I had never seen him before. He smiled at me, seemed to know me, and then he introduced himself as Randy, from Louisiana, and he said he was in California for the week, on business. He looked over at my wife, who was talking with a few people a few feet away from us. "Your wife?" he said. I nodded, intending to introduce her when she was finished with her friends. "What would it take," he said, "to get a couple of nights with her alone?"
My head snapped up and I simply said, "Ah, what?" He repeated his question and I shook my head in disbelief. "You want to buy my wife for the night?"
"A couple of nights," he said. "How much? Everything has a price," he said. "Ten thousand? Twenty? Fifty? Name your price and I'll have her back by Sunday morning at ten." I couldn't believe my own ears. He was wanting to rent my wife for two nights. He was boldly asking how much I'd charge to let him sleep with her for two nights.
She finished talking with the people she'd been conversing with and came over to where I was standing next to the man who'd just asked to rent her for a couple of days. She nodded to him and smiled, then asked me to introduce her to my friend.
"He just asked me how much to rent you for a couple of days," I said. She smiled and looked him square in the eye, then turned her head to the side and squinted one eye.
"You don't have enough," she said without hesitation, giving him a smile that said there was not enough money in the world to buy time with her.
"I asked your husband to name his price," he said. "He refused, but I'm sure you could use money at this stage of your lives, like perhaps for your business. Maybe it is not as secure as it could be," he said as if he actually knew that. In fact, it hadn't been doing that well. We had, actually, been getting dangerously close to bankruptcy over the past year, but how would he know. "How much do you need to get the business back on its feet?" he asked with a grin.
"A quarter million," I said, "Give or take. You got that?"
"Then that's your price," he said with a confident grin. "Okay, how do you want it?" I shook my head.
"No way," I said. "That's crazy. You're not fucking my wife for two hundred and fifty thousand," I said adamantly.
"A half a million then?" he said. My wife and I looked at one another, realizing it would get us out of the hole that we were in. That it would save our business that was about to tank. It would mean we wouldn't lose everything. It would mean that the business would survive.
She looked at me and smiled. "Two nights?" she said.
"Don't decide right now. Think it over," he said. "Talk it out. Let me know by tonight. Five hundred thousand dollars, two fifty a night. Think about it."
On the way home she was silent until we pulled into the driveway. "We wouldn't lose everything," she said without looking at me, her gaze out the front window.
"You could fuck him for the business?" I asked.
"I could do anything for the business," she said softly, turning to open the car door. Inside we didn't speak for a couple of hours, until, actually, we were getting into bed. "It would solve all our problems," she said quietly. "Indecent Proposal," she said. "Robert Redford and Demi Moore."
"You could do that?" I asked.
"For the business," she said softly, climbing into bed and turning off the light.
"I wouldn't ask you to," I said. "It would be way more than could be expected."
"How would you be with it?" she asked.
"I don't know," I said. I thought about it for a couple of minutes, "He said to let him know tonight. He gave us his number."
"Call him," she said quietly.
Without thinking any further, I turned on the light and picked up the phone. As I dialed the number she sat quietly and watched me, not saying a thing. When he answered on the second ring I said, "Okay, so we've thought about it. She wants to talk to you." I handed the phone to Claire and she put it to her ear. Not smiling, she asked when he wanted her and where they should meet. She listened for a few minutes without talking, then said, "Okay," and hung up.
"He'll meet me at the Marriott," she said without smiling. "In the bar."
Claire drove to the Marriott Hotel and parked in the underground parking, then took the elevator up to the main floor. Once there she went directly to the lounge and sat at the bar. She waited only a few minutes before he came in and sat next to her. "You want a drink first?" he asked. She nodded and he motioned for the bartender, ordered two drinks, then led her to a table with the drinks in his hand.
"This doesn't have to be an unpleasant experience," he said.
"It is what it is," she said with no emotion.
"Before we go up to the room," he said, "we'll have something to eat, something you like, something you can enjoy. Is that to your liking?" She simply nodded and took a sip of her drink. They went to the dining room and took a table. He ordered for them. He order filet mignon, with mashed potatoes and a fine champagne. The meal was exquisite and one of the best she'd ever had. He ordered a cheesecake and an after dinner drink.
