Many Shades of Gray (42 page)

“Simon, I just wanted to hurt you and I knew that would. Hurting you is an old habit with me. You hurt me and I struck back. I want to stop the need to see you in pain. It’s killing you and it’s killing me. Maybe I do need to leave,” she said, crying and not bothering to wipe away the tears.

She knew he hadn’t heard her but her baby kicked in her belly and she rubbed it, comforting her unborn child.

“I’m tired of fighting,” Simon said softly. “It’s not doing the baby any good and it’s not helping us. You’re pregnant, you don’t need this.” He sighed and took a deep breath. “I never started out to hurt you.” He stopped speaking and stared at her for a moment, then smiled, a sad little smile.

“That’s a lie, isn’t it; I did want to hurt you. I wanted to force you to love me. You’re right. I am what I am. Don’t worry,” he said, and walked toward the door. “How could I expect you to truly love me with my past between us?”

“But I do love you, Simon,” she said without hesitating. “I do love you. As much as I hate you right now, I still love you.”

“Then why would you agree to divorce me? You could have said no,” he said, preparing to leave the room.

“Simon, I didn’t sleep with Tommy.” Janice wanted to try at least once more to make her husband look past his doubts.

“After everything that’s happened do you expect me to believe that?”

“Believe what you want to. When have I had the time to have an affair with anyone? Simon, with the exception of the time I spent at the hotel I’ve been swamped with work. I stayed locked up here for over a month getting that damn book done and then we went to Italy. Please tell me when I slept with Tommy or anyone else other than you? Can’t we please stop fighting about this?”

Simon looked down at her, a great sadness filling his chest. “I agree we shouldn’t keep fighting, but I can’t get the picture of you making love with him out of my mind.”

“The picture should have never been there to begin with. It never happened.” Janice fell silent. “Maybe your wanting a divorce is the right thing,” she whispered and closed her eyes, hoping God would give her the inspiration to know what it would take in order for her husband to let go of his delusions.

* * *

Simon stared down at his sleeping wife. Her hair was wild and loose and covering her pillow. He couldn’t stop himself from wanting to touch her. His eyes dropped to her rounded belly. He’d screwed everything up, he thought as he allowed his hand to touch her. He ran the tips of his fingers around the outline of her belly., felt the baby kick inside her, and his resolve vanished. He pulled his sleeping wife into his arms and pressed his body against her, holding her close to him. He shook with his emotions and tears ran down his cheeks.

“Simon.”

“Shh, just let me hold you,” he whispered. “I just need to hold you.”

Janice was awake now. She started to move, to not give him the comfort that he sought but she hesitated a second and she felt the heat of his tears as they spilled on her shoulders.

They’d spent so much time hurting each other. Her throat closed up with her own pain and tears seeped beneath her lashes. Instead of pushing her husband away, she lay where she was, trembling in his arms, feeling his pain with every fiber of her being.

It swirled around and through her and she recognized it. For the first time in over twelve years, Janice became Mary Jo Adams again in spirit. She allowed herself to go back to the day that she’d changed her life. If she had not made a decision to have an abortion twelve years before, Tommy wouldn’t have hated her, she wouldn’t have hated him. And there would have been no need for Simon to root around in her past. He would not have worried about her carrying a torch for an old flame. The secret she’d kept buried for so long was part of the reason she couldn’t convince her husband that she loved him. If she had not worked so hard to keep Tommy buried, Simon would not have worked so hard to find him. If he had not thought she loved Tommy he could believe she loved him. Her hidden secret was in part responsible for the shambles her marriage was in. She and Simon had made a mess of loving each other.

She cried in her husband’s arms as she hadn’t allowed herself to cry then. She cried over the pain of the procedure. And she cried over what she knew in her soul had been so very wrong for her. She cried for Tommy, admitting for the first time that he had a right to his anger. She’d cheated him out of his right to have a say. At last with this baby kicking in her belly, she cried for the baby whom she’d aborted, only it was years too late and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it.

But she could do something about Simon. She was determined to find a way to make him believe, to erase the damage their years of fighting had done. She loved her husband and their baby and there was no way on earth she was giving either of them up. Maybe it would take Simon believing the worst thing he feared had happened to make him see that she and he were not his parents, they could be happy. It had taken a lifetime to understand that she didn’t have to continue reliving her pain. Now she had to find a way to make her husband join her.

She didn’t know how long she lay in her husband’s arms sobbing, only that when she woke the next morning she no longer hated her husband. She felt cleansed, as though a great weight had been lifted off her shoulder.

“I don’t want to fight any more, Simon,” she said into the quietness, knowing he was still awake.

“Neither do I.”

“You know, they say babies can feel the emotions of their parents and they react to it. I want our baby to hear something other than the two of us snipping at each other. We still have to take the Lamaze classes and I’d rather we not fight while we’re taking them.” She was holding out an olive branch and praying her husband would take it.

He looked down, not answering.

“Simon.”

“Are you sure you want me with you?”

“I need you with me.”

His eyes met her. “If you need me I’ll be there. I’ll always be there when you need me even if—”

Seeing doubt cloud Simon’s eyes, Janice’s hand moved across her belly as she attempted to soothe the movements of her baby. “Simon, if I told you this was Tommy’s baby, would it make you feel better? Should I tell you that I have been carrying on an affair with him since the moment you forced him back into my life?” She pulled away from him and stared at her husband as the sadness of what they’d done to each other filled her anew.

“I love you, baby. I also know love isn’t always enough and I wish that it was. I know I’ve made a mess of our lives and we have nothing left. I had such hope for us, for the family we’d have together.” Simon sighed, and shook his head. “I wish I didn’t know about my family. Maybe then it would be easier. But I do love you.”

Janice remained silent. For weeks she would have given anything just to hear her husband tell her that he loved her. But this seemed to be love based on some unfounded guilt. That she didn’t want.

“I don’t want you loving me because you want to make up for what your ancestors did. I’ve told you honestly that there is no need. I was being a bitch when I used that against you. But I can’t be the salve that soothes your conscience.”

“So you’re going to go to Tommy after you have the baby?”

Janice sighed again before deciding to answer. “How did you ever get so far in business without listening?” Then she went down to her office to write. It would never be published but the writing was cathartic.

* * *

For the next few months Janice and Simon called a sort of truce. Together they went to the Lamaze classes and Simon was with her for all doctor visits. They even shopped together for the baby. On several occasions they found themselves having fun until one of them would stare at the other and an invisible veil would fall. But in bed together, when the lights were out, they behaved as man and wife, making love as they lay next to each other. Whether out of need or out of love they didn’t know.

Janice woke and lay on her side of the bed for awhile with her back to Simon. She could feel his eyes boring a hole in her back. She faced him, thinking he would at least speak but he didn’t. He just continued to stare until she could take it no longer. He’d been staring at her for twenty minutes, not speaking, just staring, and it was driving her crazy. “Simon, why are you staring at me?” Janice finally asked. “Is there something on your mind?”

“I want to ask you something. And I was hoping I could ask without your biting my head off.”

She’d have to admit that this was progress. “Sure, go ahead and ask me. I promise I won’t bite your head off.”

“When you met me, what were you looking for? What was missing from your life?”

“I was looking for a needle.”

“Come again?”

“I was looking for a needle in a haystack.”

“Excuse me?”

Janice laughed softly. “Simon, I was looking for the impossible. I’d allowed too many things to get in the way of my living. I was looking for something to make me feel, to make me bleed. Maybe even someone who would bleed for me.” She sat there watching as Simon got up from the bed, marched out and came back in a few seconds.

“You should have told me what you wanted.” He held a needle in front of her face before bringing it down to prick his finger. “I bleed red blood, Janice,” he whispered, and then he pricked her finger. “And so do you.” He pressed his finger to hers and looked down into her eyes. “We don’t have to keep trying to hurt each other. We both know we can and do hurt. We both have baggage.”

“Can you let go of yours?” Janice asked.

“I’ve been trying,” Simon said, looking her in the eye, “and it’s hard. I’ll admit that much. I do love you. I never knew that I was obsessively jealous but I am. I hate the fact that I allow Tommy to get to me. I hate knowing that you have more of a history with him than you do with me. And I hate thinking that you might be remembering him now and the baby you aborted.” He stared at her for a nanosecond seeing the pain in her eyes but wanting to continue. “I hate thinking that you might be having my baby out of guilt for what you’d done in the past.”

“Are you insane? I’m having our baby because I love you, Simon, because I trusted that you loved me, that you wouldn’t hurt me. I trusted you enough to tell you a secret that had torn me apart for twelve years. I told you of my pain because I trusted that you wouldn’t use it against me.” She pulled in a breath. “If you believe what you’ve just said…that you could even say it…makes me think I was wrong to have trusted you.”

* * *

“Mrs. Kohl, there’s someone here to see you. He says it’s urgent.”

Janice looked up from her computer and blinked. No one ever interrupted her while she was writing. “Who is it?”

“Mr. Strong. He said it’s imperative that he see you. He’s waiting in the den.”

Janice wondered what Tommy wanted. What would be so important that he would come to the mansion? She glanced at the clock, hoping whatever it was wouldn’t take long. All she needed was for Simon to come home and find Tommy there.

A contraction hit her on the way to the den and took her almost to her knees. She’d been in labor now for the past three hours. She believed her water had broken but she wasn’t sure. She just knew that she’d found herself wet and fluid running down her legs. Embarrassed, she’d cleaned up the floor, showered and put on a pad and sat down to wait.

She’d heard how long first babies took to come and she was determined to not sit in a hospital room for hours doing nothing. So she’d started writing again on the book Simon had thought was autobiographical. And now in a way it was.

Janice had begun printing up her work each day and leaving it out so that Simon could read it. He never said that he had and she never asked but she knew that he was reading it and believing it. And with it she believed she’d found the way to mend her husband’s heart. They would both have to go through the fire and come out on the other end. Halfway measures would not be enough. He needed to believe, truly believe, that there was nothing left. She had to do this to save them.

Janice bit into her balled fist to keep from screaming out with the pain. She wiped the perspiration from her face and walked toward the den. “Tommy, what’s going on?” she asked in as calm a voice as she could with the pain still riding her spine.

“I brought you proof.”

“Proof of what?” she asked, reaching for the paper he was holding out to her.

“Proof that your husband engineered the bad press against you, that he was behind the entire thing. I even have proof that he was involved with closing up the bookstores.”

“Tommy, I know that already.” She laughed harshly. “Do you really think I’m that naïve?”

“Then why are you still here?”

Janice looked down at her belly, wondering if all men were dense.

“I can take care of you and the baby. You can divorce him. I’ll be the father.”

“Only if it’s yours.” Simon said and both Janice and Tommy turned around.

“There is that possibility,” Tommy muttered angrily and Janice glared at him.

“Leave, Tommy,” she said moving between him and Simon. “No more fighting. You two have done enough.”

She pushed Tommy toward the door with one hand and placed her body in front of Simon. When Tommy was out of the door she looked at her husband. His eyes were filled with pain, so much pain, and it was happening too often. There was no need for such pain but he wouldn’t see beyond anything that he believed to be true.