Read Online The Last Good Night by Emily Listfield - Free Book Online

have lunch without explaining it?”
    â€œNo. Not anymore. Let’s be honest, at least with each other, okay, kiddo? The network could have gone with a diva like Sawyer or maybe even Walters, for chrissakes, but they figure they’ve got their hands full with Hartley. Part of the charm of taking someone from local and making them a star is they’re easier to control, at least at first. But people have to trust you, that’s the whole point of a news anchor. You’ve got to project sobriety, responsibility, not secret rendezvous. Laura, this is the best chance you’re likely to get. Don’t blow it.”
    â€œBut it was nothing like that,” I protested.
    â€œListen, in your business illusion is reality. You should know that by now.”
    â€œDon’t worry.”
    â€œYou’re paying me big bucks to worry. And right now, you’re getting your money’s worth. You’ve got to know the tabloids are all going to be scrounging around for dirt on you. It’s how they make their money. Just stay clean, okay? Don’t give those fuckers anything to work with.”
    â€œAll right,” I said and hung up the phone.
    â€œWhat was that about?” David asked, dressed now in a charcoal suit.
    â€œNothing. Just some bullshit on Page Six.”
    He went to the kitchen and picked up the top of the three newspapers we had delivered every morning. He opened the Post to the gossip page and read the item about me out loud while he walked back to the bedroom. He dropped the paper on the bed.
    â€œNot bad. Upper-right-hand corner. Boldface.”
    â€œVery funny.”
    â€œAll right, I’ll bite. Who was your hot lunch date?”
    â€œIt was nothing, David. I had lunch with an interior decorator, and all they saw was me with an unidentified man.”
    â€œAre we decorating something?”
    â€œWe’ve been talking about fixing up the bedroom since we moved in. It was going to be a surprise,” I said indignantly, convinced for a moment of my own righteous anger.
    â€œOh.” He went into the bathroom and shut the door. I heard him turn the water on and begin to brush his teeth.
    I lay in bed picking at my fingernails for a couple of minutes and then I got up and opened the bathroom door without knocking.
    â€œI’m sorry about the paper,” I said as I came up behind him.
    â€œIt’s okay. I know it’s not your fault. What’s that expression, ‘No press is bad as long as they spell your name right’?” He reached for a towel and dried his face. “It’s not your fault. It’s just going to take some getting used to, that’s all.”
    David once told me that he didn’t particularly like watching me on television, that there was something disturbing to him about the smoothed and sanded version of me, a small portion of the woman he knew sprayed and buffed and shrunken onto screens throughout the city, his and yet not his.
    â€œIt doesn’t have anything to do with us,” I tried to reassure him now.
    â€œDoesn’t it?”
    â€œNot if we don’t let it.”
    I wrapped my arms around him and kissed the back of his neck beneath the soft fringe of his hair, and then his ear, his throat.
    â€œWhat’s this?” he asked.
    â€œSshhh.” I moved my hand over his chest and into his pants, down through the thicket of hair until I felt his cock, already thickening.
    He turned to face me. “I’ll be late.”
    â€œSo?”
    We collapsed back onto the bed and he moved into me, the sheets and the quilt sliding about beneath us.
    I wanted to want only this, this man, my husband, his hips grinding against mine, going in and in.
    I dug my fingers into his back and shut my eyes.
    But what I found waiting in the darkness was Jack.
    I wondered what it would be like to make love to him now, this new and whittled Jack, wondered if I sniffed him closely I would once more