way.”

Was that what she wanted?  To stay in his private life, even though she hadn’t realized to what extent was there?  Did she want it badly enough to tell her secrets?  Did she want it badly enough to trust him with those secrets?

“He didn’t always look like that,” she murmured absently, still weighing the pros and cons.

“I don’t care what he looked like, he’s a loser.  You could’ve had a dozen real musicians with the crook of your little finger.  How the hell did you end up with him?”

It was his fault in a very obscure way, but knowing that it wasn’t time to share that bit of trivia, she sufficed it to blandly say, “Shit happens.”

“So I guess that’s a subtle way of telling me that’s not my damn business, either?” 

He sounded none too pleased by the prospect, but that’s exactly what it meant.  It was a long, convoluted, intricately woven story that started in 1993 and ended – well, it still hadn’t ended. 

“Not yet, it’s not.”

His noisily exhaled breath was overflowing with contempt.  “You can’t have it both ways, so what’s it gonna be, Counselor?  Are you going to tell me about your husband or are we done?”

It was the middle of the damn night.  She was addled.  She was distressed.  Even if she opted to spill her guts now, she was going to screw it up.  Charlie needed time. 

“I can’t do this now, Jon.  Can we put it on the back burner until Monday, until we can talk in person?  Please?”

He was quiet long enough that Charlie would guarantee that he was going to give her a “now or never” ultimatum.  She knew it deep down inside, as well as knowing that it was going to hurt like hell to choose “never”, but that’s what she would do if he forced her hand.  There was too much at stake to give him what he asked for without the time to do some serious soul searching.

“Alright,” his grudging concession finally came.  “It can wait until Monday.”

“Thank you.”

Charlie was astonished but glad.  It would suck like a Hoover with a Hemi if this ended up being another strike against Owen.  He already had a couple thousand, and she’d vowed a long time ago to kill him with her bare hands once he reached three thousand.  Hopefully, she would be able to file for divorce before it came to that.  Her kids didn’t need a felon for a mother.