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“That’s one way of looking at it. I called Steve, he came to pick me up and we drove to Soho. We waited outside in his car.”
“How did you know it was me?”
“Red hair, contagious laugh. You were beautiful, Gemma, I knew it was you.” Even in the darkness I could tell she was blushing. “I just wanted to see you.”
She sighed. “It freaked me out in there, knowing I’d been watched.”
“Surely you can see the irony in that?”
“Of course I can see the irony in that,” she said. “But there’s a big difference. Ichooseto be here. Ichooseto meet up with you,chooseto put myself in these crazy situations you set up for me.” She clasped her hands in her lap. “There was no choice in Soho. You could have been anyone, watching me, following me. Fuck knows what else.”
“I understand that, and I’m sorry,” I offered. “I’d never do anything you didn’t want me to, Gemma. I’m no crazy stalker.”
“I know.”
I shifted in my seat to face her. “Do you know? Truly?”
“Yes,” she said. “I do.”
“Good.”
“But that was creepy, hearing Steve talk like he knew me.”
“I get that. If you want to end things here, I’ll understand.”
Please fucking don’t.
She was quiet for a long while, head turned to the window as though she could see out. “What’s going on here, Jason? What’s thisthingwe’ve got going on?”
“You really want to do this now? The big conversation?”
“This isn’t exactly how I imagined it, sat in a car in the middle of nowhere at God knows what time in the morning, blindfolded, but, yeah, I guess we need to talk things out.” She groaned. “I hate all this shit.”
“Blindfolded, anonymous, casual, dirty... That’s what you wanted.”
“It’s still what I want.”
“So, where’s the problem?”
Her sweet little hands gestured into nothing. “I don’t do relationships, and I don’t know on what planet this kind of situation ends well or leads anywhere, but I can’t stay blindfolded forever. We can’t keep doingthisforever. I think about you all the time, aboutthis. I don’t know how long I can keep up the blindfold thing before things explode.”
“I don’t know what happens next,” I said. “I try not to think about it.”
“You’re married.”
“On paper.”
“Does your wife have any idea?”
“We can’t stand each other, it makes little odds to her.”
“So, why are you still together?”
I smiled. “You want me to leave my wife?”
“No!” she scoffed. “That’s ridiculous. I just want to know.”
“We’ve got investments together, business ties, always have had. Some of them haven’t done so well. She wants me to give her the house, which is really the only major asset we have left. I won’t sign the papers and she won’t budge. Stalemate.”
