Set Them Free, If Need Be
Courtney Carter
Obsession.
Rachael thought that was a perfect name for a perfume.
She reached for the egg-shaped bottle of amber liquid, popped off the top, and spritzed a generous amount onto her wrists, neck, and cleavage.
It wasn’t her favorite scent. It was a little too spicy and a little too 1980s Dallas for her tastes, but she was seeing Mr. Klein tonight and that was the scent he liked the most. From something he’d said, she was certain his mother had worn it. Freud would have loved to sink his teeth into that one. Asking your date to wear the same perfume your mother preferred?
Oh, Mr. Klein, she thought.
She put the bottle back in its place among the dozen other perfumes lining her vanity, and smirked at her long-running personal joke. Imagine if she was seeing the Mr. Klein, rather than a regular client she secretly referred to by the designer’s name. It was easier if she didn’t think of them by their real names, their office-working, child-rearing, buying their wives presents identical to the ones they gave her so they wouldn’t get confused-names. It allowed her to compartmentalize them and keep track without getting too attached. That’s what they say, isn’t it? You should never name a pet you aren’t going to keep for very long. That way it’s less of a struggle when you have to let it go.
Run! Be free, Fluffy! Or, whatever your real name is!
Rachael put the finishing touches to her ensemble: the diamond earrings Mr. Klein gave her for Valentine’s Day that year—identical to, if also a slightly smaller carat size than the ones Mrs. Klein received—and a pair of low-heeled Jimmy Choos that matched her coral dress perfectly. Mr. Klein was stuck on the precipice of neither being a particularly tall nor a particularly short man, but she knew he liked it when she made an effort to keep her height under his.
The black Lincoln arrived precisely at eight p.m. to pick her up. She slid into the back seat, feeling the worn-in, buttery leather against the backs of her thighs. Rachael loved Town Cars, had never even considered navigating the city of Chicago any other way. Let the elite show-offs have their smooth Jaguars, their flashy BMW convertibles just made for being spotted in as they whizzed by. Give her a good old Lincoln any day, with a quiet chauffeur and plenty of Evian stocked in the back seat.
Rachael observed the entire world from the back of a Lincoln Town Car. She was a watcher by nature, a skill that often came in handy in her line of work.
When the car pulled up to the Peninsula Chicago Hotel, she waited for the driver to open her door, to help her avoid a small puddle as she stepped onto the curb. He was one of her regular drivers, Eddie.
“Have a good evening, Miss Barrow.” Eddie tipped his cap and climbed back into the driver’s seat.
She walked through the brightly lit lobby and into the hotel bar. Mr. Klein sat alone. He’d already loosened his yellow silk tie and unbuttoned the jacket of his navy Armani suit. Must have been a rough day. She pasted a sympathetic look on her face and tapped him on the elbow to get his attention.
“Hello there. Bad day, hon?”
Mr. Klein’s face lit up. He stood to kiss her cheek, his nose sliding down to linger at her throat, breathing in a deep whiff of Obsession.
“You look lovely.” He rumbled into her ear, then pulled out a bar stool for her and ordered her a drink.
The bartender brought a gin and tonic—heavy on the tonic, light on the gin—with an extra lime wedge in a little dish on the side. All the bartenders at the Peninsula knew to make her drinks on the weak side.
Rachael sipped her mostly-tonic and listened while Mr. Klein filled her in on the hardships of his day.
“First a junior partner at the firm spotted a hole in our biggest client’s investment plan, then the damn house renovations got pushed back another three weeks, and don’t get me started on Helen.” He slugged back the last of his second martini. “She’s been busting my balls since before the house work even started.”
Rachael made the appropriate oohs and aahs of sympathy, even tittered at his rare display of crude language, but she never commented on his wife. The wives were off limits. In fact, she’d removed all synonyms of the word “wife” from her vocabulary.
Spouse. Significant Other. The Old Ball and Chain.
But she let Mr. Klein vent his frustration. It was part of the job, after all.
Eventually, he lost verbal steam and had enough Grey Goose in his system to turn them toward more pleasurable topics. His hand drifted to her thigh while they waited for the bar tab to be cashed out.
Rachael was rather fond of Mr. Klein. He’d been her client for three years now. His hair had thinned and he’d put on about fifteen pounds but he was a good client. He wasn’t jealous or spiteful, if anything his only fault was that he just wasn’t “good at monogamy.”
His words, not hers.
They slipped out of the bar and stood close together in the otherwise empty elevator. They held hands down the hallway and before the door to their suite closed he reached for the zipper on her dress, and pulled her in close for another hint of perfume.
When Mrs. Klein showed up at her door three days later, Rachael was genuinely surprised. Few wives had bothered to track her down over the years, and this was the first one to show up at her apartment.
Mrs. Klein was blessed with a youthful appearance for her age, whether by nature or cosmetic assistance, Rachael wasn’t sure. She stood in the doorway, her tan slacks and mint green blouse pressed and neat, the straps of a five-thousand-dollar Hermes bag clutched in one hand.
“Are you Rachael Barrow?”
“Yes.” Rachael straightened the red maxi dress she’d thrown on to answer the door.
Mrs. Klein’s lips pursed together. “You’re older than I thought you’d be.”
“Oh?”
“And you’re a brunette.”
“That’s right.”
“That’s not what I was expecting.”
Rachael sighed. “Let me guess, you were hoping a twenty-one-year-old, blonde bimbo would answer the door?”
Mrs. Klein inhaled sharply, drawing her petite frame up, and said, “Do you know who I am?”
“Yes, I’ve seen your picture before.”
“You’ve…you’ve seen…” Mrs. Klein’s brief swell of fighting spirit died. Her shoulders slumped forward and Rachel wondered if the woman was about to cry.
“Why don’t you come in?” Rachael opened the door wide, as if she welcomed her clients’ wives into her home every day.
Tentatively, Mrs. Klein stepped into the apartment, eyes darting, possibly looking for something to make herself feel superior to her husband’s mistress. Rachael’s apartment was of modest size, but tastefully decorated. She steered the other woman to a seat in the living room and moved into the kitchen to make a pot of tea.
Soon they sat across from each other on matching couches with cups of tea steaming between them. Rachael waited for Mrs. Klein to speak.
When she did, she asked, “Are you in love with him?”
Rachael resisted the urge to laugh, only because she knew it would make things more awkward. “No, I’m not in love with your husband. He’s a client.”
“A client. I see.” Mrs. Klein smoothed the fabric of her pants. “May I ask, how long he’s been a client of yours?”
“Three years.”
She made a tiny, high-pitched noise in the back of her throat. “And, how old are you?”
“I’m thirty-six.”
“Thirty-six?” She gripped the edge of the couch. “Thirty-six? That’s only five years younger than I am! That bastard doesn’t even have the decency to sleep around with a girl in her twenties like a normal man going through a mid-life crisis!”
Rachael picked up her cup of tea, blew gently across the top, and took a long, satisfying sip.
“The way things stand, Mrs.…” She stopped short of calling the woman “Mrs. Klein.” “Ma’am. You have three options.”
The other woman blinked watery eyes at her. “Three?”
“One, you can do nothing. Go on living your comfortable life and hope that your husband will stop seeing other women eventually. Although, we both know how likely that is. Men are creatures of habit, bordering on addicts.” Mrs. Klein seemed like she needed a little more distance right now so Rachael stood and walked behind the couch. “Two, I can terminate my relationship with your husband, and you’ll at least be rid of me. Of course, then we’re back to the creature of habit theory, he might be faithful for a while but there’s no guarantee. If he doesn’t change you could always ask for a divorce, although I have a feeling that would hurt you more than help. I assumed you signed a prenuptial agreement?”
Mrs. Klein didn’t reply, but the skin around her mouth tightened.
“Option number three,” Rachael leaned both elbows on the back of the couch. “I can set him free.”
“Set him free?” Mrs. Klein blindly picked up her own cup and put it back down without drinking. “How is that any different than breaking things off with him?”
Rachael studied the woman sitting across the room, studied her designer handbag and her clothes that no doubt came from a wardrobe that, if sold, could feed a small country for a year. What Rachael saw when she looked at this woman, what she saw in all of her clients’ wives, was the person she could have potentially become. Rich, handsome men had promised her the moon if she’d only commit to them, but that commitment always seemed to be a tad unbalanced. At least in her experience.
Rachael enjoyed having a few of the finer things in life, she just didn’t see the point of giving up her freedom to get them.
“Have I mentioned that my mother was a pharmacist?”
“A what?” Mrs. Klein frowned.
“A pharmacist.” Rachael smiled, returning to her seat across from Mrs. Klein. “Not a common practice for women in her day, but she was determined to finish school and build a reputable practice.”
“What does that have to do with any of this?”
Rachael crossed her legs and settled back into the cushions. “Did I also mention that my father was another victim of habit? I do believe he tried to stay faithful to my mother, to our family, but he just wasn’t good at monogamy.”
Mrs. Klein shifted in her seat, smoothed the fabric of her trousers again. “What exactly are you trying to say, Miss Barrow?”
“When I was fourteen, they found my father dead in a room at the motel he used to meet one of his girlfriends. Heart attack. Of course, they questioned my mother because he was being unfaithful, but the autopsy didn’t show anything out of the ordinary. He was an overweight man in his late forties who spent an inordinate amount of time trying to screw women half his age. His heart was bound to give out at some point.”
Rachael waited.
Either Mrs. Klein understood the options Rachael gave her or she didn’t. Either she’d make a choice or she wouldn’t.
The Ansonia clock sitting on Rachael’s mantel ticked the time away while she waited for Mrs. Klein to speak.
Mrs. Klein stood up, pushing her bag up onto one shoulder. Rachael followed her through the apartment to the front door.
“Thank you for the tea, Miss Barrow.” Mrs. Klein spoke softly into the door. Her grip tightened on the doorknob as she drew in a sharp breath. She opened the door. “Set him free, then.”
Rachael was at her vanity, carefully tracing the edges of her eyes with her new Chanel Noir Intense eyeliner. One of several gifts from her newest client, Mr. Chanel. A brand-new bottle of No. 5 now sat at the front of her perfume collection, the unopened box just waiting for their first official date.
With her makeup completed, Rachael reached for the half-empty bottle of Obsession and spritzed liberally until she was in a cloud of fragrance. She padded across the cool hardwood floor of her bedroom to the closet. Behind the built-in shelf holding her shoes, sitting flush with the back closet wall, was a slide-out panel. It held her birth certificate, Social Security card, a few photos of her mother, and a small lock box.
Rachael pulled out the box, dropping down on the floor of her closet, and flipped the rotating numbers until the combination lined up with a click. She lifted the lid and stared down at the five perfume bottles nestled inside.
Hermes.
Baccarat.
Bergdorf.
Gucci.
Dolce & Gabana.
All lovely fragrances, collected over the years. Some she’d liked more than others; none of them did she wear anymore.
She placed the Calvin Klein in its new home and locked the box.
“You look like you’ve had a good day, darling.” Rachael pecked Mr. Klein on the cheek when he stood from the bar to greet her. The Peninsula bartender had her tonic with a splash of gin ready for her.
“It’s been a fantastic day.” Mr. Klein squeezed her waist. It appeared he’d already had more than one martini before her arrival. “No client emergencies at work and the house will be done next week. Hell, even Helen’s mood has improved.”
Rachael smiled. She sipped her drink and responded at all the right moments. It wasn’t long before he paid the bar tab and they walked hand-in-hand through the lobby to the elevators.
Mr. Klein reached for her as soon as they entered their usual suite, but Rachael danced away. Crooking one finger, she guided him further into the room where her surprise waited. Champagne, chocolate-covered strawberries, even a small plate of petit fours in a kaleidoscope of flavors.
“How did I get so lucky?” Mr. Klein wrapped his arms around her from behind, nuzzled the hollow of her throat and breathed deeply.
Rachael lingered for a moment before walking to the table, hips swaying. She popped the cork on the champagne and poured them each a glass. Mr. Klein didn’t like champagne, she knew, but he’d drink a toast to make her happy.
They toasted, they drank, Rachael feeding him a strawberry and a petit four, or two. When he offered her one, she declined until they’d “burned off a few calories.”
Mr. Klein pulled her in close, ready for another breath of perfume and another night with her.
Rachael closed her eyes, thinking not of the man kissing her neck, but of the four or five drugs now making their way through his bloodstream, helped along by a rush of martinis and champagne.
One was known as the go-to for colds.
Another was a godsend when you had a headache.
There was even a handy herbal supplement known for easing anxiety.
But put them all together, well, that wasn’t a very good idea.
The kicker? Each one was easily and legally obtained over the counter. Hell, the cold medicine was even buy one-get one free. It had taken some trial and error to find the right combinations. Poor Mr. Baccarat had taken forever to go.
Now, though, it worked out quite neatly. Rachael was never on the hotel’s registration, her drinks were never charged to the hotel bar. She might be picked up on a security camera or two, but did the managers of this prestigious hotel really want anyone knowing they catered to people in Rachael’s profession? Not likely.
Besides, no one would be all that surprised if dear Mr. Klein suddenly passed away from a strange combination of otherwise innocent drugs. After all, he was getting older, he probably just forgot he took one before taking the other, right? His wife could attest to his slipping memory, if she so chose.
Rachael wondered how long it would take for Mr. Klein to feel the effects. Maybe she had time to feed him another treat or two before taking the leftovers with her when she left.
Her thoughts were interrupted when he finally succeeded in removing her dress. He moved like a man possessed, so preoccupied with getting what he wanted that he didn’t notice he was already started to fumble.
Rachael liked Mr. Klein. But if she learned anything from her mother it was that if you like something, you just might have to set it free for its own good.
And that was fine with Rachael.
Because now she was addicted to the thrill.
Just like he was addicted to her, and to the Obsession.