Chapter 100
PAUL KEPT IT TOGETHER in front of Teo and left with Daniel Bornemann, who had slipped into the room in the middle of the presentation.
After they were gone, I congratulated Luca and stood chatting with Bruno and Teo for a few minutes, but I soon took myself home, where I spent the afternoon spiraling.
I didn’t know why I’d felt the need to defend Luca and Bruno’s research program.
I mean, I did know why, but that didn’t excuse my behavior.
My loyalty was to Paul, and when I’d asked that question, I had known there was a chance it might get back to Paul’s boss or his boss’s boss or—God forbid—the CO.
It had been reckless, and Paul had every right to be angry with me.
When I picked him up at the pier that evening, he gave me the silent treatment, but after I asked how the rest of his day had gone, he unleashed on me.
“Can we cut the crap?” he said.
This felt deserved.
“What in the hell is going on with you?” Paul asked, slamming his hand against the glove box.
I jumped.
“Going to fucking ecology conferences like you know what you’re talking about.”
“It was open to the public,” I said quietly.
“It’s strange. I didn’t see any of the other guys’ wives there.”
I didn’t say anything, just put on my blinker and turned onto the Via Ammiraglio Carlo Mirabello.
“And what the fuck was that question you asked? Can you speak to the question of half-lives?” he said in the same obnoxious voice I used to use as a kid when I was mimicking Lenny.
“It was a reasonable question,” I whispered.
Now he repeated what I’d just said, in that same awful voice. “It was a reasonable question.”
I wanted to cry, but I didn’t dare.
“Give me a fucking break, Eileen.” Paul was screaming, and I rolled up my window on the off chance that we’d pass someone we knew. “It’s like you are trying to get me fired.”
“I am not.”
“And what the fuck is that journalist doing drawing pictures of you in a bathing suit? Eileen Archer dives for nacchere… what the fuck is that?”
I really did not want to talk about Teo right now, but I also didn’t see a way around it. “I went out on the boat with him and the CNEN guys. Last summer.”
“And you fucking dove for nacchere?”
I paused a beat. “Yeah.”
“Where was I?”
“On the cruise,” I said.
“Fuck me. Really?”
I nodded.
“Did something happen between the two of you?”
“No,” I said, as adamantly as I knew how.
“He didn’t try anything?”
“No, Paul. He didn’t.”
“Why’d you go out on the boat in the first place?”
I shrugged. “He asked me to. And I was bored. It was a hot day, and I thought it’d be fun.”
Paul digested this, but I could tell he was still pissed. “So, you’re out on this boat, and he never so much as offers to rub your suntan lotion in for you?”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Well then, what was it like?”
I thought back to the day we’d spent on the water. “I don’t know.”
“You’re going to have to do better than that.”
“I liked learning something new.”
He took this in.
“Paul, I was thinking. Maybe you and Teo just got off on the wrong foot. I mean, he wasn’t the one who said all that crap at the bar. It was that friend of his, and he was just drunk and mouthing off.”
“Right,” Paul said with a laugh.
“I’m sorry if it came off like I was flirting that night. I really wasn’t. Or I wasn’t trying to, anyway.”
Paul ignored my apology, but then he said, “It was just the one boat ride?” That gave me hope he was softening.
“There was just the one boat ride with Teo,” I said, hesitantly. “But I’ve probably gone out on the Alessandra with Luca and Bruno a dozen times.”
“Jesus, Eileen.”
“I’m being honest,” I said, a little defensively. “They had a bunch of current meters I was helping with. And they let me tag along while they were doing the Rhodamine B testing.”
“They did?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
I shrugged and told him I didn’t know, but what I wanted to say was that maybe they recognized I had something to contribute. That my work ethic, not to mention my curiosity, was enough to make me an asset on a crew like theirs.
“Did you know the numbers were high?” he asked.
“Not until today,” I said. “But I assume you did?”
He gave me an almost imperceptible nod.
“What’s the navy going to do about it?”
“You know I can’t talk to you about that,” he said, and I didn’t push. I had managed to defuse the situation, and Paul was on my side again, or at least not raging mad.
As we pulled up in front of the house, I cleared my throat. “You have to trust me, you know?”
Paul touched my face. “I do trust you. It’s Teo Manca I don’t trust.”
He meant it as a joke, but it didn’t come off right.
I took his hand and removed it from my cheek, then laced my fingers through his. “I married you for a reason,” I said, softly. But in that moment, I have to say, I was having a hard time recalling what that reason was.