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She brought the bulky bag of Chinese into the kitchen, having to carry it with two outstretched arms. She began to leaf through it, sensing immediately that they’d gotten the order wrong. There was enough food in it for at least three people, for one. And also, her orange chicken was missing, replaced with some strange, sloppy-looking beef and vegetable dish.
“Fuck,” she murmured, rushing to her phone. She’d given up eating red meat the previous year and didn’t want it to turn her stomach. She dialed the Chinese restaurant, getting the same lady on the phone. “Hello,” she said, her voice still bright, if manic. “I ordered food about twenty-five minutes ago, and it’s the wrong order.”
“Okay. What is your address?” the woman asked sternly, as if she didn’t believe her.
“I’m at Wabash and 181st. On the ninth floor.”
“Ohhh,” the woman cooed into the phone. “Let me see.”
She paused for a long time, leaving Charlotte to bob her weight uneasily, anxious. All she wanted, now, was to munch on orange chicken and dive between the sheets. Perhaps all thoughts of Quentin would flurry away when she woke in the morning.
“There were two deliveries to the ninth floor,” the woman finally announced primly. “One just down the hall. McDonnell. You know?”
Charlotte’s heart began to hammer in her chest. How could this happen? How could they possibly order from the same Chinese restaurant, at the same time? Why was the universe racing her so swiftly into Quentin’s arms?
“Fuck,” she sighed into the phone, an accident.
“It just down the hall,” the woman stammered, clearly agitated. “If you’re so lazy that you can’t walk down the hall—“
“No, no,” Charlotte whispered hesitantly. “It’s not that. Thank you. Thanks.”
She hung up the phone and pressed it tightly against her chest. The Chinese food stunk from the countertop, emanating MSG and salt. Her nostrils flared, and her pussy seemed to find its own heartbeat, hammering its desire into her panties.
If she went, she knew she wouldn’t be able to resist him.
If she went, she’d fall further from her professional track.
If she went, she’d dissolve into the greatest pleasure of her life. She couldn’t get enough of it.
Fuck. What was she going to do?
12
“Orange chicken?” Quentin said, sighing. Morgan blinked up at him, expectant, her fingers still scribbling their scales across the countertop.
“You didn’t order that, Daddy,” Morgan said, her voice bobbing up and down. “Is my rice pudding in there?”
“No. Not here, either,” Quentin sighed, frustrated. He dumped the bag on the far side of the counter, unsure of what to do. There wasn’t enough food for both of them, and Morgan had been quite picky lately, eating only vegetables and avoiding meat at all costs. She was a seven-year-old activist and an annoyance at the dinner table. Phase after phase after phase: that was childhood. Maybe it was adulthood, as well.
“Well, what am I going to eat, Daddy?” she asked playfully, spinning on a single toe.
“Why don’t you go practice the last page of that new one you brought home and leave me to the dinner making, huh?” Quentin said, snapping his hands to his knees and leaning down to her height, looking her in the eyes. “We all have responsibilities in this house. And yours is to ENTERTAIN ME!” He wrapped his arms around her, suddenly, and spun her in a mad circle, causing her to giggle maniacally.
Finally, he let her loose, watching as she scrambled back toward the piano. She gave him a final, half-evil look, and then curved her fingers over the keys. For a moment, Quentin felt his heart pulse with happiness, and with pure love.
Filling a large pot of water, he salted it and waited for the bubbles to come to the surface. Spaghetti, again. For an outright millionaire, it seemed strange that he fed his kid spaghetti. But she loved it, swirling her fork as many as twenty times in the gooey strands before lifting it to her gaping mouth.
Sometimes, everything about their life seemed too good to be true.
As he poured the spaghetti into the water, however, he couldn’t shoot the thought of Charlotte from his mind. He’d spent the majority of the afternoon with the memory of her kiss on his lips, talking in low tones with The Morning Stars and holding himself back from bragging about her.
He couldn’t. Somehow, he felt she meant more than just a few brief lays.
But no. Jesus, no. He shook his head wildly, watching as the spaghetti broke down, became wavy. The no-fraternization policy had to be upheld, at all costs. Feelings were out of the question, as well. Morgan didn’t need him to have a relationship, slicing through the perfect structure of their four-day-week lives.
Besides. He’d never had to explain a girlfriend to Kate; hadn’t had to voice the words that he’d “moved on” completely from their marriage. He knew she didn’t love him any longer. Perhaps she never had. But just watching the realization that she’d “lost” fold over her face would destroy him. He also didn’t know if she would work to turn Morgan against him in the aftermath. And if the relationship didn’t work out, he didn’t want to face that, either.
