“I want you to go back to the flower shop. I’m saying it’s okay.” He tugs on my hand, leading me away from the table, through the living room, and up the wood steps. I follow him, swaying slightly, tilting my wrist in the moonlit living room to get a closer look at the bracelet. I can’t believe he’d thought of all that, and I have no idea when he’d had it made. It means more to me than all the diamonds and rubies in our safe.
Without warning, the want creeps up on me. I gently push on the small of his back, down the hall and into our bedroom, where I shove him, wanton and drunk, onto the bed. We pull at each other’s clothes, and I am laughing. The room spins, and the next morning when I try to remember the moment, all I can see is Henry’s smile, the love reflected in his blue eyes, and the overwhelming feeling that, here in this secluded country, despite all his flaws and our imperfections, where I know not another soul, I am home.
CHAPTER 12
On Saturday, I’m up at six, brewing coffee in a stainless steel percolator, standing at the gas stove, watching coffee gurgle and spit into the glass top. I can’t sleep. In our penthouse apartment, we hear very little street noise, so I can’t figure out the difference. But I had lain in bed, my leg jittering, shifting one way, then the other, before I finally snuck out and downstairs.
Arms snake around my middle and I jump. “You scared me.” I smile, my head tipped down, and Henry plants a feather kiss on the back of my neck.
“Ah, sorry,” he whispers in the dark kitchen. “Don’t be mad, but I have to drive back for a few hours.”
“Today?” I step forward, putting distance between us.
“I’m sorry. It’s going to be overcast, but not rainy. You could hike out back, there are trails. They’re not all ours, but no one cares. Just don’t get killed by a hunter.”
“What season is it?” I wonder.
He rubs his jaw. “Spring turkey maybe? I’m not sure. I generally hunt in the fall. Spring is too busy with work.”
I don’t understand Henry’s work or his hunting. It’s completely possible, likely even, that I don’t understand Henry. I pour us two cups of coffee in pottery mugs, but as I turn to retrieve the cream and sugar (for mine only, Henry drinks his coffee black), Henry’s eyebrows pucker, his mouth twisting apologetically.
“You have to go now,” I say, flat as stone, and sigh. I pick up his mug and pour the coffee into the carafe. He drops a kiss on my lips and lingers there, his hand pressed between my shoulder blades.
“Don’t pout. I’ll be back right after lunch. I just have to address some unexpected . . . issues.”
“Issues with what?” I’m curious now. What are the issues on a Saturday if you work on Wall Street?
“Zoe, do you know how boring my job is?”
“No, tell me. Put me back to sleep, and I’ll sleep till you come back.”
He laughs and the sound swallows me. I love it and miss it all at once. “Okay, fine. So Japan’s market is not actually closed on Saturday, and we have a security issue with the agency bonds.”
“Okay, okay. I feel like you just made all that up. Go.” I give his arm a gentle shove and he laughs again. I think it’s possible that this house, this town, has let out a new Henry, like he’s been unzipped. I picture him stepping out of his own skin, clapping his hands together, looking around. Okay, what do we do first? Fish? Hunt? Hike?
He kisses his fingertips and touches them to the crown of my head and I hear his shoes clack on the hardwood floor and the door click shut, and just like that I’m alone. I’m not necessarily afraid, but I have a pit settled right under my breastbone. I’m at loose ends. It’s hard to have a whole day in front of you and nothing to put in it, nothing to pencil in, no phone calls to make. I have this feeling often but generally I can fill my time by going out, taking in Manhattan. In New York, you’re never bored. I look at the clock above the sink. Six-thirty.
I part the curtains. Out leads to a forest in the back and a copse of trees in the front, then a quarter mile away, a road. I take my mug and from the back of the easy chair in the living room, I grab a sweater that I assume must be Henry’s but I don’t recognize it. It’s heavy and cable knit, its sleeves are long, with big wooden buttons. I wrap it around myself tightly and open the back door.