The Secrets That We Keep (10 page)

I force myself to get up so I can jump in the shower and wash my face that I’m sure is completely stained with mascara. When I get out
, I throw on some sweats and tank top and make my way downstairs to make myself something to eat. I grab my phone from my purse and see that I have a few missed calls and texts. I have a text from Jade telling me about her and Jackson’s most recent date. I have a text from Michelle asking me if I want to go out with her this weekend. I respond to them both.

Me:
Hey Jade, I’m glad your date went well; we’ll have to talk soon! Did Michelle invite you out this weekend? I think we should all go. I need to get out.

Me:
Hey Michelle, I am so down to go out!

I check the missed phone calls and both of them are from blocked numbers and they didn’t leave a message. Guess it wasn’t important.

I put the phone down on the end table next to the couch and go to the kitchen and start rummaging through the fridge and pantry to see what I can eat that’s fairly quick. I end up just grabbing a bowl of cereal and take it into the living room. When I sit down my phone starts ringing and when I look at it, I see that it’s Michelle.

“Hello?”

“Whoo!! Girls night!” Michelle yells into the phone.

I laugh at her excitement. “Yes! I can’t wait, when are you thinking? Let’s go Friday!”

“Friday works for me. I need to get away from this husband of mine as soon as possible or I might kill him.”

“Uh oh, no killing allowed, although I’m right there with
ya. I just need to go let loose a little bit,” I say before shoving a spoonful of cereal into my mouth.

“Are all the husbands having their periods this week or what?” she asks with a laugh.

I laugh along with her, trying not to spit my cereal out. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Fuck
em then!” she yells. “We’ll all go out and get drunk and have a good time. Just plan on coming to my house and then we’ll take a cab out together.”

“Okay, sounds good to me.”

“Alright chick, I’m gonna call Jade now and make sure she’s coming. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Okay, bye!” I say before hanging up and finishing my cereal.

I start looking forward to Friday so I can go and try to forget about all the drama and craziness going on in my life right now. I’m sure Julian won’t mind me being gone. He’ll probably just snoop through my underwear drawers again or some shit.

After I finish my cereal and put my dishes away, I grab my kindle and go curl up on the couch and get ready to escape reality for a little while. I sit there completely enthralled in my book about a woman trapped in the house of a controlling,
yet sexy millionaire. I read for a couple of hours before I finally decide to put it down. I look up at the clock and see that it’s five o’clock, Julian will be getting off work soon and I need to prepare myself for the fight I’m sure is going to happen.

After I throw a load of laundry into the washing machine, I hear my phone going off in the living room.
I go and pick up the phone and see that the texts are from Julian.

Julian:
I’m going to be late. I have things to handle first.

Julian:
Sorry

I scoff. He’s just trying to avoid having the conversation about what the fuck he was talking about earlier. I don’t respond to his texts. I have nothing to say to him right now anyway.

I
don’t even know when Julian decided to bring his ass home last night. I ended up going to bed around ten and he never contacted me again after his initial texts. There was no reason for him to be coming home that late, I don’t know what the hell he is up to, but I do know that it can’t be anything good.

When I woke up, he was just leaving for work, or at least I assumed
it was work. Who knows anymore. What I do know, is that I can’t continue living this way. I’m determined to badger him with questions when he gets home.

I spend my day doing some shopping, a little cleaning, talking to Jade and Michelle about our girl’s night out
, and editing some pictures to give to my clients. All in all, the day is pretty mundane, but it seems to pass fairly quickly and for that I’m grateful. It’s about four thirty when I receive a message from Julian telling me to meet him in the city for dinner. I almost respond saying I don’t want to, but I’ll take what I can get at this point. This may be my chance to get some information out of him. He tells me a place and time to meet him and I instantly start getting ready for the evening. I choose a strapless, hi low, cocktail dress. The top has black lace on top of white satin, and a black ribbon goes under the bust. The rest of it is a white, sheer material. I pair the dress with black, five inch heels.

When I am pulling up to the restaurant, I instantly spot Julian standing outside and he looks unbelievably handsome. He’s wearing a
black vested suit that fits his body just right and he has his hair slicked back in a way that makes him look classically handsome. I sigh and pull into a parking spot, and before I can gather my purse, my car door swings open and Julian has his hand there to help me out of the car. He sure is pulling out all the stops.

I take his hand and step out of the car and he closes the door behind me.

“You look beautiful, Annabella,” he says and kisses me on the cheek.

“Thanks, you clean up nice yourself,” I respond and he lets out a chuckle.

He holds out his arm and I place my hand in the crook of his elbow and we walk to the restaurant together in silence.

This restaurant is simply amazing. It’s called The Signature Room at the 95
th
and it’s located atop the John Hancock Center with dazzling views of the skyline. The floor-to-ceiling windows show off the stunning Chicago skyline and gives you 360° degree views of the entire city. It’s absolutely breathtaking.

We take our seats at a table near the window and there is a small arrangement of flowers already on the table.
Stargazer lilies and white roses, my favorites. I look over at Julian and he has a sheepish smile on his face.

“You arrange this?” I ask him, pointing to the flowers.

He smiles and nods. “I did. Do you like them?”

“Of course, they’re beautiful. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

We take some time to look over the menu without speaking about anything besides what we want to eat. Julian decides on a roasted rack of lamb and I choose the petit filet. There was already a bottle of champagne chilling at our table when we arrived. I assume he arranged that as well.

After we place our order with the waiter, we sit there in an awkward silence, taking sips of our champagne and I keep my gaze looking out onto the sparkling lights of the city.

Julian clears his throat and I turn to look at him.

“Annabella, we need to talk.”

Oh God, here it goes. What is he about to lay on me? I hope it’s nothing I can’t take. I continue to stare at him, waiting for him to continue.

He clears his throat again. “Well, I guess I should ask you if you have any questions or anything you want to say first.”

Julian picks up his glass and takes a long sip of his drink. I know I have questions, lots of them, I just don’t know where to start.

“Well, Julian,” I state, trying to sound confident. “I want you to know that I have overheard a couple of your conversations.” I pause after saying that to let it soak in and watch him. His face doesn’t change, he stays stoic and doesn’t say anything. He finally nods and waits for me to continue.

“Yeah, well, I heard you say “she can’t find out” to the guy at the door
, oh and how you could barely look at me. Funny, considering you had just fucked me.” He flinched a little at that comment. “I also saw you going through my things and saying “I don’t know where the fuck she is”. So I would like to know what all that means?”

I take a drink all while keeping my eyes on him and then place it down and continue to stare into his eyes. It feels like minutes before he responds.

“Annabella, you remember the new case I’ve been talking about?” he asks, and I nod in response.

“That new case involves a woman,” he says and then looks at me as if he’s waiting for me to react.

“Okay,” I drag out.

“I just need to keep track of her and gather information on what she’s doing, where she’s going and stuff like that, but it seems like I lost her. I haven’t seen her around lately and I’m afraid she might have been aware that she was under surveillance. So when I said “she can’t find out” and “I don’t know where the fuck she is” that’s who I was talking about. Not you.”

I take that in for a minute. It seems like it could be true, but for some reason, I don’t believe it.

“Okay, so why were you going through my things?” I ask.

He stiffens and reaches for his drink. Without making eye contact with me he says, “Oh, I, uh, I was looking for one of my ties. I couldn’t find it and thought maybe it had gotten thrown into one of your drawers.”

Mmhhmm
. I seriously doubt that. I look at him skeptically and he looks at me briefly before taking a drink.

“So why did you tell whoever you were talking to that you looked but didn’t find anything?”

“I was talking about the case, Annabella,” he says, slightly exasperated.

I knew there wasn’t anything that he was going to say that would placate me. I knew he wasn’t going to be forthright and he knew he wasn’t going to
be honest with me. Right as I was about to tell him that he was completely full of shit, his phone went off. Of course.

He pulled his phone out and read the text but didn’t respond.

“Work again?” I ask.

“Yeah, work.”

“Are you going to respond?”

“No, it’s not too important.”

Just then the waiter comes out and brings us our food and it looks and smells delicious. As he’s placing our plates down in front of us, I hear Julian’s phone go off again. He taps the screen and reads the message. He instantly tenses and begins looking around, so I look as well.

“Everything alright?”
I ask him.

“Y
eah, I just gotta go to the bathroom real quick. I’ll be back.” Then he rushes off.

“How does everything look, ma’am?” The waiter asks.

“Oh, perfect, thank you.”

Once he walks away I begin looking around the restaurant to see if I can spot Julian anywhere. There’s a doorway that leads out of the dining room
and I can see a few people on the other side but they all look the same; men in nice suits. I keep my eyes trained on the doorway and one of the men turns slightly and I can see that it’s Julian. He’s talking to one of the guys that are standing there and his face is stern. Julian shifts his body and looks to his right and it’s then that I notice there’s another man that he’s talking to that is standing beyond my line of sight.

After a few minutes of them talking, Julian nods his head to the man who I can’t see and then turns and walks back into the dining room. I watch the men behind him because they continue to stand there and talk to each other. The man who was hidden steps out into the doorway and I can see that he’s wearing a nice black button up shirt but has the sleeves pushed up to the middle of his forearm. He drops his arms and puts his hands into his pants pockets and the two men start to walk away. He glances back towards the dining room but doesn’t see me; he seems to just be scanning the room. My breath catches as I see his face and I instantly drop my gaze to his arm and then back up to his face. It’s Lucas. Lucas and Julian know each other? What. The. Fuck

T
he rest of dinner was excruciatingly uncomfortable to say the least. When Julian returned to the table I asked him who he was talking to. He seemed surprised that I had seen him talking to anybody, and only said it was somebody he’s worked with before but hadn’t seen in a while. I didn’t respond and only continued to eat my food. Once we were done eating, he reached over the table to grab my hand, and I almost pulled it away but didn’t.

I wanted to ask him how he knew Lucas
, and for how long, but it seemed to me that Julian had no idea that Lucas was my ex-boyfriend. I wondered if Lucas knew that Julian was my husband. Then another thought hit me. Wouldn’t Julian recognize Lucas from the photo that I had taken? If he did, he seemed perfectly fine with talking to my stalker, but then again, maybe he just wasn’t able to pinpoint the similarities like I was. I had a hard time believing that, though. It was Julian’s job to notice little details and be completely aware of everything and everybody around him. This just kept getting more and more fucked up and my head was spinning.

Julian knew I wasn’t feeling well and quickly
paid for our meal and we left separately.

I drive home in utter confusion. I’m confused about what I need and want to do with my relationship with Julian. Of course I want to b
e with him. I love him more than anything. He has been everything to me these last few years. He’s my rock, my shoulder to cry on, my air to breathe when I feel like I’m drowning, my biggest supporter, my protector, my best friend and my lover. He is my everything, plain and simple. However, can I be with someone who continues to lie to me? I know that I have my own secret that I have kept from him. But I feel like it’s more of an omission, something that happened years before I met him, and something he hasn’t asked me about outright. I just feel like he continues to lie to me every time I ask him something. Can I stay with him knowing he’s lying and not knowing what exactly he’s lying about? What if he’s cheating? What if he has a secret family and secret life I know nothing about? What if he’s planning on leaving me? I have no clue. I don’t know if I can brush that under the rug and pretend like we are still this perfect little couple. I need to make a decision and soon.

My phone begins ringing and I’m glad that I have my phone synced with my car so I can still talk without having to handle the phone. So with a click of a button on my steering wheel, I answer the phone and the deep, familiar voice drifts through my car speakers.

“Hello, Annabella.”

I’m taken by surprise beca
use even though I gave him my number, I never thought he’d call. I wonder briefly if he saw me at the restaurant and that’s why he’s calling.

“
Lucas?” I squeak out.

I hear him let out a little laugh. “Don’t sound so surprised. You gave me your
number remember? What did you expect me to do with it?”

“Oh, well I guess I just wasn’t expecting to actually hear from you.”

“I can let you go if you want,” he says genuinely.

“No!” I yell
a little too loudly. “I mean, no, uh, did you have a reason you called?”

“Actually, yes I did. I was wondering if you wanted to have lunch with me tomorrow
.”

“Oh,
uhh…”

“So we can talk,” he adds
.

Talk. At least someone was willing to talk to me. If I couldn’t get anything out of Julian, I had to get something out of Lucas. Maybe he was now willing to fill me on some things.

“Yes, sounds good to me,” I answer a little too excitedly.

I hear
him laugh again. “Good, where would you like to meet?”

“Oh, I don’t know. You want to meet in the city?”

“It doesn’t matter Bell, I’ll go wherever you want,” he responds with a softness in his voice.

“Okay, well can I call you early tomorrow and let you know? I have no clue right now.”

“That’s fine, I’ll be waiting.”

“Okay, good.”

“Are you sure your husband is going to be okay with this?” he asks with humor in his voice.

“
He’ll be fine,” I respond, sharply. Not telling him it was because I didn’t plan on telling Julian about it.

“Uh oh,
trouble in paradise?” he asks with a laugh. I instantly remember he saw Julian earlier in the night and wondered if he knew I was married to him.

“Everything’s fine. So hey, what have you been up to tonight?”

“Well that was a quick subject change. I haven’t been up to a whole lot. I was hanging out with a friend of mine earlier and that’s about it.”

“What did you guys do?” I ask, and know I sound
too eager for information. “I mean, you out looking for some ladies?” I finish with an awkward laugh. Ugh, I am terrible with trying to get information.

He let
s out a deep laugh. “Why, would you be jealous?”

“What? No! Of course not, I’m married
, Lucas.”

“Right, married,” he says
, sounding a bit dejected. “Anyway, no, we weren’t looking for ladies. It was all business.”

“Business huh?
What kind of business are you in?” I ask, knowing I probably sound really nosey but unable to keep all my questions in.

“Why don’t we talk more tomorrow?” he says.

I let out a loud sigh. “Okay, tomorrow. I’ll call you in the morning and let you know where to meet me, your number should been on my phone.”

“Alright
, Annabella, I look forward to seeing you again. Good night and drive safe.”

“Thanks, good night,” I say before ending the call. Wait, did he say drive safe? How did he know I was driving? I look in the rearview mirror and notice several cars behind me. Is he one of those drivers? I guess that will be something I’ll ask him tomorrow.

When I finally pull into my driveway I see Julian still sitting in his car and he’s on the phone. Of fucking course he is. I grab my purse and make my way to the front door without even looking his way. When I get inside, I immediately go upstairs into our room and drop my belongings onto the bed. I grab some pajamas out of my nightstand and lock myself in the bathroom.

I decide on taking a nice long, hot bubble bath, hoping that will ease some of the tension in my body. I don’t know how long I stay in there but I know by the time I get out, my skin has
already started to wrinkle. After I’m done drying off, combing my hair, moisturizing my body and getting dressed, I leave the bathroom and walk into my bedroom to see a half dressed Julian passed out on top of the covers. He’s only wearing his “wife beater” undershirt and his suit pants. I walk over and push him over onto his back and pull his pants off of him and then cover him up with the blankets. I climb into my side of the bed and fall asleep almost instantly.

***

Grateful that today is finally Friday. I wake up in a good mood and determined to put everything behind me. At least for today. I am looking forward to going out with my friends and having a good time with no confusing men around. Julian is already gone and things are still pretty strained and uncomfortable between us.

While I’m downstairs making myself some breakfast and drinking my coffee I get a call from Michelle.

“Hey girl! Are you ready for tonight or what?” Michelle yells, barely containing her excitement.

“You have no idea. I still have to figure out what I’m going to wear tonight.”

“Me too. I’m thinking about wearing that royal blue dress with those new blue leopard print shoes I just bought.”

“Ooh, that would be cute!” I exclaim. “I have that black
and red tube top dress that has the belt that goes with it, and I can pair it with those black leggings that are all lace in the back.”

“You should totally wear that! And wear those shoes that are part black but have the see through part on top of your foot with the black flower design. It will go with the lace on the leggings.”

“Settled! Thanks Chelle,” I say with a laugh.

“You got it lady. So what time do you want to meet up? I know the club isn’t going to fill up until like 10:30 but I
wanna go have a couple drinks at a bar before then. You know that club overcharges for those weak ass drinks.”

“I know! Those bastards!
It’s like they put a half a shot of alcohol and fill up the rest of the glass with juice and shit.”

Michelle laughs.
“For real! But they play the best music and it’s not all cramped in there.”

“True. Well, I can be at your place by 9:00, what do you think?”

“Works for me! I’ll see ya later. Eeek, so excited!” she squeals.

I let out a laugh.
“Me too! Talk to you soon.”

I put my phone down on the counter and continue making my breakfast. I glance at the clock and let out a groan whe
n I see that it’s only nine.

“Oh shit!” I cry. I totally forgot I was supposed to call Lucas and meet him for lunch. At least I’ll have something to do to pass this afternoon.

I run to my phone and scroll through my recent calls and see the number that he called me from last night. I click send and wait for him to answer.

“Hello
Annabella,” he answers in a husky voice.

“Hi,” I squeak out.

Lucas laughs at my short response. “Are you calling to cancel on me?”

“Oh, no!
I just kind of forgot. I still need to get ready so I was thinking we could meet here and not in the city.”

“At your house?” he asks incredulously.

“What? No! I meant here in Highland Park. There’s this little place called Norton’s. We can meet there.”

“Oh, okay. What time?”

“They don’t open until 11:30, let’s say noon?”

“Noon it is. See you then.”

“I take it you don’t need directions. Considering you’ve been here and all,” I say, still fishing for an admission of his stalker tendencies.

He lets out a low growl. “
Annabella, if I need directions, I have a GPS, so no worries. See you soon.” And then he hangs up the phone.

I
take my time and eat the egg, ham and cheese sandwich I made and then run upstairs to get ready. I decide on wearing a pair of skinny jeans, a loose white top and some beige peep toe heels. I throw on a long gold necklace, a pair of white and gold earrings and several gold bangle bracelets because I always have to have some sort of accessories on or I feel naked. I leave my hair down because for once, it seems I’m having a pretty good hair day.

After I’m finally done getti
ng ready, it’s 11:15 but I feel so antsy I decide to leave the house and start driving towards the restaurant now. When I arrive at the restaurant, it’s just opening so I take a seat at one of the outdoor tables and pull out my phone and begin reading on my kindle app. It’s about fifteen minutes later when Lucas arrives.

“You’re here awfully early.
Anxious to see me?”

I look up and the sun is shining brightly b
ehind him so I end up squinting and putting a hand over my eyes to try to block the sun. He notices my problem and takes a seat in front of me at the table.

“No, just wanted to enjoy the nice weather,” I say nonchalantly and look back down at my phone.

“Ouch,” he says with a small laugh.

I look back up at him to see him
smiling at me, and I can’t help but smile back. I put my phone in my purse that’s sitting on the ground next to my feet and then cross my arms on the table in front of me and look back at him. He’s wearing a pair of jeans and a white button up shirt with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows and a pair of white Nike’s.

“You look nice,” I say before I can even think about it.

He raises an eyebrow at me in surprise and gives me a crooked grin. “Thank you. You look gorgeous, as always.”

“Thank you,” I reply and turn my gaze away from him.

The waitress comes out to take our order and is unabashedly flirting with Lucas. Apparently, I don’t exist. She never looks my way. She just keeps flipping her hair, and jutting out her hip while telling him the specials. She actually giggles and bites her lip when he gives her his order. It wasn’t even funny. I roll my eyes when he looks over at me and he just laughs.

“Ahem,” I say and she turns to look at me like I haven’t been here the whole time. She gives me a once over like she’s trying to see if I’m good enough to be out here with him.

“What can I get for you?” she asks with an attitude.

“Uh, you can get me this chicken
salad and you can get me a lemonade too,” I reply sharply, knowing it’ll piss her off.

She scoffs and turns to walk away.

“Aww, what’s the matter Bell? Did you get mad because she was flirting with me?” Lucas says, laughing.

“I’m not mad that she was flirting with you, even though she should have assumed we were on a date or something. But that’s neither here nor there. She was rude and so I decided to give her
a taste of her medicine,” I say with a smile.