The Good Wife(128)
“Having a bite to eat with the guys,” Boone answered, laughter erupting in the background. “What about you?”
Sarah strained to hear a female voice in the hum. Please don’t let there be a female voice. No girls or women hanging out with the guys tonight . . . no girls or women having a drink and feeling pretty, feeling fun . . . please God, keep it just the men . . .
“Tidying things up before I go to bed,” she answered before taking a sip from her glass, draining it. “Where are you having dinner?” she added, hearing the hoarseness in her voice, hoping he wouldn’t. It’d be a dead giveaway, and Boone wouldn’t like it. He didn’t like her falling apart every time he left, but she didn’t know these new guys, didn’t know this team. Were these players players, or were they solid family men?
“We’re at the hotel, in the bar. It’s the only place we could order food this late.”
“Ah.” So they were in a bar. The hotel bar. “Any girlfriends or wives on this road trip?”
“One of the bench coaches is from Baltimore, so his wife came, but she’s staying with her family.”
Sarah stared into her empty glass, wishing it wasn’t empty, and smiled bitterly, thinking it was funny, this conversation, knowing she and Boone were playing a game.
She wanted the truth and all the dirty, awful details, and he wanted to give her the truth, but he knew she couldn’t handle it.
“So there are no girls at your table? No women joining you sexy men tonight?” Sarah asked, trying to sound teasing and aware it came out mocking.
There was the slightest hesitation on Boone’s part, which told Sarah everything she wanted to know. “One is a sister of a player, and the sister’s friend.”
“And let me guess—they’re twenty-two and smoking hot?”
“I don’t know their age,” he said flatly. “It’s dark in here, can’t see much of anything.”
“Are they married?”
“I don’t think so, but I don’t know. How would I know?”
“You’re having dinner with them.”
“I’m not having dinner with them. I’m having dinner, and they’re here to see Raul and visit with him.”
“But you’re all together at the same table.”
“Sarah, I’m not interested in them.”
Sarah tensed at another burst of laughter in the background, her gut churning, emotions running hot. She hated that he was out, night after night, having dinners in bars and restaurants with teammates and others, while she was home. “Just don’t take anyone upstairs with you,” she said, smiling again, feeling hateful, and petty, and mean.
“Babe, you know I won’t.”
Her eyes stung. “But I don’t actually know that, Boone. That’s the problem.” And then she said good-bye quickly and hung up the phone.
For a moment she sat there, sick, the alcohol flooding her veins, alcohol and adrenaline.
She’d said too much.
Said more than she’d meant to say.
She went through their conversation, replaying the parts about being out with the guys, and being good and not taking girls up to his room . . .
He said he didn’t. And she should know that.
And then she said something like . . . she didn’t.
Sarah held her breath as the actual words came back to her. I don’t actually know that, Boone. That’s the problem.
Sarah exhaled, rubbed her temple, queasy. Why did she say that? Not good. Not smart. What was she thinking? Maybe she shouldn’t be drinking.
Panic hit her, flooding her, and she called him back.
After the first ring she went straight to voicemail. He’d switched off his phone. Her stomach knotted, gutted.
She kicked herself, wishing she hadn’t said anything, and tried to call again. Again, straight to voicemail.
The panic grew, exploding in her chest, shooting into every limb.
She tried him again. Voicemail.
She called back a fourth time, shaking, and left a virtually incoherent message. “Sorry, baby, sorry. I’m just . . . stupid. Emotional. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Forgive me. Please forgive me.”
Then she hung up, went to the sink, and threw up, again and again. She was drunk. And sick. And she hated herself.
I’m lost, she thought, clinging to the sink.
I need help.
I need a life.
I need an identity.
Something that has nothing to do with him.
“Mommy? Mama? Where are you?” It was Ella, crying for her from upstairs.
Sarah rinsed her face and then her mouth, realizing Ella must have had a bad dream. “Coming, baby,” she said, going to the stairs and grabbing the banister, dizzy.