Cutler 05 - Darkest Hour

and into a hotel room in Richmond. I was winning. In fact, I was winning so much, one of the players who was losing accused me of cheating."
    "What happened?" Once again, my heart began to beat in anticipation.
    "He put a gun to my head. He told me there was only one bullet in the gun and if I was cheating, that was the chamber the hammer would hit. Then he pulled the trigger. I nearly emptied myself in my pants, but nothing happened. His friends thought it was funny and he decided that was just a test and he had to try one more time. He pulled the trigger again, and again it was an empty chamber.
    "Finally, he sat back and said I could go with my winnings. Just to prove he wasn't kidding, he pointed the gun at the wall and pulled the trigger once more, and this time the gun went off. I hurried out of there and got back home as fast as I could, thinking all the time that my life had nearly ended and what did I have to show for it. I could have died without any dignity in a hotel room somewhere in Richmond," he moaned. A little too dramatically, he raised his eyes toward the ceiling and sighed.
    "My sister Emily would like to hear this confession," I said dryly. "Maybe you should make a trip to The Meadows." He gazed at me again and in a breathless gush, his words spilled forth.
    "I know you're not in love with me and you still resent the way I got you to be my wife, but you're a woman with some inner strength. You come from good stock and I've decided . . . if it's all right with you, that is . . . that we should have children. I'm hoping for a son to carry on the Cutler heritage. I think if you want it, too, it will happen."
    "What?" I sat back, amazed.
    "I'm willing to reform my ways, to be a good husband and a good father, and I won't interfere with the things you want to do at the hotel. What do you say?" he pleaded.
    "I don't know what to say. I guess I should be happy you're not asking me to cut a deck of cards to decide," I added.
    He looked down. "I know I deserve that," he added, looking up, "but I'm being sincere now. I really am."
    I sat back and studied him. Perhaps I was a fool, but he did look sincere.
    "I don't know if I can get pregnant," I said.
    "Can we try at least?"
    "I can't stop you from trying," I said.
    "Don't you want a child?" he asked, shocked by my cold response.
    It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him I had one, but I swallowed the words and simply nodded.
    "Yes, I suppose I do," I admitted.
    He smiled and slapped his hands together.
    "It's settled then." He stood up and started to undress so we could begin that night. I didn't get pregnant that month. The next month we made love as much as we could around the time when I was supposed to be most fertile, but it took three more months. One morning I awoke with that familiar nausea after having missed my period and I knew what Bill wanted was going to happen.
    This time my pregnancy went much easier and I delivered in a hospital. The delivery itself went quickly. I thought the doctor suspected I had given birth before, but he didn't say anything or ask anything. I gave birth to a baby boy and we named him Randolph Boise Cutler after Bill's grandfather.
    The moment I set eyes on my child, I knew my indifference had disappeared. I decided to breastfeed and found that I couldn't stand being apart from him, nor did it seem he could stand being apart from me. No one could put him to sleep as easily or make him as content as I could. We hired one nanny after another until I finally decided that I would be the one who looked after him. Randolph would be one child in my life who never lost his real mother. We would never even be separated for a day.
    Bill complained I was spoiling him, making him a mamma's boy, but I didn't change my ways. When he was old enough to crawl, he crawled around in my office, and when he was old enough to walk, he walked with me through the hotel and greeted guests, too. In time, it was as if he was just another part of me.
    Once Bill had his son, he quickly forgot his promises and his reform. It wasn't long before he was back to his old ways, but I didn't care. I had my son and I had the hotel, which was still growing in many ways. I had tennis courts built and a ballfield constructed. I began motorboating for the guests and started more elaborate dinners. Building the resort became my sole purpose in life and I got so I would permit nothing to hinder or interrupt that progress. At the age of twenty-eight, I