The Secret of You and Me - Melissa Lenhardt Page 0,30

I could marry a man and have a normal life. Not with Charlie, he was a means to an end, but with someone.

Seducing Charlie killed three birds with one stone: it silenced questions about Nora leaving town and the cause of our rift, it gave me hope I could have a normal life, and it proved to my mother that she didn’t need to ship me off to conversion camp like she threatened when she caught Nora and me the second time, after we’d sworn it was a one-time thing, an experiment, we’d been drinking—it was graduation, after all—we knew it was wrong and would repent, do anything, even not see each other, as long as Brenda Russell kept what she saw from my father, and Nora’s.

Every word out of our mouths had been a lie. Nora and I were in love, had known it for almost a year. The best year of my life.

My mother wasn’t stupid, though like all teenagers, I thought she was. She saw through our lies and, like the master manipulator she was, proceeded to separate Nora and me with surgical precision. I finished the job for her, though. You’ve never seen an evangelical so happy at her daughter’s fall from grace as the expression on my mother’s face when I told her I was pregnant with Charlie’s baby. Forgiveness for that sin was easier than the crime of being in love with another girl.

To his credit, Charlie didn’t hesitate in doing the right thing when I told him. He’d convinced himself he was in love with me—energetic, daily sex will do that. But, all that energy and passion was born of anger, fear and lies, not desire. Is it a surprise a relationship would rely on the same to keep it alive?

* * *

The only way I could enjoy sex with Charlie was if I was angry. I’d become a master at blowing up small slights and perceived wrongs into mountains of injustice. Today my old anger at Nora resurfaced. By the time I finished rage-fucking Charlie, we were both hot and sweaty and he had come, but I hadn’t. I never did, though Charlie had no idea I’d been faking orgasms since the first time we’d had sex.

“Geez, Soph. We need to do this more often.”

I smiled at the ceiling and hummed noncommittally. “Do you need my help planning the fund raiser?”

“Nope. Avery’s got a handle on it. You just have to show up and look beautiful.”

“Hmm.”

Avery Rhodes, up-and-coming political phenom, started her career in the Election Industrial Complex as an intern for Bush ’04, worked on McCain’s technology team in ’08, trying and failing to convince her baby boomer bosses social media was the future, worked at the RNC during the Tea Party wave, and finally moved on to Romney’s campaign as Anne Romney’s media liaison. It had been something of a coup for Charlie to land her as a campaign manager for a piddly State Senate seat, even if it was Texas. Her name was mentioned in reverent tones among a particular subset of political operatives—i.e., Millennials who were determined to take over the world—and I suspected she noted Charlie’s discipline, his resume, his made-for-television charisma, and saw a potential to grow her political capital and influence as she grew his career. I had to admit, Avery was impressive in person. She had a girl-next-door attractiveness with a fierce intelligence and a no-bullshit demeanor. She was the best parts of me and Nora rolled into a ruthless package. No wonder Charlie was fucking her.

“Let her know I’m happy to help,” I said, more to watch Charlie squirm than out of any real desire to get involved. Showing up and looking pretty was about all I cared to do.

Charlie rose from the bed, turning his back to me. “Will do.”

I watched Charlie walk into the bathroom and turn on the shower. With his broad shoulders, trim waist, and muscular legs, I knew I was a lucky woman. Most of the other husbands our age were thickening around the middle, athletes in high school turning to flab. Charlie was disciplined in all areas, but I think his fitness obsession was rooted in his need to balance out his hair loss. He’d seen the writing on the wall and decided to take matters into his own hands before nature did it for him, coming home one night with a shaved head. Thinking he was an intruder, I threatened him with a knife before he