WORTHY, Part 2 (10 page)

“It’s just that, before I knew you, Violet was my friend,” Jane said. “It’s nothing personal.”

Violet. Now there was a name I wouldn’t be sad to never hear again. Violet, the woman who Amelia favored over me as a wife for her son. Violet, the woman who’d crashed my wedding because she still felt like there could be something between her and Jonathan. Violet, the woman who’d had Jonathan before me, the Jonathan I still didn’t know. I’d felt sorry for Violet in the beginning, feeling for what must have been a terrible shock when I entered the picture. But the more Jonathan and I interacted with her, the less I felt that she was an innocent. Violet had tried to manipulate Jonathan into dumping me and continuing his relationship with her — even if he wasn’t the same person who’d asked her to marry him in the first place.

Jane was right in the middle of taking my silence to mean the worst when I finally tuned back into the presence.

“I hardly talk to her anymore,” my sister-in-law was saying, her face a mask of panic, but I shook my head.

“I understand,” I said. “The world still turned before I started living in the Wharton compound, and I bet it’ll keep on turning when I’m not living there anymore. Be friends with whoever you want to be friends with. I don’t mind that you’re friends with Violet. Everyone needs friends.”

“Are you planning on going somewhere?” Jane asked, suddenly curious.

“I’m just saying,” I said, toying with my silverware and poking at a piece of iceberg lettuce on my plate. “As soon as Jonathan gets back from his tour of duty, we’re planning on going to the cottage for our honeymoon. In the future, maybe we’ll even want to get a condo or something away from the compound. I don’t know. I’m just thinking out loud. The only thing for sure at this point is the honeymoon.”

“Okay, well, this might affect that,” Jane said carefully. “It’s just that sometimes Violet sends me texts — I don’t answer them half the time — and this time I thought there was something you should know about.”

“Really, Violet doesn’t concern me anymore,” I said as Jane swiped at her phone. “She’s just not a threat. Jonathan isn’t the man she used to know, and she has to come to grips with that. It’s sad, really.”

“I think she’s got something else in her grip,” Jane said, her face grim as she passed her phone over to me. “Scroll to the right.”

I brought the phone up to my face, my eyebrows furrowed as I struggled to make out what I was seeing.

The Eiffel Tower was the first thing I noticed about the photo. But below the glittering lights, as clear as day, were a man and woman kissing.

The man was Jonathan.

The woman was Violet.

“What is this supposed to be?” I asked, looking up at Jane, but she only shook her head.

“Scroll to the right,” she repeated, pointing at the phone.

I did as she told me, finding another photo of Jonathan and Violet standing in front of the Louvre. This time, their kiss was even more passionate. I could swear I could see my husband’s tongue probing the inside of Violet’s cheek.

The next photo was in front of a crumbling ruin — the Parthenon. That would make this photo in Greece, I remembered from my history books. Both Jonathan and Violet stared into the camera, their eyes smoldering. He looked different, somehow — younger, freer, with less worry and care. Like he knew exactly what he wanted, exactly who he wanted to be.

“I don’t think I understand,” I said, swiping again to find yet another photo of Jonathan and Violet embracing in front of a landmark I didn’t recognize. They were endless, and I decided I had seen more than enough.

“She’s been sending these to me ever since Jonathan left the wedding,” Jane said softly, her eyes wide and refusing to leave mine. “I didn’t know how to tell you, Michelle, or else I would’ve done so sooner. I swear I would’ve. Are you angry? Please don’t be angry with me. I’m entangled, here. I mean, Violet used to be my best friend, and now you’re my sister, and Jonathan’s my brother. It’s terrible, really terrible, and I’ve been struggling —”

“I’m not angry with you,” I said quickly, cutting off her lament. “I’m just struggling to understand what’s happening here.”

“What’s happening is that Violet has been with Jonathan this whole time,” Jane said.

I shook my head. “That doesn’t make sense. He went abroad to save his job and this family’s stake in their company. I saw him off at the airport.”

“That’s one theory,” Jane said, then lapsed into silence again.

“Are you going to enlighten me as to the other theory?” I asked, starting to breathe a little harder. What was happening? Was I going to wake up from some terrible dream? Was Jane going to lunge at me at some point to laugh that this was all some elaborate prank involving Photoshop?

“I don’t know how much of this to believe,” my sister-in-law began, “because Violet has always been a little prone to exaggeration. But she’s been telling me that she was waiting on board the jet at the airport for a reunion that she and Jonathan had agreed upon before, um, at your wedding.”

I shook my head again, more forcefully this time. “That’s just not true,” I said. “Jonathan and I love each other more than you can possibly imagine. He wouldn’t do anything like this to me — not ever.”

“That’s one thing I don’t think you understand about my brother — or men in general,” Jane said. “They will do anything for pussy, and I mean anything. The Jonathan I used to know would’ve probably married Violet that night in place of you, bailed from the reception on a little ‘business trip’ of his own, and had something fresh for himself waiting on the plane.”

“Stop,” I said, grabbing at the edge of the table and feeling like I was going to be sick. “That Jonathan isn’t there anymore. He’s a changed man. That’s not who he is.”

“That Jonathan will always be there whether you like it or not,” Jane said. “I’m sorry to be real with you, but you need to learn to accept it. It’s a fact. Who knows what’s leaking through, what’s really going on inside that twisted head of his. My brother was not a good person. In fact, I — no. I can’t. It’s too terrible to put into words.”

“What could you possibly have to add that isn’t worse than what I’ve already seen and heard?” I cried, drawing a few stares from other diners.

Jane glanced around and bent forward, closer to me. “I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole loss of memory was just something he invented to keep himself from being bored. You know. Like a little game.”

“No, I don’t know,” I said, realizing that I was speaking far too loudly for polite restaurant conversation, but not caring. “I don’t know what that would be like, Jane, because that is absolute insanity. It’s not possible. You don’t understand. What Jonathan and I have is real. It’s real. I know it is.”

“You sound like you’re trying to convince yourself of that,” she said softly, staring at me with the same blue eyes that Jonathan had. “I know that I can’t understand. You know me — can’t tie myself down to one guy, can’t let myself love. I know that I can’t judge that. But Michelle, honey, I’m just a female version of my brother. He’s exactly the same way. He bounces around from girl to girl, not caring who is who or what is what. He’s a pure hedonist, and I don’t think he even knows what a conscience is.”

I looked at the phone I still held in my hand, looked at the way that Jonathan was kissing Violet. Did he kiss me like that? Had he ever? Was it possible that he’d been doing all of this just for the hell of it?

I couldn’t believe that. I just couldn’t. He was my husband. He was my first and only. I loved him, and he loved me.

“Open your eyes!” Jane commanded. “Look at what you’re holding. This is physical proof that he’s not a good person. What are you going to do about it?”

“This can’t be real,” I said, shoving the phone back at her. “I just really can’t believe this, Jane. Maybe — maybe Violet knows Photoshop or something and made all of these.”

“Honey, Violet doesn’t know her ass from a hole in the ground,” Jane said. “She definitely doesn’t know Photoshop.”

“Well, she was a model,” I pointed out. “She probably knows people in the business who can do Photoshop of this quality. It’s not that hard anymore — technology is pretty amazing these days. She — oh, I actually feel sorry for her — she probably had these created so she wouldn’t feel so lonely.”

Tears pity filled my eyes. Poor Violet. Maybe I should call a mental health facility. This was bordering on a dangerous obsession with my husband — one that I wouldn’t tolerate.

“Michelle, look at yourself,” Jane urged. “You’re ignoring the facts. You know as well as I do that this isn’t just a simple manipulation in Photoshop. This is genuine. Maybe Jonathan didn’t have Violet waiting in his jet at the airport. I don’t know. But I do know that she’s been at least following him from city to city — and he obviously hasn’t been turning her away. These pictures are proof of that.”

God, it made too much sense. It made so much sense I didn’t want to believe it. Why else would he practically refuse to call me? We rarely texted, and we hadn’t Skyped since that night — day, for him — when we’d talked each other to orgasm.

I’d only seen his face that session. Was it possible for Violet to be on her knees in front of him, sucking my husband off while he watched me masturbate? Was he that level of kinky depravity?

Were all of these excursions with different chairmen really the adventures he was having with Violet? Were they on my honeymoon, living it up?

“I need you to see reason,” Jane was saying. “I need you to open your eyes to this reality and understand that something isn’t right. You told me yourself the first time we went out to lunch together after your wedding that you weren’t hearing from Jonathan regularly. Right?”

“He’s busy,” I said brokenly, staring down at my untouched salad. “He’s been so busy with work.”

“I’m sure he’s staying busy with Violet,” Jane remarked, making me push my chair away from the table with a loud scrape. Ever since my explosion, we’d been getting more than a few long stares. We had become dinner entertainment — the Wharton heiress and the freak of nature — and I was through with it.

“What are you doing?” Jane asked.

“I’m leaving,” I said. “I can’t take this anymore.”

“What are you going to do?”

I shrugged uselessly. What was there to do? “I don’t know. Call Jonathan, I guess. Ask him if everything’s all right. Tell him — God, I don’t know.”

“Well, I think you’re moving in the right direction,” Jane said. “You should absolutely confront him. Tell him all about the pictures Violet’s been sending. Tell him you know everything.”

“I don’t think I can do that,” I said. “I still don’t know what’s real. We’re married. We love each other.”

“You sound like a broken record,” Jane said. “Something terrible is going on between Violet and my brother, and I can’t stand to see you getting burned. It isn’t right, Michelle. I want you to have all the knowledge you can possibly get. In these kinds of things, knowledge is the real weapon.”

“I have to go,” I said, grabbing my purse. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

To my credit, I made it out to the sidewalk before I blew chunks into the gutter. The paparazzi waiting outside got some very juicy shots for their assignments, but I didn’t care.

Nothing mattered except for the increasing possibility that Jonathan Wharton was playing me for a fool.

Everything was painted in a nightmarish fog. I only barely remembered the driver grabbing me and pushing me into the car, Jane practically diving in after me, before leaving the sea of paparazzi behind with a squeal of rubber.

I remembered Jane holding what I thought was water to my lips, then choking as it burned down to my stomach and then some.

“Vodka,” she told me. “To steel your nerves when you talk to that dick.”

By “that dick” she meant Jonathan. It was strange to realize that, strange to realize that Jane had such vehemence toward her brother. I felt as if I were someplace else. This couldn’t really be happening, could it? We loved each other. People who loved each other didn’t do this.

The next time I took in my surroundings, I was sitting on the floor in Jane’s living area — the one that dripped pink chandeliers and featured a full-service bar. I clutched a glass of something alcoholic in my hand, but I couldn’t tell whether I’d tasted any of it yet. Jane hovered over me, seemingly worried and not tapping on her phone for once. I hated that phone. I hated the things it contained.

“Michelle, I think it’d be good if you had a little something else to drink,” she cajoled me. “It’s not going to feel like this forever, and the good thing is that alcohol’s always there for you to dull the pain.”

“Jane?”

“Yes?”

“I need to be alone.” I looked down into the cocktail. It held no answers for me, and it gave me very little comfort. “I need to be alone so I can talk to Jonathan.”

She paused for half a second before giving me a smile. “Of course. Let me know if you need anything — and I mean anything. Xanax, marijuana, anything. All right? All I want to do is help.”

“Thanks,” I said, trying for a smile but falling flat. I knew that Jane was just trying to make me feel better, but there wouldn’t be a better until I talked with Jonathan. My mind kept casting around for some sort of rational explanation for those photos and the feeling I had inside of me, but there was nothing. I was hoping that speaking with my husband would offer me some insight into this entire situation that I hadn’t perceived before. There had to be a good reason for those photos. I just wasn’t seeing it.

I practically crawled up the stairs to Jonathan’s floor, surprised that I even had the energy in me to do so, and propped myself up against his bed.

This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening.

I took my phone out of my purse and stared at it. I didn’t know what country he was in, let alone what time of day it might be.

My mind turned unwillingly to those awful photos of him with Violet. Kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower. The Louvre. The Parthenon.

He’d told me that he’d thought he was in Italy for a whole day until he saw the Parthenon and realized it was Greece. Was that because he had a distraction in the form of a certain former fiancée on his arm the entire time?

Jane had presented me with proof. Now it was up to me to decide what I was going to do with it.

I put my phone back in my purse. Maybe I could catch him in his room, Skype with him, talk to him face to face. That was the right thing to do — the best way to conduct business barring actually going to him — but it sounded horrible. The last thing I wanted to do was look at the man I loved and tell him that I knew everything.

That I knew he was unfaithful to me.

Waking up my iPad and tapping on the Skype application, I saw that Jonathan was offline. I called him anyway, safe in the knowledge that he wasn’t able to pick up. It was a cowardly thing to do, but it got the ball rolling.

There. I’d tried to contact Jonathan. Now I wouldn’t feel so bad about not acting. Too bad. I didn’t know where he was or who he was with. I didn’t know when he’d be available to talk, or even if I wanted to talk to him.

I felt sicker now than I had after trying to drown myself in alcohol that night at the club with Jane and Brock. I didn’t think that was possible.

But instead of being able to simply swear off alcohol, what were my options? I couldn’t just swear off my husband.

Retrieving my phone again, I looked at the last text message I’d received from him. It was more than three weeks ago, received the same morning I woke up with such a hangover at Brock’s condo, telling me that he loved me and couldn’t wait to get home, to honeymoon with me back at the cottage.

Was that just a lie? Had he only sent me that to appease me? Had Violet told him to send that to me?

I took a deep breath and fired back a response. “Call me when you can,” it read. Simple and straight to the point. There was my effort at contact. The ball was in Jonathan’s court now, and I was somehow relieved.

Relieved until I put my head back to stare at the ceiling and was startled by my phone vibrating wildly.

Looking down, I saw Jonathan’s smiling face on my screen, indicating I had an incoming call from him. That was fast.

Steeling myself for what was about to potentially be one of the hardest phone conversations of my life — and still holding out hope that there was a reasonable explanation for those photos — I answered.

“Hello.”

“Hello,” Jonathan responded.

There was a long, awkward, gut-wrenching pause before I plunged back in.

“I hope I’m not bothering you,” I said, my voice soft.

“I was just finishing up dinner,” he said. “Now’s a good a time as any.”

His voice sounded stiff, and I wished I could see his face to try and judge what he was feeling. Something was definitely wrong, and I needed to confront what it might be.

“Where are you?” I asked. “Who’d you have dinner with?” Was it Violet, your psychotic former fiancée? Have you been fucking her behind my back? There were so many things I wanted to demand, but I couldn’t give them voice.

“I’m in Shanghai,” my husband told me. “I was dining with the Wharton Group chairman here at his home.”

“Isn’t it late over there?” I asked, looking at the clock. It had to be in the wee hours in Shanghai if it was late afternoon in Chicago. I wondered if Violet was listening in on our conversation. Maybe she was on the menu for dinner. It turned my stomach, and I tried to smother a gag.

“Dinners are a very elaborate affair over here,” he said. “Lots of business discussed, drinking games played, one-upmanship with eating and serving and spectacle. A cultural marvel, these dinners. With as much as you like cooking, I think you’d find them fascinating.”

“Sounds like fun,” I said, wincing at myself and my apparent inability to get to the point, to confront my husband about what I’d seen, about what was going on.

“So what’s going on with you?” Jonathan asked, his voice strangely tense for such a casually framed question.

“I wanted to talk to you about some pictures I saw,” each word the hardest I’d ever had to say.

“What a coincidence,” he said, a hard edge in his voice. “I wanted to talk to you about some pictures I saw, too.”

That threw me for a loop. What was my husband talking about? Was it the same photos? Why would seeing them bother him so much if he was living them?

“Jane showed me photos of you and Violet together,” I said. “Is she there with you now?”

“Who, Jane?”

“No,” I snapped before calming myself again. I had to be calm no matter how hard my heart was pounding. “Violet. You know, your former fiancée. Your wife would like to know if your fiancée has been traveling the world with you, offering tasty little distractions from your daily grind.”

“You’re delusional,” Jonathan said incredulously. “No, of course Violet hasn’t been here with me. I’ve been working my ass off. You know that.”

“Going to midnight drinking dinners?” I asked. “Sure. Sounds really hard.”

“I am exhausted,” Jonathan said. “And I don’t know where this is coming from.”

“Your sister had all these photos,” I said. “She said Violet had been sending them to her. Photos of you two kissing by the Eiffel Tower. The Louvre. The Parthenon. Places I know you’ve been lately.”

“I’ve been to those places, but I wasn’t kissing anyone,” Jonathan said. “Your information’s faulty, Michelle.”

“I know what I saw, Jon,” I said, feeling more confused and defensive than ever. I hadn’t expected my husband to deny that the photos even existed. That somehow didn’t put my heart at ease at all.

My phone gave a short buzz, and I pulled it away from my ear for a moment. It was a text from Jane.

“Thought you might need this when you’re talking to that dick for proof,” it read, and attached was the photo of Jonathan and Violet kissing at the Parthenon. It turned my stomach yet again to see them together. Jane’s text was so well-timed that I wondered if she was listening just outside, but I didn’t care.

“I’ll text you one of these photos right now,” I said. “So you can see what I’m seeing.”

I forwarded the photo to his phone and waited.

“Let’s see,” he muttered, and then I heard a sharp, faraway gasp. “Look, I don’t know what kind of game this is, but this photo didn’t happen, Michelle.”

“I’m not playing any kind of game,” I said. “All I’m doing is trying to get to the bottom of this.”

“There is no ‘this,’” Jonathan said, flustered. “I wasn’t at the Parthenon during the day. I was there at night. And I haven’t seen Violet since I kicked her out of our wedding — for whatever that gesture was worth to you.”

I cut my eyes. What did that mean? “Are you sure you’re remembering correctly?” I asked. “You thought Greece was Italy for a whole day. Maybe you were drinking a little too much grappa with Violet.”

“After I met you, I remembered everything perfectly clearly,” Jonathan snapped, angrier than I’d ever heard him. “And these photos are bullshit. Never happened. End of story.”

“It’s not the end of story,” I fired back. “There are tons of them, Jonathan. Tons of photos of everywhere you’ve gone. Violet has always been there, hasn’t she? She was waiting in the jet for you when you went to the airport, wasn’t she?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “And you’re one to talk about too much grappa. I’ve seen what too much grappa can do to you.”

Where did that come from? I’d never been wasted in front of Jonathan.

“You wanted to talk about the photos,” I said. “So let’s talk. Where do you think they’re from if they never took place? Pretty good Photoshop job?”

“These fakes aren’t the photos I wanted to talk about,” he said tightly.

“Really?” I asked. “Are there any other photos in existence right now that you’d like to talk about? These photos are the ones at the top of my list.”

“I’m texting you right now,” he said, his voice faraway again, and I waited for the telltale buzz.

What I saw on my screen next absolutely shocked me.

The photo I received showed me sprawled on my back on a bed, my gold dress halfway down my stomach, my breasts spilling out on top of it. I was directing a half-lidded gaze at the camera, my makeup smeared to shit, my legs parted.

I was still staring at that photo, realizing that it was the night I went out with Brock and Jane, when my phone buzzed again.

It was another photo, this time of me straddling a man’s bare, hairy legs. The dress was hitched up to my waist from the bottom, and my panties were off, my naked ass presented to the camera. My hair was wild, and I looked to be in mid-head toss.

Before I could even begin to make sense of that photo, my phone buzzed again.