“My face gives nothing away,” said the judge.
“It’s not about you giving it away, it’s what she’s taking,” said Rook. He turned to her as he spoke to the judge. “I’ve been with her weeks now, and I don’t think I’ve ever known someone so adept at reading people.” He held that look to her, and although they were nowhere close to breathing each other’s exhalations like they had on Starr’s balcony that day, she felt a flutter. So she turned away to rake in the pot, wondering what the hell she was playing with here, and she didn’t mean the cards. “I think I should call it a night,” she said.
Rook insisted on walking her down to the sidewalk, but Nikki stalled until they were embedded in the group departure of the other guests, so she could get away clean. A group seemed the perfect place to fulfill that. Because the truth of it, she reflected on the ride down, was that she didn’t want so much to be alone as not to be paired up.
Not tonight anyway, she thought.
The news anchor and her husband lived in walking distance and made their exit just as Simpson flagged a cab. The judge was heading uptown near the Guggenheim and asked if Nikki wanted to share the ride. She sorted her feelings about leaving Rook hangdogging on the sidewalk versus staying and having to deal with the awkwardness of the good-?night moment, or worse, the come-?back-?up moment, and answered yes.
Rook said, “Hope you don’t mind I sort of Punk’d you into coming over.”
“Why would I mind? I’m leaving with money, jokey boy.” Then she slid way across the taxi seat to make room for Simpson. Ten minutes later, she was unlocking her lobby door in Gramercy Park, thinking about a bath.
Nobody would accuse Nikki Heat of leading a life of indulgence. “Delayed gratification” was a phrase that came to her mind often, usually invoked as a means to talk herself down off some rare flash of anger at what she was doing instead of what she would rather be doing. Or saw other people doing.
So as she ran the tap to revitalize the bubbles in her tub, allowing herself one of her few indulgences, a bubble bath, her mind ran back to thoughts of the road not taken. To Connecticut and a yard and the PTA and a husband who took the train to Manhattan, and having the time and resources to get a massage once in a while or maybe take a yoga class.
Yoga class instead of close-?quarter combat training.
Nikki tried to imagine herself in bed with a ropy tofu advocate with a Johnny Depp beard and a “Random Acts of Kindness” bumper sticker on a rusted-?out Saab, instead of sheet grappling with the ex-?Seal. She could do worse than Johnny Depp. And had.
A couple of times that evening she had thought about calling Don but didn’t. Why not? She wanted to boast about her perfect arm-?bar takedown of Pochenko at the subway station. Quick and easy, take a seat, sir. But that wasn’t why she wanted to call him, and she knew it.
So why didn’t she?
It was an easy arrangement with Don. Her trainer with benefits never asked her where she was or when she’d be back or why she didn’t call. His place or hers didn’t matter; it was logistical, whichever was closer. He was looking neither to nest nor to get away from anything.
And the sex was good. Once in a while he would get a bit too aggressive, or a bit too into task completion, but she knew how to work with that and get what she needed. And how much different was that from the commuter guys, the Noah Paxtons of the world? The Don thing wasn’t the be-?all, but it worked fine.