All Other Things Charlotte Stein Bea’s husband Tommy is the sweetest, most gorgeous guy she’s ever met. There’s just one problem—he doesn’t seem to want to have sex with her. Or at least, he shows no interest in the kind of sex she’s craving. Kinky, torrid, passion-filled sex, of the sort a too-handsome and too-fascinating colleague at her workplace is offering. Kieran is everything that Tommy’s not—dark to his light, triple caramel swirl to Tommy’s vanilla. But Bea will not be tempted. Or at least, she thinks she won’t. Until she discovers Tommy and Kieran have been IMing each other for some time—and they haven’t been talking about innocent things. They’ve been talking about her, and more importantly, they’ve been talking about what they’d like to do to her. Together. And once Tommy’s buttons have been pushed and Kieran’s been let off his leash, anything seems possible…
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All Other Things ISBN 9781419935787 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED All Other Things Copyright © 2011 Charlotte Stein Edited by Grace Bradley Cover design by Syneca Photography: wtmas, Okssi and sapandr/Shutterstock.com Electronic book publication September 2010 The terms Romantica® and Quickies® are registered trademarks of Ellora’s Cave Publishing. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502. Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000. (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/). Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously. The publisher and author(s) acknowledge the trademark status and trademark ownership of all trademarks, service marks and word marks mentioned in this book. The publisher does not have any control over, and does not assume any responsibility for, author or third-party Web sites or their content.
ALL OTHER THINGS Charlotte Stein
Dedication To AH again. That’s far more life than I needed, actually.
Charlotte Stein
Chapter One She didn’t mean to say it. It just slipped out, in the middle of meaningless talk about customers and IT problems and what had been on TV the night before. Some program with a ton of sex in it, Kieran had said, before giving her that look he sometimes did. The flat, assessing one. The one that made his eyes look like glaciers, shivering with color and completely devoid of shame. He was shameless, Kieran, and he proved it now, in answer to the words she hadn’t meant to say. “And what exactly makes you think he’s having an affair?” He sounded almost like he wanted to laugh—but that was the other trouble with Kieran. She found it almost impossible to tell what he was thinking or feeling at any given moment. He could have been imagining flying on a marshmallow to Mars for all she knew. “Nothing. I don’t know. Forget it.” She winced as soon as the words were out. How fluttering and indecisive they sounded. How spineless. Kieran would have never said “I don’t know” or “forget it”. He would have said, My wife is fucking someone else and I hate the cunt. Even though he didn’t have a wife, as far as she knew. His rough-knuckled hands were free of rings and the most he ever said to her in terms of his personal relationships was, The woman I slept with last night had a tattoo of a snake on her back. As big as a house, it was! And now he just stood there, eyeing her side-on. As though he didn’t even have to say anything to get her to confess all. He just knew she’d start up again in a second, when she felt comfortable enough to do it. She wondered why Kieran always made her comfortable enough to do it. “He won’t…” she started, but couldn’t finish. Finishing meant she’d have to admit it, and admitting it to someone like Kieran was an almighty and crushing defeat. He made her comfortable enough to talk about things she never spoke about with anyone else, true. But he was also a dirty bastard, a filthy lecher—lust incarnate. Everyone knew it. The whole office talked about it. Kelly Tyler swore she’d found a sex toy in the neat little laptop bag he carried with him everywhere. And Martin from marketing had passed the rumor around that Kieran had fucked the boss on her desk, on that long, hot Friday when everyone had left at twelve to go to the pub. “He won’t fuck you?” he asked, but it wasn’t really a question. People who happened to be lust incarnate didn’t need questions. “That’s a real shame.” 6
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They also didn’t need restraint, it seemed. God, he was looking at her weird now. The way he sometimes did when she felt at her most awkward and exposed. Hungrily, she thought, but that didn’t seem right somehow. He might well be hungry for the boss and the new receptionist and that girl he’d picked up with the snake tattoo, but he couldn’t possibly be hungry for her. She didn’t have anything that men got hungry about. Her husband was proof—he was practically legally obliged to fuck her, and he still didn’t want to. “Have you tried talking to him?” And there was the other thing about Kieran. He might well have been a dirty bastard, but he could also be pretty…girlfriend-y. He asked the right things—the ones she’d always imagined a nice gal pal would. Of course, it made it even harder to figure him out. “What am I going to say? Oh hey, we haven’t done it in a while. Maybe you’re having an affair?” He never made a sound when he laughed, but she could tell he was doing it anyway. Creases appeared around his eyes. His grin was filled with teeth as wicked as the rest of him—big teeth. Wolf’s teeth. And then after, he put the cigarette he was smoking to his lips. “Surely you can come up with a little more tact than that,” he said finally. She watched him blow a streamer of smoke toward the dull, gray sky before he continued. “I mean, you’re usually pretty careful about your words.” Of course, he was setting a trap. She could see it a mile away and yet somehow ended up in it, even so. “In what way?” He flicked ash from the end of his cigarette. Gave her the old side-eye again. “Saying done it instead of fucked. You couldn’t even use a coy euphemism the first time. You just trailed away into nothing and I had to guess.” She tried to roll her eyes and missed. “I can say fucked.” “Sure?” “I just did.” “Can you say it to him?” “Say what?” “Fucked. Fucking, fucker, fuck me.” She turned away from him then. Not enough for it to be noticeable, but certainly enough to give her some comforting distance. He sounded too…something when he said things like that. She could almost imagine his tongue curling around every syllable— and the faint Irish accent didn’t help.
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It just made her think of words coated in smoke and whiskey and other nonsense things that had nothing to do with Ireland at all. He did most of his growing up in Bromley, for God’s sake. He was about as Irish as she was, when you really got down to it. But that accent… “This isn’t some I’m a prude problem,” she said, and hated him for raising an eyebrow. Of course he put the eyebrow right back down again the moment she turned back to him, but he did so far too late. She caught it. He thought she was a prude. “I’m not, Kieran, all right? He’s the—” She cut herself off before the accusation could come out. Mainly because it felt as though she’d been manipulated into saying something again—but also because she couldn’t be sure. She just didn’t know if her husband was the very thing Kieran had just implied of her. How did you judge levels of prudery? He didn’t flinch when she swore or act disgusted on the rare occasions they did have sex. He just didn’t seem to want it enough—or at least, not enough for her. God, it was nowhere near enough for her. She could feel her sex aching right now, right this minute, and for no more than Kieran saying fuck, fucker, fuck me in a voice that curled up at the edges, like burning paper. “So he just won’t do the things you want him to?” he asked, and this time it was a question. It brushed against her, gently, nothing about it too forward—as though he knew he’d gone too far with the fucks. “Sort of.” She thought about Tommy’s face between her legs, licking slow and steady until she felt sure she might pass out. Tommy with his big hands on her hips, that look on his face like someone concentrating too hard on a problem they couldn’t solve. “He’ll do some things… It’s more like he just doesn’t want it enough.” Yes. Yes. That was the crux of the issue. He’d go down on her, fuck her in different positions…most of the usual stuff. He just wouldn’t do it often. “Doesn’t mean he’s having an affair.” She glanced at him then. Of course, she couldn’t for the life of her tell if he was just trying to placate her or not. He sounded sincere, but with Kieran, sounding and being were two wholly separate things. And there was this look on his face too…the low look again. The one that always reminded her of headlights dipping on a car—maybe as it sped toward a deer trapped and hypnotized in the middle of a road. “You ever see him jerking off?” he asked, and she just couldn’t help it. Her body reacted to him talking like that—in a way Tommy never would. Yeah, that was one thing Tommy would never, ever do. 8
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Talk dirty. He never talked dirty—hell, he rarely even moaned or gasped or did anything to show how good her mouth or cunt felt on him. “No.” “Not ever? Middle of the night, in the shower, while you’re watching—nothing?” She stopped then, and considered. Really considered. “I’ve never seen him jerk off.” It seemed amazing to her, this realization. But it remained true, nonetheless. She had never seen her husband touch himself in any way, shape or form. Not even to get hard, in preparation for sex. “Well believe me, doll, he’s doing it. But the question is—how often? If he’s getting his jollies elsewhere he’s not going to be fucking himself daily, is he?” “He wouldn’t need to do it that much. He’s just…not very sexual.” This time when Kieran laughed he made a sound. A real, honest-to-God sound— one that made her flush from head to toe. Lord, he thought she was ridiculous. “I hope that’s not what he told you. Come on, Bea. You’re smarter than that. Most guys need a little something more than every Sunday night at half past ten.” The flush deepened, to hear him say those words. How in God’s name did he know about every Sunday night at half past ten? “Really? How often do you need it?” she asked, then couldn’t quite believe she had. He was going to say something abominable now, something she’d never be able to get out of her head. “Why don’t you look at me and tell me what you think?” She couldn’t resist. He had tractor beams attached to her eyeballs, and putting all power to the engines didn’t stop her head from turning. “Twice a week?” she tried, but it sounded pitiful even to her ears. His many-toothed smile, the way his tongue curled up to touch his upper lip— those things told her the rest. Or at least, they did until he decided to hit her with actual words. “Honey, I’m lucky if I get away with twice a day.” Of course she’d known. She read enough Cosmos to get a pretty accurate picture of what men liked sexually. But everything about this moment, right now, kind of made her wish she read a magazine called Denial Monthly instead. “Yeah, but you’re pretty disgusting,” she said, then cursed herself for not going with a better word. A sweeter word that more accurately summed up how she felt about Kieran Murphy. “You really think he’s going to be any different from me? Men are disgusting. We’re disgusting pigs who just want to rut and sweat and fuck everything that walks, and any man who says otherwise is a liar.”
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How weird that she suspected—with some sort of surety, for the first time ever— that he was being just that—a liar. He was lying. Though about what, she couldn’t say. He certainly seemed like a giant man-slut. She watched him flick away the smoldering end of his cigarette, body language suddenly jagged. An almost-sneer curling up the corner of his mouth as he pushed away from the bike-stand they’d been leaning on, in this little sheltered place behind the Werner and Marcus building. Any second he would go back inside, back to his lair of IT. And then maybe next time he wouldn’t call her over for a chat as she made her way to the door with her lunch in her hand. He wouldn’t say her name—like every other person in this place, who didn’t know her from Adam—and ask her how she was doing. And all because of the feeling growing inside her. The one that told her she’d said something wrong to him, something that required an apology. Even if the notion of apologizing to someone like Kieran seemed ridiculous, on the face of it. He didn’t give a shit what people thought of him. He didn’t give a shit about anything. She wasn’t even sure if he regularly brushed his hair or ironed his clothes. Right there, standing before her in the gloomy light with one hand in his back pocket, he appeared singularly rumpled. The start of a beard scratching over his sharpboned face, dark hair tangled and half curly. He looked as if he’d just rolled out of someone’s bed five minutes ago. Though it wasn’t the general air of lustful disarray that caught her attention. It was his gaze, his steady and unwavering gaze, and how cold it should have seemed. Did the cold ever burn like this? “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean that about you being disgusting,” she rushed out too suddenly, but he didn’t make her feel embarrassed for it. He smiled instead—with just the corners of his mouth. The middle part stayed downturned, and there was only the barest hint of light in those amazing no-color eyes. “I don’t think your husband’s cheating on you, Bea,” he said, but he was backing away toward the building as he did so. It made her want to go after him, to pull him back, but just thinking about touching him flooded her body with heat. And then by the time he next spoke he had to almost shout. He had to declare it from the rooftops. “Because if I was your husband, I’d never stray. No force on earth would make me want to fuck anyone but you.”
***** There were many things she couldn’t get out of her head after her conversation with the devil himself. The way he’d looked—which just made her feel like a cheating harlot—and the way he’d talked—which just made her feel like a cheating aroused harlot. 10
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Then finally, the words themselves. The ones about never straying, in the imaginary relationship he was having with her in his head. The ones about how disgusting he thought he was—how disgusting he thought all men were. And finally, finally… The ones about her husband’s masturbatory habits. Of course, the other words drew her attention more. But she focused on the latter, because the latter was safe. The latter didn’t imply some hidden wealth of feeling inside some guy who wasn’t her husband. And the latter gave her a starting point. A way to get to the truth in a manner that didn’t involve checking what Tommy had for breakfast and how much cologne he wore on a regular basis. Neither of the last two things proved anything, the way Cosmo claimed it would. He still ate three rounds of toast and a metric ton of cornflakes every morning—so it wasn’t as though he’d started watching his waistline for some new woman. And he never wore cologne, so that proved a dead end too. But according to Kieran, he had to be masturbating. Had to be. She just didn’t know when. Spying on him in the shower yielded no results. He just caught her watching him through five innocent minutes of shampooing, and asked her if she needed the bathroom. “You can pee in front of me, hon,” he called out over the rush of water. Then he laughed, because he wasn’t like Kieran. He was goofy and easy to read and full of joy about stupid stuff like his wife of six months being nervous about peeing in front of him. Surely he wouldn’t mind if she just came right out and asked? Instead of standing there, staring through the frosted glass at his glorious naked body. Even with the steam and the swirling pattern on the shower door, she could make out trails of water and soap slicking their way down his thick thighs, the perfect curve of his big back, the firm swell of his arse. And when he turned just so, she could see the heavy shape of his cock between his legs, and recall exactly how it felt sliding into her ever-ready body. “Hey—you okay?” he asked. Probably because she’d been standing there too long, gawking like a perverted moron. It was embarrassing, really. A few minutes spent staring at her husband and her nipples had stiffened beneath the material of her t-shirt. A low ache had started up between her legs, as though it was somehow wrong or illicit to be doing this. Even though that was crazy. No person in the world thought it was wrong and illicit to find pleasure in the naked body of their husband. They only thought it was wrong and illicit to find pleasure in the naked body of their husband while the words I’d never stray flashed in neon at the back of their mind.
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She closed her eyes, briefly, and tried to think straight. Tried to think like Kieran, instead of about him. What would he do now, if that were his wife in there? Get in with her, she thought, but that proved right out of the question. Mainly because thinking it only prompted some lurid fantasy about Kieran getting into the shower behind her, to soap her back and persuade her into a little wet sex. It wouldn’t have taken much, she realized. Not in the state she was in. Most of her just wanted to sink to the ground under the weight of this thrumming, all-consuming arousal. She could feel liquid running between the cheeks of her arse, and when she moved everything seemed too slick and too full. And then Tommy got out of the shower—as naked as anyone could be—and suddenly her legs didn’t want to hold her up anymore. He looked incredible, just incredible… God, how had anyone as handsome and amazing as him ever wanted to marry her? Because he never has to have sex with you, a little voice answered, and as ridiculous as that seemed she couldn’t deny it as a possibility. If you were the kind of guy who never wanted to have sex, who better to marry than a plain and prudish-seeming woman? Kieran had said as much about her. Of course, he hadn’t said the plain part. In fact, he’d said the exact opposite of that and, oh God, she didn’t really want to think about it. But she could actually think about the other thing, the prudish thing. Was that what Tommy had thought? That she would make a quiet and undemanding wife, sex-wise? “Honey? You okay?” Lord, he looked so innocent and hopeful then. Blue eyes wide, face absolutely smothered by a grin. She could tell it would just crush him to know that she was extremely far from okay. “Great. Perfect. You want a towel?” she asked, mainly because the sight of him, dripping and naked, was starting to hurt her eyes. He looked so solid in their little white bathroom, so solid and real. And he had all that dark chest hair too—which appeared even darker when wet— and the big, broad shoulders. By comparison, Kieran barely seemed like anything at all. Her husband topped six-five. What was Kieran? Five-eleven? Possibly six foot? Nothing, really. “That’d be cool, hon,” he said, and then he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek. She felt pretty sure he didn’t know how much of a tease that was. He didn’t seem to see her eyes drift closed, for the barest second. And when he pulled away—the towel she’d held out to him in his hand—he’d already moved on to a new subject. His kisses were nothing. They were the kisses you’d give a child.
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“You know I’ve got to work late tomorrow, right?” he asked as he checked his reflection in the mirror above the sink. She watched him mussing his hair this way and that, the copper hints shining through the dark even when wet, and thought of Kieran. Kieran, who never mussed his hair. Kieran, who would never pretend to be working late so he could cheat. She had to face it. Tommy had chosen a plain wife because he had seven hundred gorgeous mistresses. “Sure,” she said as everything inside her sank. Cosmo definitely had things to say about husbands working late. Definitely. He glanced at her then, one hand still poised mid-muss. His face ever ready with a smile. “You don’t mind, do you?” he asked, as though her true feelings had written themselves across her face and for once he could read it. It made her want to straighten her expression out, to make it as brilliantly happy as his always looked, and that was not good at all. The false world they’d built around themselves was apparently a lot tougher than she’d first suspected. “Of course not,” she said, and then he reached down and scooped her up into his arms. Like a doll, she thought, like a doll or a child or anything, anything that isn’t a woman with real sexual needs. Though when he did it, she understood how easily he got away with it. It wasn’t even getting away with anything, really. He just picked her up and shook her about and snuggled her, and said silly things like oh I love loads of you, my little pickle, and then she simply had to giggle. He made it easy to giggle, and forget. To put an arm around his broad shoulders and let him carry her into the bedroom. When he sprawled her across the bed, limbs tangling and the wetness of him kissing her skin, she could almost forget how much she needed something more. He was her big, sweet guy. Her big, sweet, very handsome guy and oh she couldn’t resist kissing him. Not a child’s kiss, not a nothing kiss—a real one, hot and openmouthed. He wasn’t ready for it, she could tell. It came out too desperate and weird—the kind of kiss you’d give to someone in the back of a cab, when you weren’t sure which way the night was going. Did this guy you’d just met want to sleep with you or not? It felt kind of like he did. Something seemed less than soft between his legs. And when she pushed her tongue into his mouth, he pressed the less-than-soft thing against her thigh—so firmly it was thrilling. She couldn’t help moaning into his mouth. This was it—sex. After two weeks and three days he was finally going to give it to her again. He felt hot beneath her equally feverish touch, and when she shifted her body just a little—not enough to disturb the
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mood, but enough to get some contact between her own legs—he ran a hand down over her arse. He never ran a hand down over her arse. It was definitely going to happen. Kieran was wrong, he was wrong, and when she pushed a hand between their bodies and felt the thick length of him, it seemed like triumph. Or it did until he rolled off her, so suddenly she hardly had a chance to catch her breath. One second he had his tongue almost in her mouth and his hand close to squeezing her arse, the next second she felt like a slutty fool, spread-eagled on the bed with no man to fill the space above her. “Sorry, hon,” he said. Of course he did. He always said sorry, hon. She could almost mouth the next words he uttered along with him. “I’m just so tired.” Tired. Jesus. What would Kieran have to say about tired? Probably that she was a huge idiot for failing to initiate a hot, steamy fuck session. You’re a sexual dishrag, he’d say. No pulse, no power, as weak as a kitten. God, it had to be bad when she spent her time mentally berating herself on behalf of another person. “Tommy,” she started, though words didn’t want to come. All the breath in her body seemed to be blocking them, and it got worse the more she tried to push them out. “Is anything wrong?” It sounded like a death knell before she’d even gotten to the heart of the matter. She practically felt him freeze next to her, as though she’d shot an arrow into his perfect big heart. “No,” he said, half-bemused. But then quieter, quieter. “Why? Is there something wrong with you, hon?” How could she answer then? He was perfect. He was just tired. She should be satisfied. “No. No—nothing wrong. It’s just…” Go on, you great idiot, Kieran said in her head. “You don’t seem to want to have sex very often.” This time the Kieran in her head ran across a field in football shorts and jersey, then booted the ball right into the back of the net. She shoots, she scores— Well done, girl. “Really?” Tommy asked. He sounded genuinely surprised. Her body felt genuinely electric. “Huh. I hadn’t really thought about it… I guess I haven’t!” God, trust him to sound so…cheery about it. Like hey, it’s no big deal! She wanted to take him by the shoulders and scream at him that it was a big deal. She had another man running around in her head, scoring goals when she managed to live up to his bizarre ideals, for fuck’s sake. Everything was not cool in Happy Land. The magical pixies had run away and the laughing fairy queen had been replaced by a rumpled Irish man with a sex toy in his luggage.
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“I mean—you’d tell me if there was a problem, right?” she asked, though most of her wanted to say something else instead. I have a problem. I do. “Oh Bea, honey. Of course I would,” he said, and when she dared to look at him, his face was all openness. Still full of smiles, still as golden and handsome as always. And his voice fair near dripped sincerity—as warm and silky as just-vacated sheets. “Honestly—work has just been so tough lately. We’ve got the big merger coming up, the departments are shifting…” He stopped then. Leaned back in to gaze at her a bit, with his foggy, blue eyes. “Hey. You’re my girl, okay? And I promise, I’ll stop neglecting my girl as soon as things are less crazy at work.” And when he kissed her…whoo Lord. It felt like the first time he’d ever done it, under the arches on their way back from lunch. Him still just some guy she’d sold insurance to, everything normal and normal and normal and then bam. His soft mouth on hers, suddenly, pulling at the tender skin there. Catching her bottom lip between his two plump ones, everything so slow and arousing at the same time that she’d masturbated later, thinking about it. She had a feeling she was going to masturbate thinking about this later too. When he pulled away she felt breathless, agitated. Her clit pulsed once, insistently, and then he was gone. He was turning off the light. “Good night, Bea,” he said, and oh God, she just wanted to curl up and die, she did, she absolutely did. He had no problem drifting off to sleep with his arm across her middle, while all she could think was— Could a person die of arousal?
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Chapter Two She snapped awake at some ungodly hour, like 3:30 in the morning, sure of one thing and one thing only. Her dream had been about Kieran, and Kieran hadn’t been doing pure and wholesome things in it, and she’d woken up because in between poking his filthy tongue into her ear, he’d whispered something she couldn’t quite hear. Something like time to get up now. And then she turned over in bed and found the space next to her empty. As though the devil-Kieran in her head had snuck into her bedroom in the middle of the night and stolen her husband away. She’d made him into one of those goblins from stories about people being replaced with eggs and the like. She put a hand over her face and tried to restore sanity. Only the empty space next to her wouldn’t let anything like that happen. The empty space said, Hey, your head is full of another man, you cheating whore. Or it didn’t say that, exactly—really it was much more like, Hey, go find out where your poor husband is. Though in truth she felt the sentiment was much the same. She scrubbed her face once and swung out of bed. Likely as not he’d be at the computer, adding things to a proposal he was developing or a marketing budget he had to oversee. Sometimes she even got up in the middle of the night and found him hacking someone to death on World of Warcraft. Though this was the first time she found herself hoping for the latter. If he was up because what she’d said had unsettled him, she was going to kill herself. And in truth, it could have done. It hadn’t seemed to, but then again she still remembered the time she’d vaguely mocked his choice of ties and only discovered later that he’d binned them all and bought new ones in the exact color she’d suggested. Things seemed to bounce off him, because he was big and golden and perfect. But really… Really she didn’t think anything bounced at all. Most stuff got under his smiling skin, she knew it did. And that, above all, was what made things hard. Nobody wants to be the one to take away the sunshine from someone so sunny. She certainly didn’t want to be the one to do it. Which was why she found herself approaching his study, slowly and with a million comforting words in her head. Words like, It’s really no big deal if you’re tired. I completely understand and am not horny in the slightest. Also, I love you and only you, always. She mentally scratched that last one, just as she got to the half-open door. It sounded guilty, and by God she would never be guilty of anything. Thoughts were not actions, and actions would never, ever happen. Never. Ever. 16
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Not even if her husband decided he wanted to have sex with people via his computer. At first, she didn’t get it. Of course, she could see him sitting at his desk with his back to her, and she could tell that he was neither playing a game nor writing a report. But the pieces didn’t coalesce. They were just words on a screen, words that flickered by faster than she could read them—they could have meant anything. Until she thought of Kieran saying, Any man who says otherwise is a liar. Her husband was a liar. Or at least he hadn’t told the whole truth. He’d claimed tiredness, but here he was at 3:30 a.m., messaging someone. Some babe probably, who’d get her tits out on a webcam very shortly. She tried to slow her breathing, tried to calm down. If her heart beat any harder he was going to hear it—and really, that was the last thing she wanted him to do. As terrifying as this was, she needed him to carry on, and if he noticed her hovering so dangerously close to him he’d stop. He’d pretend it wasn’t happening, flick to some game, smile too brightly. Whereas this… This was real. It revealed the true face of her husband, and she had to see what it looked like before he turned away. She had to. And God, the words were just big enough for her to see. Some of them were blocked by his shoulder, but not enough. She could tell at the very least that he’d picked the name Tom359 for himself. And the person he was talking to had the handle Wakewood. Weird, she thought, then hot on its heels—it’s a pun. Wake. Wood. Scare up an erection, etc. She wanted to roll her eyes, and couldn’t. She wanted to frown, and couldn’t. Her body had frozen in place, bare feet welded to the wooden floor, eyes eating up every word she could get at. Tell me about her mouth again, the words said, but she couldn’t for a second imagine who this person meant. Some other babe Tommy had jerked off to recently? He was jerking off now, she could tell. She’d never seen him do it, but the rhythm was unmistakable. It passed through his body to his shoulder, which fair near rippled with whatever sensation he was provoking. And she could hear it. The slick click-clack of a hand on a cock, so reminiscent of a million adolescent fumblings she’d experienced in the back of Malcolm Braithwaite’s Ford Fiesta. So viscerally, involuntarily exciting—just as it had been back then. She watched him reply one-handed, her body humming. Breath catching in her throat. Disgust and arousal warred inside her, with disgust coming out the loser. She wasn’t even sure if disgust was the right word, when she really thought about it. It felt more like…wonder. Especially when Tommy typed—
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She always wets her bottom lip with the tip of her tongue, so everything looks slick and shiny constantly. And her upper lip only curves right in the middle, almost like—
The words cut off then. His shoulder blocked the rest of them—though she could make out the next line. And when she does it, she always looks up at me with these dark, hungry eyes.
She wondered if it was possible to actually stop breathing and not die. It felt as though her body had forgotten how to take in oxygen, and that was before they hammered out their next exchange. It’s not kind to starve a girl, Wakewood said, because of the hungry comment. Because of the hungry, obviously-talking-about-a-blowjob comment. And then Tommy answered— What should I do then?
While she died on the spot. He was… What was he doing, exactly? Talking about blowjobs with a stranger, talking about some other girl and what he wanted to do to her? Only it wasn’t some other girl, was it? The mouth that only went up right in the middle, the way she liked to lick her lower lip… He was talking about her. He’d decided to talk online to some woman about his wife, for reasons unknown to man or beast. She got, Oh hey I’m so tired, and this online person got descriptions of all the things he wasn’t doing to her. She could have punched him. She very nearly pushed open the door and announced her presence, at the very least. And she would have done, if Wakewood hadn’t then typed— If I were you, I’d go to her right now. I bet she’s all warm from the bedclothes and still as horny as fuck. So I’d turn her over all gently, you know—so as not to wake her completely. And then I’d run my tongue between the cheeks of her arse until she moaned for me to stop.
She felt grateful for one thing—Tommy had leaned back in the chair enough for her to read the whole thing. She wasn’t sure what she would have done if she’d only been given half of those lurid, delicious, impossible words. And oh God, they went on.
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I can’t do that, Tommy typed, but he was a little fucking liar. She could hear him
jerking off even more vigorously than he had been before, and when Wakewood added a few more choice words he actually made a sound of pleasure or frustration. A little groan, of the kind he’d never made for her. And once I’d finished licking her neat little arsehole, and made it all nice and wet, I’d spread her cheeks and sink my finger all the way in to the hilt.
It almost seemed natural that Tommy then typed, no, no. He’d never so much as glanced at the general area this person was talking about. And yet he was still stroking his cock, and when Wakewood continued typing the lewdest, most obscene things, that little no, no started to look more and more like the protestations of a virtuous maiden, swooning in a rake’s arms. It made her desperate to know who this woman was. What sort of babe turned a man into a swooning maiden? She had to be some kind of sexual genius. She certainly had Tommy on tenterhooks, and Bea wasn’t too proud to admit that the same thing had happened to her. She couldn’t wait to see what this woman typed next. And then when she’s primed and squirming on the bed, just begging for more, I’d slide my cock into that tight little hole of hers.
Even when the words made her not a woman at all. For the second time that night, she found herself floundering. Unable to process. After all—it had nearly made sense, to catch her husband sex-talking with some hot piece of filthy-mouthed arse. It did not make any sense to catch him talking to a man. It just didn’t. Tommy wasn’t gay, despite his supposed lack of sex drive. He got too hard when he went down on her. He glanced too often at her chest. The problem had never appeared to be about his proclivities, at any rate—and the rest of the conversation seemed to bear that out. Though she still found herself squirming and unsure, when Wakewood next “spoke”. What? Don’t you want me to fuck her arse? Last night you seemed happy enough for me to fuck her face, he said, as though to underscore how long this had been going on for.
Clearly, they’d been having little chats for some time. And most of the little chats probably fell into a similar insane pattern—Wakewood suggesting filthier and filthier things. Tommy protesting all the while, because oh he just wasn’t like that. Oh no—he was good and sweet and he honored his lovely wife. She could almost see the whole thing clear, in her head. Could taste it, when Tommy typed— 19
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Don’t, don’t.
And then Wakewood responded with worse— Are you gonna come? I could tell you some other things that’d make you come faster. How about— Once I’m done filling her with my cum, I’ll let you lick it out of her. God, I bet she’d love that. I’ll kiss her mouth while you kiss her cum-soaked arse. How about it?
She heard her husband moan this time. Long and loud and almost beautiful. His shoulders were trembling by this point, and the wet sound had grown to epic proportions. He only just managed to type out, Ohhhh God, you’re disgusting. Before something definitely happened. She could hear the slicker sound it made, as he spurted thickly over his still-pumping fist. And though she wanted more than anything to be able to see, to just go over there and show him how okay it was for him to feel and need those things, she couldn’t. Mainly because her eyes had drifted over to the screen, and the screen said, Pretty sure she’d say the exact same thing to me, mate. In fact, I’m more than sure.
Her heart stilled in her chest. He meant the insult Tommy had just lobbed at him, she knew. The words you’re disgusting. The ones she’d aimed at Kieran earlier that day, without thinking. She didn’t have time to consider all the implications of that little doozy, however. Mainly because Tommy was getting up, he was getting up, and she couldn’t let him see now. If she did, he’d notice all of the eight million theories that were currently rattling around inside her head. So she took a step back, and another, and then suddenly found herself in the spare room next to the bathroom, just standing there in the darkness like a ghost. Of course there was always the chance he’d simply go straight to the bedroom and find her missing, then want to know what she was doing in a box room with no curtains. But when he didn’t, it wasn’t the relief she’d been expecting. She heard the bathroom light click on and the door close. Heard him turn on the water, as though he’d gotten himself into such a filthy, dirty mess he just had to scrub himself clean. It made her want to kick something, or just run into the bathroom and yell at him that she knew what he’d been doing. But instead, she found herself moving like a sleepwalker until she stood in the middle of the study, staring at the computer screen.
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The little green thing by Wakewood’s name was still on. He hadn’t said anything since his pointed comment about being disgusting, but he hadn’t gone anywhere either. As though Tommy usually came back and finished the conversation after clearing up the incriminating evidence. How long has this been going on, she wondered, but there were more pressing concerns than that. They made her hands shake as she sat down in the chair, and suddenly her stomach felt like a great mass of wet concrete, but she touched the keys anyway. She fingered the letter K. And then maybe the letter I too. And just as her courage started to fail her and her breath turned to lead in her throat, she finished the entire name and hit return. Kieran?
Of course, she expected the little green light to go off. Or maybe Wakewood would just say something bland like, I think you’ve got the wrong chatroom. None of which explained why she was still holding her breath. Or why her fingers had stayed hovering over the keys, just waiting for him to reply. To say something— anything. The cursor blinked over and over, and time ticked on. Any second, and Tommy was going to come back to the bedroom—only he wouldn’t just find her not in bed. He’d find her running her fingers all over his most private secrets, and what then? Divorce, probably. Irreconcilable shame-based differences. She willed Wakewood to reply. Only when he did, it brought her no pleasure. Who is this? he asked, as though he knew full well. As though only one person in the world could have sat at that computer and typed the word Kieran. He knew it was her, and worse than that— She knew it was him.
***** She’d lost her surety by the time she got to work the next day. It had seemed plausible in the dim light of the study, seeing the words spread out over a computer screen. But now that she could see him standing there, across the office…it didn’t fit as tightly. How on earth would he have been able to search out her husband? Why would he have searched out her husband? It just didn’t make sense. And yet she blushed when he wandered over to her desk. She thought of all that arse talk, and the way Tommy had described her—and it hadn’t been the first time he’d
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done it either. As though the stranger was just that hungry to hear the strangest details about her face. And her mouth. And the way she licked her lips. It made her want to press them together hard, to stop anything untoward slipping out. “Hey,” he said, just as casual as anything. God, it wasn’t him. It couldn’t possibly be him. No one could be that easy about something so…wicked. “You okay today? You’re looking a little…peaky.” She didn’t appreciate the way he said peaky. It sounded like a euphemism for something else. “I’m fine,” she squeezed out. “Just not had lunch yet.” It sounded sane and plausible and she was pleased with herself for putting the sentence together—though less so when she realized the opening it had given him. “So come with me now. I’m off to Maples.” She pictured the place in her mind automatically—dark, pub-like, lots of secluded corners. The opportunity to drink a lot and eat sensual, decadent food. “No! No. That’s fine. Thanks though.” She willed herself not to look at him. Not even when he put a hand on the back of her chair—almost as though he’d wanted to go for her shoulder, but not quite—and rattled it a little. “Bit jumpy today, aren’t you?” he asked, and just like that she couldn’t resist. She had to see his face—his face would tell her whether it was really him or not. Talking dirty to her husband. Saying things he’d do to her, if given half the chance. But when she glanced up at him, he just looked like always. Mouth curling up into an almost-smile, eyes as cool and still as anything. In some lights they were summersky blue, but other times they looked almost… Colorless, she thought, but then shrugged the idea off as ridiculous. Nobody had colorless eyes. “Is it because of what I said yesterday?” Her heart leapt the entire length of her body before she could get a hold of it and rein it back in. And even then she had to hiss at it that he didn’t mean the computer conversation. He meant what he’d said as he’d walked away—about only fucking her. “No.” He leaned down, too close to her. His breath smelled the way his voice sounded, like whiskey and smoke. “Sure?” God, his mouth was wicked. Just a hint of teeth this time, but no less deadly. “Positive. In fact, I can’t even remember what you said to me yesterday. Something about men being pigs, was it?”
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She couldn’t read the expression he leveled at her. But it burned in the same way it had the day before. “You know I’d never really mess around with another man’s wife, right?” he asked, so low and heavy. You already are messing around with another man’s wife, she thought. Then straight after it came an even stranger idea—only it’s with the man’s consent. It wasn’t a direction she wanted to take the conversation in, however. What sane person would? She had no proof, and besides—he’d touched on something else she could easily pick apart. “Who says I’d let you mess around with me?” Of course she expected him to protest at that. To plead innocent or else apologize for probably being a misogynistic arse. But he just smiled his little faint smile instead, and said— “Well yes. Quite.” Weirdly, it made her feel embarrassed. As though he would never make such an assumption, and how dare she think he would and oh, by the way, now he wanted to laugh at her. For being the fooliest fool who ever fooled. “Sure you don’t want to come to Maples?” he asked, and there was something jarring about him doing so, coming on the heels of his little sort of denial. The well yes, quite felt like a dismissal, the question like a come-on, again. She wondered what he’d say if she told him only one man had ever recognizably come-on to her in her entire life. Would he laugh? Without sound? Show her his wolf’s teeth and flash at her with those colorless eyes? “Okay,” she said. Then wished she hadn’t.
***** He drank bitter, foamy on top and near thick as tar beneath. She’d never tasted it— hadn’t tasted most types of alcohol, truth be told—but imagined it burning his tongue. Imagined it coating his throat, like some sort of evil cough syrup. He didn’t laugh at her choice of drink. Apple juice with ice—mainly because cola gave her migraines and anything stronger made her legs all jelly-ish and really, she was just thirsty. So incredibly thirsty. Her mouth felt like sandpaper in a way it had never done before, when trying to talk to Kieran. Once, they’d come back late from lunch because they’d spent an hour and a half discussing TV crime dramas. How hopeless they all were, how full of the same clichés, and then finally into stranger territory—how they’d like to be found after being murdered. Kieran had wanted to be drowned. She’d wanted to be strangled.
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Of course, the boss had nailed them for it afterward. But Kieran had somehow oiled their way out of any trouble. Business with a client, he’d offered, then plucked a name out of the air. “So come on then,” he said, after what seemed like an endless amount of time. “Tell me what it is.” She considered just confronting him with it. Look, I know it was you. I could practically hear your voice coming out of those words on the screen. Only somehow she seemed to have trapped herself in this dark little corner with him, everything all heavy wood and red velvet and too close for comfort. If she accused him, there’d be no room for escape when he denied it. “You were right,” she said finally. Because that was safest. Or at least, it was safest until she really considered what she was going to do—tell him all about the thing she suspected he was guilty of, without actually admitting she thought it was him. “He is…you know…” “Euphemisms again, eh?” he asked, then took a sip. The foam made a little white kiss on his upper lip. “Fine. He is jerking off when I’m not around.” His eyes betrayed absolutely nothing. Of course, they usually betrayed absolutely nothing, but that wasn’t the point. Right here and now, it was worse. “Were you asleep?” he asked, careful, so careful. If it was him, he had to know she must have been. “Yes.” “And he got up in the middle of the night.” God, so close to an admission of things he couldn’t possibly know. So close. “Yes.” “And then what?” She could feel her heart pounding in her ears, just like the night before when she’d caught Tommy. He knew there was more. Of course he knew there was more—but she had to trap him tighter still. She had to be wily, because he was wilier. “And then nothing. What more would there have been?” A flicker of a smile danced across his face then. Caught, she thought—but no, not quite. “Well, I’m guessing you came across him. Where was he, in the shower maybe? Out on the balcony, spying on the lady across the road with her nightie off?” “He was in the study. Talking to someone on the internet.” Heat had started creeping its way up her neck, and worse—she knew it was visible. There he sat, as cool as a cucumber, while an inferno raged through her body. “Bad boy,” he said, shaking his head. But there was more than a hint of a smile on his face now. 24
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“It could have been worse. He could have been talking to a woman.” His eyebrow didn’t even go up at that. Not a single solitary flicker of surprise crossed his features. “You think talking to a man is better then?” “It is, when the man in question spends all his time talking about me.” His smile moved from faint to halfway for that. And he at least had the decency to glance away as he bared some teeth. “So let me be clear on this. Your husband spends his furtive alone time talking to some man about his delicious but frustrated wife?” She took a drink of apple juice before she answered, and for the first time in her life found herself wishing it was something stronger. “The man he was talking to spoke about me. About things he’d like to do to me.” Kieran’s eyes almost flickered closed at that. Just a little flutter of his eyelashes, and then a flash of teeth again. It was the kind of look she imagined he had when over some woman, body slowly sinking into hers to the hilt. But then he straightened, and the expression vanished, and when he spoke his voice came out clear enough. “Well. There you have it then.” She thought about all the things she could possibly have, in a rapid succession—an admission of his guilt, a confession of his desire, an understanding of what’s truly going on here. But they all melted away when he next spoke. “He sees you as his perfect, virginal wife. He can’t sully you himself, so asks someone else to do it for him.” It sounded like something he’d thought long and hard about. But just because he’d spent God only knew how long thinking about it and hatching a plot in his head and maybe even searching out her husband, it didn’t mean this virginal theory wasn’t solid. In fact, when he said it aloud it just seemed obvious. She felt almost stupid for not thinking of it sooner. “Great. Easily fixable then. I’ll just put on a leather catsuit and attack him in the middle of the night.” “Well, that might put paid to the virginal thoughts. But—” She couldn’t help cutting in, though her words sounded too brittle and bullish to bear. “But what?” He shrugged one shoulder, as though he couldn’t even hear the resentment in her voice. As though it meant nothing to him. “Might make him take off like someone’s lit a fire under his arse.” “Maybe I want to light a fire under his arse.” She watched him toy with his glass, turning and turning it. Most of it was still untouched, but he didn’t take another drink. Strange, really. She’d always thought of 25
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him as a big drinker. The kind of man who went out lairing it on a Friday and Saturday night. “So do it then. Though might I propose something a little less obvious than a leather catsuit?” She thought of flimsy nighties, smoldering looks, low lighting. Though somehow she suspected he had other things in mind entirely. “Oh, so even my ideas of filthy perversions are virginal now?” The words didn’t come out half as mean as she’d feared they would. But she couldn’t resist adding more. “Or are they just hackneyed?” “Both,” he said, but with too much mischief in his voice for her to hate him. “Don’t worry though. I’m neither.” “You’re a regular Fairy Godmotherfucker.” When he bared his teeth this time, it felt like less of a threat. It had a casual air to it, a hint of carelessness, and his words were the same. “Aren’t I just.” She took another drink, but this time it wasn’t the apple juice she brought to her lips. She picked up his glass instead—just to see. Just to get a taste, for once, of something she’d never had. It didn’t feel like cough syrup going down, however. It felt like Dutch courage, shoving forward all the questions she wanted to ask. It was you, wasn’t it? she thought at him. But in the end not even bitter as thick as tar could get the words out. Instead, she went with— “So what would you do?” He flicked his gaze at her, the way some people drew and snapped open a knife. “Next time he gets up in the middle of the night to talk to some stranger about you, join in.”
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Chapter Three Of course it was all well and good Kieran saying a thing like that. But when it came to actually doing it… She thought of a million ways to interrupt, and rejected them all. What have you been up to? sounded too condemnatory. Do you need a hand? as hackneyed as Kieran had accused her of being. So instead of getting up to search him out—after actually hearing him leave the bed—she remained frozen in place, undecided. The taste of bitter had gone and all it left behind was the memory of Kieran’s shark grin. His flick-knife eyes, demanding she be daring. Though the more she thought about it, the less it felt like he’d simply decided to give her helpful advice to save her marriage. After all, if Wakewood was Kieran, the words “join in” took on very different connotations. Perverted sort of connotations. Wanting her sort of connotations. She shook herself and tried to think about something else. The trip they were planning together maybe—or the errands she had to run in the morning. Just anything, really, apart from Kieran grinning. Kieran saying, in her head, He’ll be in there now, saying all sorts of things about you. Don’t you want to hear what they are? I bet they’re filthy. I’ll bet he’s revealing terrible, dirty secrets about you, like how sweet your mouth is on his cock or how tight you feel around him when he pounds into you. Don’t you want to know, Bea? Don’t you? She did. The idea nagged at her like a rotten tooth. Her two best friends were gossiping about her, talking about doing dirty things to her, and she had it in her power to hear what they were saying. All she had to do was get up and go to the study, and stand outside the door like she’d done the night before. She didn’t even have to do what Kieran had suggested. She didn’t have to join in. She could just stand there and watch and see every little word they had to say about her, and then creep back to bed like a little mouse, brimming with secret knowledge about Tommy and herself and Kieran. Only… Only it wouldn’t be secret with Kieran. He knew she was watching. His words would be designed to snare her, she knew they would, and oh God she had to see them. She pushed back the covers in one big rush, heart thumping. The apartment wasn’t cold, but her teeth chattered immediately anyway. It made her want to pull on a robe, but doing so seemed too planned, somehow. If Tommy saw her, he’d know she’d been aware of this for some time and likely be even more embarrassed.
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And if she was honest, putting on a robe went against the grain of the little kernel of a scheme inside her. A person couldn’t join in with a bunch of sexual shenanigans while wearing a robe. They had to join them in a flimsy nightie, like the one she’d purposefully decided to wear. It wasn’t too unusual a choice for bedtime, but it had a lacy edging and it clung to her full breasts, and when she moved, it whispered against her thighs. It didn’t help matters. The sensation only made her uncomfortably aware of her own body, and all the ways in which the term join in could be interpreted. Did he mean in a touching-her-husband sort of manner? Or maybe he wanted her responses, her words typed up there, on the screen. She couldn’t tell and wasn’t sure if she wanted to know or not. After all, Kieran had urged her. Kieran had offered that little golden join in. But Tommy hadn’t. Tommy had come to his study all blissfully unaware, sure and certain in his wife’s maidenly virtue. It didn’t seem to matter that said wife thought the idea of maidenly virtue was ridiculous and kind of wondered what sort of person Tommy was to believe in such a thing. It still stopped her a meter before the door. As though really, it was Tommy who had to remain intact. The little bubble around him shouldn’t be pierced under any circumstances. And she wouldn’t have even gotten close to piercing it, she really wouldn’t have, if he hadn’t made some unholy noise and yanked on her curiosity hard enough to almost send her over. She actually skidded on the slick wooden floor, then froze. Had he heard her? She didn’t think so, but even if he hadn’t she felt sure he was going to catch the hard beating of her heart any time soon. It sounded like a gong ringing inside her head, and it only got worse when he made the noise again. Dear God, what was it? She couldn’t tell if it was pain or pleasure. It sounded almost disappointed—a protracted groan with a hint of despair—but she didn’t have a clue what he could possibly be disappointed about. Had Wakewood failed to turn up? She peeked through the crack he’d left in the door—the one he should never have allowed and yet somehow still did, like an invitation he felt too nervous to offer in person—but no, Wakewood was there. She could make out the red of his name clearly, and Tommy was obviously in the middle of crafting a reply. He had a finger in his mouth and was gnawing on the nail—a habit he’d worked hard to kick. Though apparently, not hard enough. Whatever Wakewood had said it had sent him right back into the loving arms of nail biting, and it was only when she read the words for herself that she understood why.
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Go get her. Something hot and red flashed through her. It couldn’t be denied now. He’d told her husband to do the exact thing Kieran had tried to persuade her into, so who else could it be but him? It was Kieran, it was, it was. No way around it. She could practically hear his accent curling around the words. Those cool, colorless eyes of his brooking no refusal. Even if Tommy clearly wanted to refuse. If you saw him, if you looked at him, you wouldn’t debate. But all Tommy had was the computer screen. The red of Wakewood’s name, the blank black of those direct words. It should have been easy to turn Kieran down under such circumstances, and yet somehow it took Tommy an age to finally type, Never. It surprised her how bleak the word looked, once he’d put it out there. Like the end to a sentence she hadn’t had a chance to make. Though far more unsettling were the words Wakewood then chose to type, in response. You act as though you’re respecting her, but you’re not. You’re not even giving her the opportunity to speak.
It was almost as though he’d read her thoughts. The ones about sentences and chances and other things Tommy didn’t want to talk about. And apparently, her thoughts about these things made Tommy angry. He practically punched out the keyboard as he typed. It’s nothing to do with her having a say. I don’t want her to have to deal with my weirdness, okay?
The urge to push open the door and go to him swelled up inside her. He’d used the word weirdness to describe himself, even though this wasn’t anything—not really. It was just a bit of computer fun, just some talking, and not even about someone other than her. It could have been so much worse. Naked girls. Meeting up with naked girls secretly. Meeting up with naked girls secretly, then talking to the same girls about how awful his evil wife was. But instead there was just this, and he even seemed to feel bad about that much. What if she wants weirdness? Wakewood typed, and again she thought about how
bizarrely in sync he was with her own thoughts. Though when she considered, she realized he had an unfair advantage. She’d actually told him how much she wanted her
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husband to share. He knew she needed a bit of weirdness and wasn’t afraid of the things she’d already overheard. Whereas Tommy… She doesn’t, he typed, and then Wakewood followed too quickly, after. You’re only saying that because you’re afraid.
She heard Tommy tut, and his response matched that little note of irritation. Oh don’t go into all of that “you’re afraid of women” crap. Not afraid of women. Afraid of yourself. Of what you’d do, given the opportunity.
She had to admit, Wakewood had a point. Tommy had never seemed the type to make assumptions or be weird about women. He just seemed like the type to freak out over his own ridiculous ideas of what was perverted, or not. I wouldn’t do anything, he typed in reply, as though to confirm what she’d just been
thinking. But unfortunately, confirmation wasn’t enough for Wakewood. He needed to push a little harder, be a little firmer, and oh how sweet it looked typed up there, on the screen. Of course you would. A woman like that—who wouldn’t? You’ve told me yourself how wet she gets, over the littlest things. Imagine what she’d do if you held her down, spread her open, made her beg.
So they’d spoken before about how aroused things made her. She couldn’t imagine how such a conversation had come about or where it had led them, but it was there, nonetheless. A little hint of it that made her squirm on the spot. And then the other words—all the talk of spreading her and holding her down. She couldn’t bear to read it, and couldn’t bear not to. I wouldn’t make her beg, Tommy typed, and she almost started crying. Her sex had
become a shivering ache between her legs over the thought of it, and all he had to say was, I wouldn’t, I can’t, I won’t. Shortly followed by Wakewood saying the opposite.
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You do. All the time. She’s probably in bed right now, begging for you to come in and fuck her.
Tommy’s fingers hit the keys, hard. His shoulders were hunched now, and it made her wonder how often and how quickly he got to this stage. Did every conversation start up with him sitting ramrod straight in his chair, and end with him huddled so close to the computer screen he could have kissed it with very little effort? She’s asleep! he typed, but Wakewood wasn’t having any of it. How do you know for sure? She could be touching herself right now, thinking of all the things you don’t do to her.
She squeezed her thighs together on hearing him talk that way—so close to the knuckle—but in truth it only made things worse. The idea took root in her mind, and for a moment all she could think about was returning to the bed to relieve the ache that had somehow become a fierce pounding. She could almost feel her heart, beating between her legs. Her senses had fled and all that remained were Kieran’s words, flowing across the screen like water. Water that was probably made of poison. Can’t you tell how much she wants it when you’re around her? You make her go weeks— she must be aching. I bet she’s in there right now, two fingers in her pussy, desperately wanting it to be something bigger, something thicker, something that fills her up.
She hated him for using that word—aching. She hated him for being a mind reader. But he kept on anyway, as Tommy grew what could only be described as breathless. And then just as she’s sure she can’t fill up that great void herself, she strokes her thumb over her clit and comes, and comes, and comes.
Tommy moaned. Lucky, really, because she felt almost certain she’d moaned too. The little bud he’d just talked about seemed to have swollen to some impossible size. She wasn’t even sure if she could have walked into the study, the way she so desperately wanted to. Liquid had found its way to her thighs, to the groove between the cheeks of her arse. Everything felt huge down there, and that pulse beat frantically. What do you think? Do you think she likes something hard in her, or something soft on her clit? Maybe both, right? Maybe something in her arse too while we’re at it.
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She’d never known anyone to talk in such graphic and constant detail about arses. Of course, realistically she knew men thought about that sort of stuff. It was an available orifice. They seemed obsessed enough with the mouth and the pussy, so why not the third thing? But even so, even so. It was eye opening to actually hear it from the horse’s mouth. It made her think of Kieran in one of his v-necked sweaters, tie slightly askew. Everything about him so normal and everyday and oh Lord, on Monday she’d have to face him with all of his lurid fantasies about her backside now firmly between them. She wondered if he’d done the boss that way. Mrs. Henderson, on her desk, in the bottom. It was like a game of Clue, only absolutely filthy. You want to take her arse while I lick her clit?
She had to cover her mouth with her hand, just to stop the sound that wanted out. The words echoed through her too strongly, leaving behind vague hints as to what such a thing would feel like. Tommy’s big cock, sliding back and forth…there. And then…and then… What was he saying exactly? That the pair of them would do things to her, at the same time? Imagine how she’d respond, he continued. I could finger her sweet pussy, so soft and slow as you fuck her. And then I’d wait. I’d wait until she moaned and gasped, before giving her a little lick. Just right on the tip of her clit, as my fingers slid back and forth in her cunt and your cock filled her arse. How long do you think it would take for her to come?
It surprised her when Tommy actually answered. He’d been silent for a long time, by that point—though she understood why. He was turned-on. In fact, she suspected he was past the point of turned-on. He felt each word as strongly as she did, and when he put his hands to the keyboard his typing sounded jittery. Thirty seconds. Less. She can come with hardly any help at all.
It was what Wakewood clearly wanted to hear. Tommy hadn’t started jerking off— Lord only knew why—but Wakewood obviously had. He missed a few letters out of several words when he responded with, God yes, tell me, tell me. And then Tommy did. I can just press the heel of my palm to her pussy through her clothes and she’ll come. Sometimes she’ll even try to hide it, because we’ll have hardly done anything at all and she’ll be
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shaking and flushed and really ready. It’s my fault, I think, because I’m all silent and I can’t show her, so I guess it seems embarrassing when she’s so loud.
He was right. It did seem embarrassing. So much so that her cheeks flamed red and her body went into some sort of involuntary paralysis, just seeing him talk about it with a complete stranger. One who then said, Ohhh Jesus. Yeah, keep going. Don’t, she thought at Tommy. But he didn’t heed her. Once, when I went down on her, she climaxed two or three times. She wanted me to stop, but her moans were making me crazy.
Three times, it had been. She’d hardly been able to believe he was actually doing it, and she’d gone over so quickly, and in such a rapid succession, that once it was over she couldn’t remember how she’d behaved. And now she knew. She’d moaned like a beast, according to her husband. Does she say things? Wakewood asked, and her husband had words to give him on
that topic too.
Sometimes. My name, stuff like that. Does she tell you how to do her? Faster, harder—that sort of thing?
Her face flushed even redder, though it didn’t seem possible. She knew how dirty her mouth got when she’d passed that certain point of arousal. Once she’d asked Tommy to come all over her face. He had refused, naturally. But it didn’t stop him describing the incident to Wakewood. She begged me to do it and I just couldn’t, he typed, while Wakewood put in a lovely
series of moans and exclamations of approval. She could almost hear Kieran’s voice again, through all of those letter Hs after each O. She could hear it in the word yeah and the word fuck and the words Jesus Christ. And all of them suggested a passion she hadn’t dared guess at. Of course she knew he was a horny bastard. Anyone could tell that. But this was different somehow. It seemed hungrier, more desperate, as though he was bound to the same stymied desire that governed her and Tommy. 33
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Go get her, he said again, though this time Tommy wasn’t so slow to answer. And if I do? What then?
Clearly he expected Wakewood to be flummoxed. But that only told her that he didn’t know Wakewood as well as she did. I’ll show you how easy it is to give her a pearl necklace, if she so badly wants one.
It made her hands shake, an answer like that. Not because it was rude—which it clearly was—but because it brought Kieran so close to them. It turned the computer screen to tissue paper, so thin that he could have punched through it with very little effort at all. And Tommy didn’t seem to be doing anything to stop it. He was in mortal danger and didn’t even realize it. Oh God, I can’t, he typed, but that was it. All Kieran had to do was simply slip in,
through the tissue paper door of resistance he’d put up.
Just get her on her knees. You don’t have to be rough—she’ll go easy. Get your hand in her hair, maybe tighten it a little until she can feel it. And then let your cock slide over her lips until they part—which they will—and once they do you can just push right in. You want to, right?
Tommy didn’t answer. He’d started breathing hard, and when she leaned in close she could hear his hand on his cock—not quite getting to a fast pace yet, but close. I know she wants to, Wakewood continued, but all she could think was how, how,
how? How did he know “she” wanted to? Because of course he was right. She couldn’t even think of any way around it. She wanted to get down on her knees and have Tommy stare down at her, cool as anything. And then just as she started to break and lean toward him, he’d press the slick tip of his cock to her lips and wait for her to open up. She didn’t think he’d have to wait long. She felt greedy just imagining it—the taste of him and the feel, so thick and hot and good. And maybe… Maybe while she sucked him she could put her hand over the swell of her sex—the way he’d described earlier. Just the heel of her palm over herself, pressing and rubbing until the tension thrumming through her broke. It had reached almost unbearable levels. She found herself just sort of touching herself in that area anyway—even without the safety net of Tommy’s awareness—and 34
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when she brushed something, when the material slid against the pouting outer edges of her sex… Oh it felt like an end to all the pain in the world. She sagged against the doorframe, everything in her saying resist resist resist. But Tommy wasn’t resisting and Kieran wasn’t resisting, so why should she have to? Kieran had written something even worse than he had five minutes ago. And then just cream all over her face, he’d put, which was undoubtedly the rudest
thing she’d ever read in her entire life. It made her body echo the sentiment, a new burst of liquid spreading down over her thighs and between the swollen lips of her sex. If Tommy saw her—if Tommy saw the mess she’d made of herself—she had no idea what he’d think or do. Her cheeks heated with a fresh bloom of shame, but when he actually said something aloud…when he threw caution to the wind and did more than just type or maybe moan or squirm in his seat…it drove her half-mad. He said, “Oh yes, I want to do that so badly.” And then she couldn’t stop herself from going to him. Of course she tried. Most of her wanted to run back to the bedroom the moment he spoke, and never come out of there again. But in the end, arousal won the day. Arousal and the sound of his voice and a great surge of need for him, just plain need, as bright and stark as any she’d ever felt. And oh God, just knowing that he felt the same way… Because he clearly did. He looked stunned to see her, but there was something else in his expression too. A lost sort of hunger, as though he’d stumbled to the kitchen and found it empty of all the things he’d expected to find there. And then he tried to speak, and that was no better than the plain greed written all over him. She couldn’t let him speak. It was obvious what he was going to say— something fumbling and apologetic, or even maybe outraged and horrified. None of those things fitted into what she most needed to happen next. She didn’t want outrage or apologies. She wanted to run her hands all over his big body—the way she’d so often fantasized about doing, when he wasn’t around to get weird about it— and then slowly sink to her knees in front of him. It was to his credit, she felt, that he didn’t try to stop her. His mouth hung open and his eyes remained as big as dinner plates, but he didn’t try to stop her. He just sat very still in his great, curved swivel chair, hands suddenly tight on the arms as though he desperately needed the support, waiting for her to do whatever it was she’d decided to do. In truth, she didn’t even know. Her mind had gone blank about thirty seconds ago, and all she could really feel was the slick, sweet ache between her legs. Whenever she moved—when she sank to the ground, when she nudged forward between his spread thighs—the lips of her sex slid against something too sensitive.
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And the sensation it provoked—that almost-on-the-edge-of-climax sensation— intensified the moment she saw how hard he’d gotten. She’d never seen him like it before. Of course she’d known—it was obvious that this thing going on with Kieran excited him more than their halfhearted attempts at lovemaking—but even so. It was a sight to see, close up. The head of his cock had grown thick and swollen. Liquid beaded at the tip, and when she dared to slide her hands up over his thighs that little droplet eased down over the stiff shaft. She couldn’t resist leaning forward, to taste it. And though she knew how close he was to stopping her—could feel the tension shivering through him, like a breath he’d held too long—she had to go one step further. He’d said it, after all. He’d said he wanted it. Now he had to take it. And all she had to do to ensure that happened was capture his hand in hers, and press it to the side of her head, and make him tighten his fist in her hair. It surprised her, how quickly he understood. How quickly he did it, in all honesty. She didn’t even have to squeeze his hand or play a quick game of charades with her head in his lap. Instead, she licked a hot, wet stripe the length of his gorgeous cock and felt him grasp a handful of her hair—like a reflex. The kind of reflex she sorely hoped he was going to repeat, often and with little restraint. Though when he did continue in that vein, when he didn’t balk or say the magic words I’m tired, she didn’t mind admitting how much it terrified her. His first words weren’t even a discussion or an explanation. They were just— “He wants to know what’s going on.” And then a deep and satisfying thrill joined the terror. He didn’t even sound all that ashamed about it. He knew she’d seen, and he understood that she didn’t need explanations, and now he wanted to test her out, it seemed. See what the reaction was to the whole scenario and his obvious excitement and oh Lord, he was rocking his hips. He’d actually started rocking his hips, so that every slow suck she offered him turned into something deeper and more exciting. She found herself groaning around his thick cock, torn between Kieran demanding to know what was happening and the feel of her husband, suddenly so excited he couldn’t stop himself from giving in. The hand in her hair felt like a vise. He was making noises too—little breathless pants that turned her to liquid. And then just as she thought he couldn’t possibly do anything more exciting than the mess of things he was already doing, he said, “Oh God, yeah, keep doing that.” She didn’t want to disobey him, but something burst through her when he spoke. When he said actual words during a sex act and didn’t seem to regret them. She could see he didn’t regret them, because when she broke off to look at his face he seemed just about flooded with sex, and nothing more.
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His eyes were glazed. His mouth still hung open, only this time when she looked his lips were slick, as though he’d run his tongue all over them as she ran her tongue all over his dick. It was quite possibly the most arousing thought she’d ever had. Her husband was not only enjoying the blowjob she’d decided to give him, he was kind of touching himself at the same time. And it was because of Kieran. She couldn’t deny it. Kieran had broken the dam and gotten through where she had failed. Kieran had made him open up like this, and she had to acknowledge that. “Tell him,” she said, and for just the barest moment she thought she’d gone too far. He could accept her knowing, and let her suck him off in just the way Kieran had described, but actually confronting that fact? Actually including her in this and letting things go further? No. He wouldn’t allow it. She even geared herself up to dole out some stern words in regard to the notion of him giving her “permission” for something. Only she didn’t get to dish them out. He just pushed forward until she felt almost sandwiched between his legs, then leaned over her to get at the keyboard. One hand still in her hair, the airy-but-sharp scent of him filling her up. And then the clatter of his fingers on the keys. Of course her mind immediately informed her of all the millions of dirty things he could have been typing, but none of them seemed quite right. And besides—the most likely suspect was obviously, I have to go now. With maybe a conciliatory, My wife is giving me a blowjob, on the end. She thought of Kieran’s face on hearing something like that and almost laughed, but then felt glad that she hadn’t because oh, Tommy was speaking. He was speaking, and he wasn’t giving her the football scores or an update on the weather or any of the other things he usually shared with her from the computer screen. “I’ve just told him that you’re…doing this,” he said, then seemed to pause and take a big breath. “How much more do you want me to share?” She thought of Kieran, peeling away all of her coy little euphemisms. All of her evasions, her hidden desires and secret shames. “Don’t say doing this. Tell me the words you’ve used. Tell me the actual words.” He moaned at that. A real despairing sound too—of the kind he’d given Kieran, when Kieran had asked too much of him. And for a second she balked. She considered taking it back, maybe saying he didn’t have to tell her if he didn’t want to. He didn’t have to share any of this or do any of this and everything could just go back to the way it was, no questions asked. But the second turned into another and then another, and the silence spooled out until finally, finally— “I’ve told him that you’ve got your mouth on my cock.”
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It thrilled through her to hear him say it. But there was another side effect she couldn’t have predicted—one that terrified as much as it aroused. It made her want to push harder, demand more. It made her greedy for him, all of him, and not even the hoarseness in his voice and the tightening of his hand in her hair could make her stop. “Now tell me what he’s said in reply. Read it to me—don’t leave anything out.” She couldn’t tell which was sweeter. That he hesitated, or that the hesitation was so short. “He says, Fuck yes. I told you. Is she hungry for…” His breath hitched in his throat. “For your cock?” Of course it wasn’t a surprise that Kieran took it all in stride. No, no—the surprise was Tommy. Tommy, who’d barely even let her touch his cock before right now, and yet couldn’t seem to stop pushing into the hand she’d kept on him. She couldn’t blame him, however. He’d started shuddering about five minutes ago, and when she ran her thumb over the slick slit at the tip of his cock, he shuddered harder. He’s about to go off. She started shuddering herself. “Tell him I am. Tell him I can’t wait for you to come in my mouth. I want to taste you, and then I want you to decorate me, make a mess of me—God, tell him all of those things.” It should have felt dishonest or disgusting, somehow, to share something with someone she knew. Someone that Tommy had no idea about. But instead all she could think of was how freeing it felt to have this kind of…buffer. It quickly became clear why Tommy enjoyed the whole scenario. It made things so…easy. No shame, no blame, no weirdness. “Fuuuccckk,” Tommy said. She’d never even heard him swear before. And then he typed. He typed everything she’d asked him to and more besides, because in the middle of doing so he informed her that Kieran wanted to know what it felt like. So she told him to go ahead and describe it, while she squirmed and turned and got close enough to suck the swollen head of his cock back into her mouth. He moaned loudly when she did so, so loudly she just about burst with glee, and all the while his fingers stayed on the keyboard, clicker-clacking away. Though that wasn’t the best of it—oh no. The best of it was the running commentary he kept up, as though he didn’t even need a push anymore. He actually wanted to share all of the things he’d never said to her before, as he laid them all out for Kieran. “Her mouth is incredibly hot,” he said, and then he changed it, he actually changed it! “I mean—your mouth is incredibly hot. It feels like you’re burning me, but I know it’s just because I’ve been turned-on for so long. I’m too close— I’m not even sure if I can… I can’t really…” 38
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He gasped just as she rubbed her tongue over that sweet little spot under the head. And then he did it again, louder this time, when she sucked hard enough to hollow her cheeks. “Uhhh, God. Oh that feels… It feels really good when you do that.” The most she’d ever heard him say during sex was, Please pass the condoms. And since they’d stopped using condoms three months ago, she’d been shit out of luck on that front for a good long while. But now…he didn’t even seem fazed by it. There were some hesitations, true, but there was also something so…diligent about his tone. As though he’d found himself in a weird meeting at work, and just had to wing it on a presentation no one had told him he was going to have to make. “Uh, he wants to know more about how it feels, so I’m telling him that—ah Jesus— you’re doing… You’re, uh, using your tongue, that you’re licking over the slit and stroking me with your hand at the same time and oh Lord. Bea— I’m gonna come. Bea, seriously.” She got the impression that he was giving her a warning. That he expected her to stop, once the idea of him spurting in her mouth entered the equation. But in that, at least, she didn’t mind disappointing him. He tasted so good and his hips wouldn’t stop rolling up at her, and when she rubbed over his stiff flesh he told her more, in a frantic, up-and-down sort of voice. “He says he’s coming all over his hand.” He paused then. Swallowed, hard. “He says he wishes he could be here, to cream in your mouth.” She closed her eyes tight and worked harder on her husband’s cock, taking as much of him as she could and then grasping for more when he touched the back of her throat. He squeezed a fistful of her hair and went taut all over, such lovely guttural sounds pouring out of him. And all of them blocked out the thought of Kieran doing whatever he was doing. Kieran knowing she was there, and coming over the thought of it. “Don’t stop, don’t stop,” Tommy moaned, and then she tasted the first thick spurt of his come. It filled her mouth, hot and salt-sweet—so good she didn’t want to give it up. But there was one last thing, one last little treat she wanted more than any of the rest of it, and for once it took so little to get it. She simply forced him back in the chair and he went as willing as anything. He didn’t even try to stop her when she slid her hand down over his stiff shaft, stroking and stroking until he groaned and shuddered and spilled the rest of the silky fluid all over her face and throat. It was only after he’d made such a filthy mess of her that he looked ashamed. But that was okay. It was fine, because after the barest moment of shame something else happened—something amazing and wonderful and so easy to join in with. He laughed, and she couldn’t help doing the same.
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Chapter Four She would have been disturbed by his awkwardness—he avoided talking, and she could tell by the way he chewed on that one nail and flicked through the TV channels without seeing any of the programs that he’d reached some sort of freak-out stage. But fortunately, the freak-out stage was somewhat alleviated by the frantic sex they’d had, only minutes earlier. She’d thought everything was over—they had gone about their business in a new, weird, polite sort of way. He’d cleaned himself up and she’d cleaned herself up and then they had climbed into bed as though nothing had ever happened. Only then he’d grabbed her quite suddenly, hands dragging over all the places she most wanted to feel him. It had shocked her, how quickly his touch had tugged her back into that sizzling space of too-far-gone—though not as much as it shocked her to feel him so desperate again. He hadn’t even waited for an answer. No polite inquiries as to whether she was ready or not. No waiting for her to spread her legs and offer her still-embarrassinglyslick cunt. He just climbed on top and slid in, fingers leaving marks on her thighs and her arse. No words this time, but by that point she didn’t need them anymore. The memory of him moaning and telling her not to stop proved enough, as he pounded into her and looked down on her with new eyes. He saw her clear for the first time, and that was all it took. She’d climaxed fiercely, pussy clenching tight around his still-working cock, her entire body blazing and blazing and oh she hadn’t wanted to let him go. Even now—in the middle of this weird awkwardness—she could recall exactly how he’d felt lying on top of her. His body all slick with perspiration, great breaths running through him like a piston still pumped somewhere deep inside his chest. And then the various memories of her deceit and Kieran’s intrusion prickled through her and crowded that lovely, glowy sensation back out again. “Hon?” she started, but wasn’t sure what should follow, exactly. Beginning with, It’s cool that you did that sounded childish. I’m really sorry but I kind of know who Wakewood is sounded like some terrible admission of cheating guilt. Neither were places she wanted to go. “Yeah?” She couldn’t see anything but the curve of his big, solid back. And occasionally a glimpse of his hand as it moved to his mouth. “You okay?” 40
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“Awesome,” he said. Of course he did. He’d tell her he was awesome after having a finger cut off. “Because you know, none of what just happened is a big deal.” Both patronizing and untrue. Good going, Bea! She winced and tried to pull it together. Reached for his shoulder, then drew back at the last second like a dumbarse. Only then he said, “Yeah. I know.” In a perfectly calm, reasonable sort of voice. Which just made her unsure about everything. Had that laugh been for real? Did he honestly not mind all that much? And if so, why was he rifling through ten million programs as if he just wanted to put his entire life on fast-forward? Probably because he did actually want to put his life on fast-forward. “I’m still waiting for you to be upset or weirded out about it though.” She did put a hand on his back this time. “You really think that’s a possibility?” “I don’t know. Sometimes I think I don’t know you at all.” Of course she wanted to deny it immediately. He did know her. He knew what she liked best for breakfast, and understood when she was cranky or happy. He always bought her amazing presents for birthdays and Christmas, because he knew all the things she liked best in the world. But try as she might, she couldn’t get away from one glaring problem with this assessment. He didn’t know her—he could never know her—because she’d hidden something from him. She still hid it now, in the middle of this conversation that required the utmost trust. “Tommy, I…” She took a deep breath. “I can’t be angry. Or weirded out. Or anything like that. Because…I think maybe that I kind of sort of know who—” “You know who I’ve been talking to. Right?” The words she’d been trying to say smashed together inside her, then fell in a steaming pile of wreckage to the pit of her stomach. How could they not? They didn’t serve any purpose anymore. He already knew. He knew she had some sort of weird flirtation going on with someone. He knew, he knew, he knew, and oh this was going to go terribly. “I…yes. I think so. It’s this guy at work and…and I don’t like him, I mean— I haven’t done anything with him. I don’t want to do anything with him, not ever, but I think maybe he’s kind of messing with you or something, I—” “He’s not messing with me. He’s told me everything. Who he is, how many of his advances you’ve turned down, how much he wants you. His name’s Kieran, right? Kieran Murphy.” He paused while she absorbed the blow. Then said, quite flatly, “Are you mad now?” She thought of that word—mad. It implied lots of vigorous action, she felt. Lots of tearing at stuff and screaming and maybe some rending of flesh. But nothing in her
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wanted to rend flesh, exactly. She just wanted to sit very still for a moment and not think about anything at all. “Please say something,” he said after a while, but she couldn’t think of anything to add to the discussion. All this time, and they’d been sort of…tricking her. She’d agonized and tortured herself, and all along they’d known. They could have talked about anything, when she really thought about it. The conversation she and Kieran had had, that day by the bike stands. How raw she’d felt afterward, and how low—and he’d just told Tommy everything about it. Maybe even taunted him a little about it. Though when she really thought about it, it didn’t seem as though any taunting had gone on. She couldn’t ignore those four strange and almost comforting words, after all. Advances you’ve turned down. God, he’d used the term advances. It hadn’t just been her imagination. He really had been coming on to her all this time, though she couldn’t exactly give herself the credit Kieran seemed to have done. Turned down implied a fierce and unyielding resistance to everything he was, and she wasn’t even sure if she had that in her. If he’d tried to kiss her, or touch her, or really shoved up the charm to factor eleven, could she still have said no? Definitely. Though the real question remained—did Tommy know that? “Nothing would ever have happened between us.” He turned, and his expression wasn’t half as bad as she’d feared. At the most, he looked wistful. “I know.” “Did you also know that I was watching you? Did he tell you what I’d said, about…us?” “Some of it.” She put her hands in her hair, briefly. Took a few deep breaths. “Man he’s an arsehole.” “But I didn’t know you were watching. Did he tell you to do that? He said he’d suggested that you join us, but…” So that was why Tommy hadn’t immediately freaked out! How it all made sense now. Except for the parts where it didn’t. “He didn’t tell me to do it. He just…‘suggested’ that I find out what you were getting up to. Sex-wise. Which I guess he already knew, the gigantic arsehole.” Tommy rolled his shoulders. Looked both exasperated and relieved at the same time. “He isn’t a gigantic arsehole. He’s a good guy—and he’s cool. Cooler than I’ll ever be.” She had to give him a little sock on the shoulder for that one.
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“Hey—you’re cool.” She gave him a shake, just for good measure. “See, this is why he’s a gigantic arsehole. Because he’s making you think you’re not cool.” “It’s okay, hon. I’m not sad about it. I mean, I know you’re attracted to him but—” “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Let’s just hold up right there. I’m not attracted to him.” He did more than turn and look over his shoulder this time. He actually moved around on the bed until he faced her, and raised some eyebrow while he was at it. Clearly, he’d seen what Kieran looked like. Which didn’t give her the opportunity to do much, aside from maybe spreading her hands and confessing all. “Yeah, okay. It’s possible that I’m a little tiny bit attracted to him,” she got out, all in a rush and with too much breathing in between. But he didn’t look the least bit perturbed. He looked intent, instead, and maybe sort of…smoldering. She’d never really thought about him as the type of person who smoldered, but he’d done it twice in the last hour or so. More than twice, in fact. And even though it made no sense, it felt good. Reassuring, somehow. “But being attracted to someone doesn’t mean anything. When you love someone, that means something. Love comes above anything else,” she added, and now he looked perturbed. His breath caught somewhere low down in his throat, and she rushed on just to keep it moving. Just to keep him breathing. “And I love you. No one else. No matter what he’s told you about me or how many conversations I’ve had with him, it doesn’t change the fact that I love only you.” Relief washed over his face and he took her hand, but all it made her think was, What have they spoken about? She could just see Kieran now, smoking and leering and telling her husband how hot to trot she was for another man. “I know. I mean, I knew. He’s never tried to tell me otherwise, you know?” Even though Kieran clearly hadn’t done that. He’d had the chance, but he hadn’t done it. Why? Why? “Good. Because I want to know everything about you and what you want, secretly—even the stuff you think you can’t tell me—but I’d never do anything to hurt you.” He let out a long breath, and once it was done she just had to hug him. How long had he felt this way, how long had he worried about it? She didn’t know, and wasn’t sure she wanted to find out. Instead she just put her arms around him and squeezed, hard. So hard that he laughed after a moment, and oh it felt almost as good as when he’d done it in the study. It made her tone firm and filled her with conviction. “I’d never do anything with Kieran. Never.” Why would she want to, when she had this guy right here? Her big, handsome guy and all of his mixed-up-crazy secrets. How long had he been talking to Kieran, exactly?
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She couldn’t even imagine. And when she tried to picture how they’d first started talking, the whole image of the thing got even more blurry. Kieran approached him in some chat room, and just came right out with it. Hi, I’m Kieran, and your wife looks kind of sexually unsatisfied. Want to talk about it? she thought. But thankfully, she didn’t have to think about it for long. Mainly because Tommy then said, sort of quietly and with a note of terror in his voice, “What if I want you to do something with him?” Seven revelations in one night were enough. Eight just felt like overkill. And though rationally she knew there hadn’t been anything even close to seven during the course of this conversation, it kind of seemed that way. She kept going hot and then cold again. Her palms seemed as sweaty as they had in the study. And though it felt good to have so many things out in the open, it also felt kind of like she’d woken up that morning to a stranger in her bed. Some insane stranger, who wanted her to have sex with another man. “You can’t be serious.” Yes. Yes. That was the way to do it. Make a strong statement that questioned his mental health. Doing so would obviously take the panicked look from his gorgeous face. “I…well…here’s the thing…” “Is the thing that you want me to fuck another man? Because that’s what the thing sounded like. Jesus, Tommy! You know I’ve been going out of my mind over all of this? Thinking some guy is fucking with me and fucking with you and oh Lord I just don’t know if I can keep processing all of this and still be totally calm.” “You don’t seem calm.” “I’m not calm. You just told me you want me to fuck someone else!” He rolled his shoulders, again. Like a squirm, only much more manly. “I kind of thought that was every woman’s fantasy.” “Every woman’s fantasy is to fulfill her husband’s cuckolding dream?” This time he did more than roll his shoulders. He threw up his hands and pushed back on the bed, as though he suddenly needed to get away from her. Not a good start. “I don’t want to be…that. I don’t want you to fuck him, for God’s sake.” “Really? Because it sure sounded like you did.” The shoulder rolling and the trying to get away stopped. But the hand punching and teeth gritting were only just getting started. “I don’t want you to take him into the supply closet and fuck him over a stack of paper boxes, okay? That’s not what I’m saying. I don’t even know what I’m saying. You started this conversation!”
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She gestured wildly, but none of said gestures seemed to actively sum up how incredulous she now felt. “I started this conversation?” “Well, you’re always wanting to talk. About things. So let’s talk.” “Fine.” “Okay.” Folding her arms across her chest seemed like a good move. It spoke of confidence, and surety, and a firm resolve to uncover all of his dirty thoughts at last. He wanted to give it? She was going to take it. “So you don’t want him to fuck me. Maybe you want to fuck him.” Unfortunately, her first attempt at “taking it” ended up with him going big-eyed while her head filled up with an assortment of pornographic images. She could almost see Kieran holding her big husband down—maybe with just one hand on the nape of his neck—and the idea was not unpleasant at all. Kieran was so slight, so sinewy, but she knew without a shadow of a doubt that Tommy would give it up to him. The thought made her mouth water. And maybe other things watered too. “I— I don’t— No, that’s not…” She shrugged. “You’re in your study every night, talking dirty with a man. What else am I supposed to think?” He made a supremely exasperated sound. The one he reserved for board games and soufflés that hadn’t risen. “We’ve been together for over two years and you think I’m gay? I’m not gay. I just can’t…ask for things! That’s all it is. I can’t ask, and he can.” “You seem to be doing okay right now.” “Doing okay at what?” “Asking.” He set his mouth into a thin, mean line. She’d seen him do it before—usually when he wanted to be mad but could only manage amused. “I’m not asking for you to fuck him. Or asking permission for him to fuck me.” He shook his head and glanced away—still with that half-amused look on his face. “Weird, that this conversation isn’t going half as badly as I thought it would.” She let her cross-armed, firm stance position slip a bit. “How did you think it was going to go?” “With you taking a vow of silence and leaving to live in a nunnery?” She couldn’t help it. Her eyes just had to roll for something like that. “He said you thought of me as some pure little virgin. Did he tell you the same thing, by any chance?” “He might have done.” 45
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“And you want to have sex with this person?” He lunged for her before she had the chance to finish the laugh she’d started, and then his hands were on her. Tickling the little sensitive spots behind her knees and just above her hips, and refusing to give in when she screamed in protest. Only for the first time ever the silly fooling around and his body over hers—it didn’t feel frustrating. It felt like a relief, as though the world had tipped upside down and everything that had once driven her mad now brought a giddy sort of joy. Even if the tickling didn’t lead to the thing she’d so often hoped for, it didn’t matter. Because she’d gotten her fill only half an hour earlier. He’d fucked her like a maniac, and let her blow him without a murmur of protest, and now here they were, actually talking about sex things. More than just sex things. Insane sex things. “I’m so crazy about you,” he said once she’d finally gotten him to let up. He looked breathless, and flushed, and oh yeah. He was definitely hard again. “Then trust me. You can tell me anything. You can ask me for anything. I’m not a nun. I like sex.” “I know.” He took a breath. Seemed to search for what he needed to say for a second. “It’s all me, you know. It’s just the way I am. I think I was just a late bloomer or something, because everyone in college seemed to be fucking everyone else, and I just… I’ve never really…” She kissed him then. He needed a kiss. “Plus there was all that ‘sex is bad’ from my crazy mother. You know. Might have had something to do with it.” And then maybe another kiss. Bigger this time. When she broke away she felt as heated as he suddenly looked—though something still pressed on her, even so. “You can talk to me about this stuff, you know. I mean, I understand that Kieran’s real easy to talk to but—” “It’s more than him being easy to talk to, Bea. It’s like he…just knows. And he homes in on the thing you want most—he doesn’t even seem to try.” She thought of his eyes like glaciers, burning right under her skin. The way he always seemed to say what she’d been thinking, before the words even came out of her mouth. Most of her now suspected he’d gotten half of it from Tommy—wheedled out information from him, played them both like the devil playing a fiddle. But most of her also knew that this wasn’t the case. He just had a knack for it. He just understood people and their desires. “So what is it you want him to try to do, huh? What is the thing you want from him, and from me?” He paused then. One hand in her hair, stroking and stroking and soothing. His expression flitting from wary to relieved to desirous, and back again. 46
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“I want us all to talk, together. Properly,” he said finally. Funny how talk sounded so much like fuck in this brand-new light they’d found themselves in.
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Chapter Five She didn’t know what pissed her off more. That he avoided her all morning and well into the afternoon, or that he didn’t even bother to deny that he’d done so. He just came right out with it, the moment she managed to corner him in the copy room. “I’m going to just assume right now that he’s told you,” he said, bold as brass. Bolder than brass. Brass didn’t begin to cover the extent to which he was bold. A giant horned animal covered in gold and diamonds would have more aptly described his level of absolute audaciousness. And then he put his hand on his hip and shrugged. “Are you furious? I’m going to guess furious.” She wondered if fury had ever rendered anybody mute. “You look furious. But you know, don’t be furious at him. He’s a real nice guy. Just a total sweetheart—” “Don’t tell me what my husband is like, Kieran. And that goes double if you’re going to mock him.” He raised an eyebrow. She couldn’t tell if that was to his credit or not. “So that’s what you think’s going on. I’m making fun of him. He’s six-foot-five and he looks like Hercules, but I’m making fun of him. Should I climb on a stepladder to do it?” “You sound jealous.” “I am jealous. Did it really take you so long to figure that out? I’m mad with jealousy. It’s lucky, really, that he is such a sweetheart. Because if he’d been a total bastard I would have taken him down like nothing you’ve ever seen.” She almost took a step back when he spat the last few words out. They emerged fierce and reckless sounding—but that wasn’t the problem. No. It was his eyes, flashing bright and burning. The way he bared his teeth, like an animal just waiting for its chance to run some helpless creature down. She hoped to God Tommy wasn’t the helpless creature in this scenario. And the hope made her ask, she had to ask. “Why did you do this crazy thing? Just…why?” Again with the shrug. She could have killed his left shoulder. “I mean, some of the stuff you said…” Her eyes got big without even meaning for them to. But he didn’t shrug this time. He even managed to look a little bit embarrassed, possibly. Or at least, she thought so
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until he said, “Me and your husband make the perfect tag team. He’s got shame coming out of his eyeballs and I’ve got none at all.” “You’re disgusting.” “Never claimed to be otherwise,” he said, but this time she knew it was something other than a blasé casualness about it all, on his handsome face. He winced—or he did what passed for a wince in his catalogue of non-expressions—and she caught it. And he looked as though he knew she’d caught it too. “Look, I can’t help the way I am. I got talking to him about something else, okay? He emailed me one day about some computer thing—you’d mentioned I worked in IT and I guess I seemed like as good a person to ask as any. It was nothing at all, just some harmless chatter, and then we started IMing about it and maybe he mentioned something innocently about your underwear and things just snowballed. They have a habit of snowballing with me. My mam used to call me The Confessional because people just spill their guts when I’m around.” It was awful, but she wanted more than anything to laugh then. Only the sensible, still-furious part of her brain kept her face straight. “It was a little more than Tommy spilling his guts to you.” “Well…” he started, and she could see he was going to try wheedling out of it. She couldn’t allow that. She didn’t feel half as angry as he seemed to think she was, but still. No wheedling permitted. “For God’s sake, Kieran. I saw you asking him all that shit—and not just the dirty stuff either. I mean, why did you keep asking about what I look like? You know what I look like. He knows you know what I look like!” “Did that come across as creepy?” “It did once I knew you were both perfectly aware of who you were discussing things with.” “How about now? Less creepy since we’ve talked?” “More creepy. Creepy to the power of a million.” “Would it help if I told you that I just like picturing you sleeping?” She rolled her eyes and threw the nearest thing that came to hand. Luckily for him it was just the small pile of spare paper by the copier, and not the copier itself. “All right, all right!” he said, and when he grinned she couldn’t help mirroring it. “You want the real explanation? I just like hearing him talk about you. He describes you the way I’d describe you, if I was as good with words as he is.” He sounded so sincere, but weirdly sincerity only made her want to slide away from his suddenly intense gaze. She could feel those words itching under her skin, burrowing deep, to the place reserved only for Tommy. “Are you fucking with me, Kieran?” she asked, because that seemed like the safest thing to do. He had to be fucking with her in some way. After all, Kieran was good with
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words. And even if he hadn’t have been, she doubted he’d want to waste time thinking up better ones for her. “Does it seem like I’m fucking with you?” She wished she hadn’t used the word fucking. “Sort of.” “If I’d wanted to fuck with you or him I could have just kept on, waiting for my chance to slip in and cut you free of him.” “Are you trying to take him down, Kieran? Because I gotta tell you, admitting that is not endearing me to you.” “I think you’ve just answered your own question.” “Really? Because—” “I’d never do anything to hurt such a cool guy, but more than that, I’d never do anything to make me less endearing in your eyes. I’d never do anything to hurt you.” He leaned in close suddenly, and she just couldn’t bear it. His eyebrows had drawn together in the middle of his forehead. Like something had actually…bothered him. And his eyes didn’t look still and emotionless anymore. They looked… She didn’t even want to think about what they looked like. Her heart was pounding in her teeth again. A weird trip to the dentist was definitely in the cards. And things only got worse when she thought about what she’d been sent to ask him. Or not sent exactly—more like they’d decided together that she would ask him to come over and maybe… Talk. “You’ve been a better friend to me than anyone I’ve ever known,” he said. “And sometimes when I look at you I feel as though I’m drowni—” She blurted it out quickly, before he could finish the rest of those awful, awful sentences. The ones that were making her knees turn to jelly and her brain turn to mush and oh Lord, why did he think he needed better words? He had great ones, all of his own. Whereas she just had, “We were thinking that maybe you could come over for dinner some time!” Her tone was so bright and loud and falsely cheery she came close to vomiting.
***** She could see him from where she was standing, when she leaned back against the kitchen counter. He’d taken up residence on the couch, one arm spread over its back, naturally. All of the rest of him taking up as much space as was humanly possible. Only one word described him perfectly—louche. Like some decadent Lord of the Manor, surveying the scene with a bored yet faintly amused eye.
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It made her want to go out there and tell him this had all been a terrible mistake. He had to go, and she had to get a new job. Immediately. Somewhere far, far away from him. And then Tommy came into the kitchen to get drinks, and suddenly she had other things to worry about. Things like her husband looking all twitchy and sweaty palmed, before saying things like, “I feel as though he’s almost definitely here for a threesome.” She had to check to see if she’d misheard. And after it became clear that she hadn’t, something broke inside her. His sweaty palms became her sweaty palms. His nervous, wild-eyed twitching became her nervous, wild-eyed twitching. She actually found herself flapping at him. “Just…just don’t say the word threesome, okay?” Her voice sounded panicked, even to her ears. Though she had precious little idea as to why. Shouldn’t he be the nervous one? “What other word do you want me to use? I hate to break it to you, honey, but we’re in a threesome. I didn’t masturbate until the age of thirty-eight but even I know that.” He wasn’t the nervous one. He was saying things she’d never imagined him talking about in a million years instead. “You’re not even thirty-eight now. Tommy, stop being a goof, okay? This is serious. He’s…like…a panther. I’m a gazelle. You’re a gazelle who didn’t masturbate until he hit an age that’s past the one he’s at right at this moment. You don’t know what he’s like!” God, how she wished that sounded more rational than it actually ended up being. Somehow she’d said things about panthers and gazelles, even though panthers and gazelles probably didn’t live on the same continent. And she’d started unwrapping some dips too, despite the insanity of serving food in this situation. She’d asked him over for dinner, but nobody thought dinner was actually going to take place. Not even Tommy, apparently. “His dad passed away when he was four.” “What?” “He ran away from home and supported himself by stealing cigarettes from offlicenses and selling them for twice the price to other school kids.” She couldn’t figure out what he was rambling about. But then, even the cellophane on the dips was proving a challenge. It shouldn’t have been a surprise that holding a conversation about boyhood hijinks had her flummoxed. “When did this become Oliver Twist? Are you serious?” “I’m just saying. I probably know more about him than you do.” Ah, now it made sense. Even if nothing else did.
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“Yeah, you know that he’s the Artful Dodger. Is the Artful Dodger really trustworthy and kind and safe to have a threesome with?” “The Artful Dodger was a kid. They’d put me on a registry if I had a threesome with him.” She actually had to pause and stare at him then. When had he turned into this person, exactly? He looked all hopped up on goofballs and he’d started acting as though he was hopped up on goofballs, and she couldn’t for the life of her think how to rein him back in and make him calmer than this. Her mouth attempted it. But mainly her mouth just came up with, “Just shut up, shut up, he’s watching—shut up. Take the dip through.” He rolled his eyes in response and took the offered tray of sour cream and chives, thousand island, red hot salsa. They didn’t even have any chips to go with them, but what the hell. In for a mad penny, in for a mad pound. “I have no idea why we’re having dip,” he said as he disappeared into the living room. As though everything was just so easy. But then when she really thought about it, this had been that easy for Tommy. He was the one who’d sparked up these underwear-based conversations with Kieran. He’d done the dirtiest things possible, while she hung back and pretended not to see. And though that idea startled her, it couldn’t be denied. Tommy was the brave one. She was just… Terrified. “Are you coming in here or what?” Kieran called after a moment, as though they’d all suddenly found themselves in the dressing rooms at Marks and Spencer’s. Now he and Tommy were just waiting for her to emerge, in that nice cream twin set she’d tried on. “Just a second,” she said, but there wasn’t a second to be had. She could hear them murmuring together, even now. They were probably discussing all sorts of things she desperately wanted to know about, like how far they could push things tonight. And this suspicion only deepened when she walked in the room, and both of them snapped a look to her. “At last,” Kieran said. “I was starting to think you’d died in there.” She had no clue how he could be so casual. She couldn’t even cross the floor and sit down. After all, sitting down would mean she’d have to choose a place to sit, and the only one available happened to be right next to Kieran. Would it look as though she’d hung her hat on him if she took up that place on the sofa? She eyed the arm of Tommy’s chair wistfully, but sitting there would almost certainly make her look nervous and strange. Everything’s cool. No one’s going to mind if you sit next to Kieran.
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Unfortunately, the thought only seemed sturdy and sound until she actually did it. Once she’d sat herself down—almost in the crook of Kieran’s arm but not quite—he took it as his cue to say, “Well, what are you waiting for? Go sit on his cock.” She bristled from head to toe the moment he said it. And it wasn’t just the words either. It was the way he said them, so matter-of-fact and almost amused. She could feel him looking at her too, eyes wandering all over one side of her face until she just wanted to shove him or call all of this off. Instead, she stayed frozen until he spread his hands as though to say, It weren’t me, guv’nor, and said, “What? Come on now. We all know I didn’t come over here to partake of some cucumber sandwiches and a nice pot of tea.” She forced herself to glance at him. It didn’t help to find him looking so amused and intense all at the same time. Amusement and intensity just weren’t a good combination. They made him seem like an evil genius. “What did you come over here for then?” she asked, though she knew. Everyone knew. Next door knew. “Do I really have to spell it out?” he asked, and when she answered, so did Tommy. They spoke at almost exactly the same time—her first and then her husband. “Yes.” “No.” Kieran laughed. With sound. “One yes, one no. Give it thirty seconds and you’ll probably switch sides, am I right?” He brushed her arm with his hand—the one that she’d sat too close to. Any more and he really would have an arm around her, and then what? “Look—you’re both as nervous as the other. That much is plain. She blushes when I use the word cock, for Christ’s sake. And you, my man…well. I know you’re just itching to talk through me.” Tommy nodded. She couldn’t fathom why. Because Kieran had hit the nail on the head? Kieran always hit nails on the head. It didn’t mean you had to agree with him. You could lie and tell him not to hug you, if you really wanted to. Before anything that might make you lose yourself happened. “I mean, that’s what I’m here for, isn’t it?” he asked. He’d started rubbing her arm now. Just a light touch, on the exposed skin beneath the short sleeve of her blouse. “To give you both a bit of…direction.” She swallowed thickly. Tried not to look at him, but pictured his gorgeous face anyway. Those eyes, God, those eyes like a winter sky. “And if you’ve changed your minds…if maybe you think I’m intruding in some way—” he started, but Tommy cut in. Sharp as a tack and twice as sure sounding. “No,” he said, and this time she bristled hard enough to clack her teeth together. She shot a look at him, just to try to figure that no out. Was it a no that really meant yes? Yes, you are intruding, please go?
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She couldn’t tell. He looked too peaceful—as though Kieran had slipped something in his drink only a moment earlier. “So what are we waiting for then? Go on over there, Bea. Go see if he likes you in his lap.” She turned to examine Kieran now. But he just seemed spark-eyed and too sure of himself, in a way that turned her legs to water. Her clit pulsed once, insistently. And that was before he decided to push a hand through her hair. After he’d done it, the whole area pulsed. And other things happened too—all equally involuntary. Her nipples stiffened beneath the too-thin material of her blouse, and for the longest moment she couldn’t take her eyes off him. He had such a commanding presence, even when he looked as though he wanted to melt right through her body. “Unless you want to tell me I’m intruding,” he said, which should have made him seems less sure. It should have put a dampener on things, or forced her to think of backing out again. But instead, she thought of him holding a door open for her, like a gentleman. Go through if you want to, this thoughtful Kieran said. We don’t have to do this if you don’t want it. “No,” she said, just as Tommy had. Because like Tommy, she was in thrall to Kieran Murphy. “So go on then. Go to your husband,” he said, and that just made everything sweeter. Softer. Finer. Her legs were still shaking when she stood, however. And when she got to Tommy, for a second she struggled to get the thing done. There wasn’t a lot of space on the chair and she had to sort of put her knee— “No, no. Panties off first.” She jerked and Tommy put a hand on her hip as though to steady her, while Kieran rattled off instructions. “Really,” he said. “Do I have to go over everything? I’d thought you’d know to take your underwear off, Bea.” She flushed, but that was okay too. Tommy still had a hand on her. She didn’t have to think too much about another man telling her to bare her pussy. She just had to reach up under her skirt and tug the elastic down, hurriedly, while Kieran’s eyes burned into her back and Tommy swallowed too thickly and the air in the room grew hotter, hotter. “In a rush, are we?” Kieran asked, and she would have hated him for it if the embarrassed heat that spread through her body hadn’t felt so damn good. Somehow, his mildly amused talk was making her wet. And she got wetter when he said, “Lift your skirt.”
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Of course, she knew why he was saying it. He wanted to see her clearly. But it still proved hard to actually perform the deed—to actually clasp the hem and lift, and know that he could see the bare curve of her arse. And then when she let Tommy tug her toward him, when she put her knees on either side of him and came so close to rubbing against his still-clothed groin, she knew Kieran could see more than just her backside. She had her legs spread. Tommy wanted to kiss her, and she had to lean forward to do it. Which only meant one thing— Kieran could see her slippery slit. He could see all of it, and didn’t seem shy about pointing a thing like that out. “Ohhh that’s lovely. Do you want to know what she looks like from here, Tommy?” She closed her eyes and tried not to think of too many possible descriptions. Wet. I look wet. But he didn’t say that. “She looks so swollen and ready. Like she’s just aching to come. Is that how you feel, Bea?” Her clit felt swollen—she knew that much. It ached when Kieran spoke, and it ached when Tommy fumbled with his fly and the moment he finally pulled his cock free she couldn’t help it. She simply had to reach down and rub the thick head of it against her little bud. “Jesus,” Tommy said, and his head went back. He didn’t have to worry though. Kieran was only too happy to pick up the slack. “Is she wet?” he asked while her clit kissed and slid against Tommy’s cock. The consequent blast of sensation that went through almost took her out. “Check to see if she’s wet enough to take you.” She didn’t know what was more arousing about him talking like that. The tone, or the dirty words, or the fact that Tommy responded immediately. “She is. I can feel her all over me.” “You sure?” Kieran asked, and she knew it then. This was the question—the one that stood between I’ll just sit here and be a filthy puppet-master and I’ll join in. It made her shudder all over, but Tommy… Oh Tommy just took it in stride. “Come and see for yourself,” he said. And then he tugged her down and kissed her hard enough to bruise. He carried on too as Kieran walked toward her. Of course she couldn’t see him doing the walking, but she could hear him. And after a moment she could feel him, pressing soothing hands down over her back. In a way, she was glad he didn’t just go for it. It would have been too much, too rude, and a bit of stroking beforehand helped. As did Tommy’s mouth, pressing hard and slick to hers. Tommy’s tongue, sliding and flickering and generally being much dirtier than it was usually.
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He’d almost started moaning into her mouth by the time Kieran ran one firm hand over her arse. And when he found the cleft between—when he actually slid a couple of fingers through that groove—she had to moan back. Though said moan sort of paled in comparison to the one she let out when he suddenly pushed two fingers into her cunt. He didn’t do it tentatively. He simply plunged right in, so sudden it made her buck. Tommy’s hands clenched at her sides, but it wasn’t Tommy’s hands she was thinking about. It was Kieran’s hands—the one he had in her hair and the one he had in her pussy—and how he touched her in long, languorous strokes. And of course, there was the way he spoke too. “Oh she’s soaking,” he said, which was mortifying enough on its own. But then he added, “Keep rubbing his cock against your clit.” At which point she thought she might faint. Kieran had two fingers inside her and Tommy was rubbing and rutting against everything else, and just when she thought it couldn’t get any sweeter, someone was unbuttoning her blouse. It felt slightly weird to have to check exactly who it was. But the sensation passed when the material was spread open and rough hands shoved at the cups of her bra. Kieran, she thought, simply because the touch quickly became a curious fondle. He squeezed and cupped and finally tugged at a nipple until she moaned too loudly and pressed too hard against Tommy and felt almost certain she was going to come. The certainty grew stronger when Kieran ordered Tommy to lick one stiff point. He didn’t even hesitate—he just leaned forward and drew a long, wet line over the taut peak, then held her tight while she shuddered and gasped and begged them both to go faster. “What exactly is it you want faster?” Kieran asked, because he was a maddening bastard. He slowed his fingers in her slick cunt, and somehow got Tommy to slow down too, and then he simply waited for her to answer or perish from lust. “Your…” she started, then considered. How bad did it sound, to declare that she wanted Kieran’s fingers fucking and rubbing inside her? “I…” “You’re going to have to do better than that. Or I could just guess for you.” “I want you to finger me faster,” she blurted, but nope—it still wasn’t good enough. “Really? Sure you don’t want that big fat cock inside you?” She moaned then. Couldn’t be helped. He kept saying things like cock and inside you and—really. Who could have expected more from her? “I think you do. Why don’t we turn you around, and then you get nice and filled and I get a lovely view. What do you say?” She couldn’t say anything. Words had failed her five minutes ago. Instead of forming sentences, she simply sagged against Tommy and waited for Kieran to do his worst. Which he duly did. 56
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He lifted her—actually lifted her—off her husband and turned her as easily as Tommy would have done. And once he’d accomplished that he waited for her to do as he’d asked. It proved a struggle. For a start, Tommy couldn’t seem to hold still. The moment she grasped his slick cock in her hand, his entire body bucked and he breathed a great choking gasp into the nape of her neck. And then there was the slight problem of how wound-up she’d become. So woundup, in fact, that when she tried to press the head of his cock to her pussy, she couldn’t quite seem to work it in. Her body had clenched tightly shut, and even if it hadn’t she knew Tommy was going to come any second. Any second, and he’d be spurting all over the folds of her spread sex. The one that Kieran was currently staring at as though he’d taken leave of his senses. “You’re beautiful,” he said, and for a second she felt sure he was making fun. People just didn’t stare at vaginas then proclaim someone beautiful. The whole concept sounded mad, completely mad, until he did it and then it just seemed… Tender, somehow. “Go slowly,” he said, and that sounded tender too. She could see him watching her carefully, so carefully, his glacial eyes taking in every little movement Tommy made. And she couldn’t deny that she found it arousing—not just the idea of him examining her sex as it spread around so thick a shaft, but the thought of him devouring Tommy’s flesh with his gaze. When she looked down, she could see almost the same thing he could. The broad head of her husband’s cock, pressed tight to her clenching pussy. The way it slid in all the slippery liquid she’d produced before finally, oh finally, sinking in. She moaned when it actually happened. Long and joyous and only beaten by the noise Tommy made, at exactly the same time. He sounded hoarse and half-done in, and when she rolled her hips around that thick, solid sensation of being opened and taken, he lifted his. Pushed in deeper. Caught her off guard and almost made her fall headfirst into Kieran. It didn’t matter though. He had a hand on her before she even knew she wanted one. He cradled her head, stroked through her hair, made her look at him. And then after a long moment of watching Tommy push slowly in and out of her cunt, Kieran dragged his gaze to hers. Spoke in a rough, lust-thickened voice. “Is it good?” he asked, and she had no choice but to answer. It aroused her just to hear his voice, just to have him demand something of her in the middle of all this. And if she was any judge of her husband at all, it aroused him too. His hips snapped up, that thick cock rubbing maddeningly against the bundle of nerves inside her. And he gasped, he gasped so loud and long. He’d spent his life being silent—now it seemed he couldn’t shut up.
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“Amazing,” she burst out, though she knew that one word didn’t adequately describe the sensation. “Does he feel big inside you?” “Immense.” “You want to come on his cock?” “Ohhhh God yes.” “Do it harder then. Fuck yourself on him.” His words were irresistible. They made her want to reach out and grab something, but the only thing to grab were Kieran’s arms, and she couldn’t have that. Not just yet. Everything was just too mixed up inside her, too rude and uncertain. And besides, leaning back meant she could get her hands on the arms of the chair, and that helped. Oh God, it helped a lot. Before she’d even meant to do it, she found herself bouncing roughly on his cock. And he was breathing hard too—right on the nape of her neck—his body shaking beneath the pressure of hers. “Oh don’t, don’t,” he said, only he meant it in the right way. Not the no I can’t have sex with you way. The fuck I think I’m going to come sort of way. It thrilled her to the core to hear it. Usually it took him an age to get there, but everything about this was apparently so exciting, he just couldn’t help himself. And Kieran knew it. “I think he’s going to go off before you can get there,” he said, and it should have sounded mocking. It should have, yet somehow it didn’t. His voice sounded too thick with arousal, and the gaze he laid on her looked filled with longing. It didn’t surprise her in the slightest when he suddenly knelt between her spread legs and pressed his mouth to her slick pussy. But it did send a shock of pleasure through her body—and not just because of the feel of his tongue, suddenly hot and wet against her straining clit. It was the idea of what he’d decided to do that got her the most. He’d started licking her, while her husband fucked her with his cock. And every time he swept his tongue downward—away from her clit—all she could see behind her eyes was him licking the thick shaft of Tommy’s cock as it slid in and out of her sex. Tommy’s moans didn’t help her vivid imagination either. It seemed almost as though he was timing them to the lap of Kieran’s tongue, to the point where she started actually bemoaning the feel of that slippery thing against her clit. The burst of pleasure she got from the notion of Kieran practically blowing her husband was more than enough to compensate for a lack of contact. In fact, it filled her to such an extent that she simply had to lift herself up. If she lifted herself up she could make things out, and give him better access—though nothing prepared her for what Kieran actually did the moment Tommy’s cock was almost free of her pussy.
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He caught her gaze, eyes suddenly bright. Whatever darkness had been in him before looked thoroughly banished now, and she felt almost certain it had something to do with the taste of her on his lips. And maybe the feel of Tommy’s cock in his hand. She hadn’t the foggiest clue if Tommy knew what was going on. Though in truth, she was looking at the thing and didn’t have the foggiest clue about what was going on. The sight of Kieran on his knees, slowly stroking that thick flesh—it was too much for her tiny mind to process. Her breath had lodged itself somewhere just south of her throat. Her entire body hummed, on edge, just waiting for him to do the thing he definitely wasn’t going to do. He just wasn’t. And then he leaned forward and licked that wicked, pointed tongue over the glistening tip of Tommy’s cock, as though to tell her directly, Don’t tell me what I’m not going to do. You’ll always be wrong. “You can breathe now,” he said, and that was mocking. But it didn’t sting, the way she expected it to. Instead she found herself obeying, taking in a long, shaking lungful of air until something like normalcy returned to her. It soon fled, however. She couldn’t maintain anything like real life while Kieran knelt between her legs, sucking on her husband’s cock. She just couldn’t. The whole thing looked too amazing—the sight of Kieran’s cheeks hollowing and the slickness of his lips and the way she could actually see that swollen head making strange shapes against the insides of his mouth. And then, oh God then…Tommy moaned. He had to know what was going on—no one could mistake a mouth for a pussy—but he clutched her hips tightly and cried out his pleasure anyway. And he didn’t keep it to formless exclamations either. He had things to say, it seemed. Rude things that made her want to collapse into Kieran all over again. “Uhhh yes, suck me off. Fuck, yes—tighter, tighter. Oh yeah, make me come.” It was, without a doubt, the dirtiest thing she’d ever heard in her life. Her whole body bloomed to hear the words, clit sparking and swelling as though she barely needed a thing on her to orgasm. Though Kieran seemed to think otherwise. She’d thought for a second that he might actually take Tommy’s come in his mouth, but after a few good sucks he aimed the cock in his hand back at her pussy. Waited for her to go for it, waited for her to try to sink down on it, before grinning his wicked grin and pulling the stiff flesh back, just a little. “You want it, huh?” he asked. He didn’t need an answer, however. “Yeah, I can tell how much you want it.” Of course, her mind went automatically to how she must look—glistening, flushed, nipples and clit as stiff as Tommy’s dick was. But then she thought of what he’d just been doing, and a different notion presented itself.
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He can taste me all over Tommy’s cock. That’s what he wants me to know. She would have blushed, if her face had been capable of getting any redder. Instead she just squirmed, and tried to get at the thing in his hand, and fell to begging when he wouldn’t give it. “Please, please, oh please just let me. I need it in me, please.” But he just stared up at her steadily. Waiting for something she didn’t know how to give. Hand still on her husband’s cock, stroking almost possessively. By God he was good at keeping control. She didn’t even know how he did it, but it seemed obvious now why Tommy had found him so compelling. Why Tommy let him suck and touch his cock without a single note of protest. Because Kieran was lust incarnate. The office had him right. He didn’t care what happened or who did what to whom, he just wanted. He just got lost in it, and he made you get lost too. She felt lost right now. “Where do you need it?” “In my…in my pussy.” “I don’t know. Maybe I should just make him shoot all over you—what do you think?” “No! No— I—” “I could do it. He’s about ready to pop, wouldn’t you say? A couple of strokes and he’ll spurt right over your clit.” He paused, cocked his head to one side. As though considering. “And then maybe I’ll lick it off.” A fresh burst of liquid slid between the cheeks of her arse, but she couldn’t be embarrassed about it. Not even at the idea that he could see it, could see her creaming herself over his dirty talk. It felt too good for something as petty as embarrassment. “Do you think you’ll go over if I do? If I lick his come off your clit?” What in God’s name was he talking about? She felt as though she was about to go over just hearing him discussing the idea. And from the sounds of Tommy, he was in exactly the same state. He kept saying yes, yes, but she had no idea where he was aiming the word. At Kieran’s filthy, come-licking suggestion? At the idea of letting her slide down on his cock again? It could have been either at this point. Clearly neither of them were the least bit bothered about doing things with another man. Or at least, they weren’t right now. The fall-out was going to be a whole different matter, she was sure. “Just put it in me,” she settled on, finally. The idea of him licking her and tasting Tommy was sweet, but too much. She couldn’t take a moment more of this, and the idea of something even filthier happening just warped what little sense she had left.
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Though the sense didn’t come back when Kieran finally, finally relented and aimed the fat head of Tommy’s cock back at her clenching pussy. Instead she found herself actually wriggling, body straining for that delicious, filling sensation, and then, oh then… “Yes, that’s it—take it. God that looks so good. Look at your sweet cunt, taking that cock.” She couldn’t look. Her entire body had clenched with pleasure the moment the head of Tommy’s dick slid in, and it didn’t allow for any extraneous movement. It just wanted her to work herself on that gorgeous length, quickly, to get at the orgasm she could feel cresting. Just like that, and she was going to come. Though Tommy wasn’t faring any better. She could feel his fingers making actual bruises on her hips, and the moment she rocked her hips and filled herself with him, he reacted as though stung. He jerked, and moaned, “Ohhh fuck, I’m gonna come. I’m gonna come. Ah…keep doing that.” She didn’t even know what it was she’d started doing. Every move she made seemed spasmodic and ridiculous and completely out of keeping with the steady rhythm sex usually required. Or at least, that Tommy required, in order to climax. But oh it felt so good against that little swelling inside her. Like such a relief, after all the teasing and tormenting. And then even better, there was Kieran’s tongue on her clit again, lapping so steady and firm. As though he hadn’t lost the slightest bit of control. He just gripped her hips— hands so close to Tommy’s he was practically holding them—and flicked over her swollen bud until she bucked and called out their names in some random jumble. Toman, perhaps. Kieromy, maybe. And then her orgasm came on her in a great wave, tight and almost like choking. Her body clenched against it, but it pushed its way through her anyway and wouldn’t let up. Not even when she grunted and put a hand in Kieran’s hair. Not even when Tommy shouted a name-jumble of his own, shortly before his entire body jerked and his cock swelled and a burst of wetness filled her. Unrestrained wasn’t even the word for the way he gave in to his orgasm. And once it was done, he didn’t shudder or lock up or say something that spoke of his mortification. She felt him sigh against her instead, body so relaxed that after a moment it started to seem like a great weight sagging over her. But she didn’t mind. She didn’t even mind Kieran staring up at her, mouth as slick as anything, eyes dark with lust—because Tommy didn’t mind. He’d given the okay, he’d waved the green flag, and now here they were together in this great tangle of limbs. It didn’t even feel weird when Tommy murmured that he loved her, against her skin. There was a safety in the thing they’d just done, a sense of calm completeness that didn’t leave her half as on edge as she’d felt at the start. This was right. It was good. 61
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Or at least it was until Kieran put his mouth on hers and sent her world upside down.
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Chapter Six When she woke sometime in the middle of the night, she could feel him pressed against her back. Of course she knew automatically that it wasn’t Tommy. She could see her husband through the dim light from the hallway, sprawled out in front of her. And even if she hadn’t been able to make him out, Tommy would have felt different. Tommy was solid and heavy—rounded almost. Kieran was all angles against her, hard and sinewy. She’d seen his body for the first time when he’d stripped off to join them in bed, and it hadn’t looked the way she’d expected. He had muscle where she’d imagined rail thinness. His arms curved in and out the way Tommy’s did, only leaner. More pronounced. It made her picture him in a new light—one that included running in the mornings or swimming at night or just something, anything that toned a body the way his was toned. And now said toned body had insinuated itself against hers. It had been Tommy’s idea. Kieran hadn’t pushed for anything more—beyond the kiss she stupidly couldn’t stop thinking about—and so Tommy had simply said, Hey, why don’t you sleep over? As though they’d all regressed to the age of twelve, now that sex things were out of the way. Though somehow she doubted sex things were anywhere near done with. For a start, she could feel another angle pressing pretty significantly into a lower part of her body, despite the fact that he was obviously unconscious. And then there was Tommy whispering to her through the darkness, quite suddenly, “That was incredible.” His words stumped her for a second. So casually spoken, before she’d even realized he was awake. No worry or uptightness about any of it—and he further proved this notion when he continued. “I’ve never seen you like that.” She could tell by his tone he didn’t mean anything bad. It sounded so light and wondering, and even though she couldn’t see his face clearly, she knew he was smiling. Still, she had the urge to push, just a little. “Well, now you have,” she said, then added after a moment, “No going back.” Of course she expected him to balk at that. To tell her it had just been a one-off, and that they didn’t need to do it again. So it shocked and thrilled in equal measures to hear Tommy say, louder and clearer, “I don’t want to go back.” Kieran had sucked his cock, but he didn’t want to go back. She couldn’t think badly of herself for not knowing what to make of the idea. “Did you like him…doing that?” 63
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She had to ask. She just had to. It didn’t exactly matter if he had, but then again if he liked it a little too much… “Are you seriously going to ask me if I’m gay again?” Or you know. Maybe she was just being the fooliest fool that ever fooled once more. “No.” It was amusing, how churlish her voice came out. Even she had to laugh at it. “You totally were.” “I was going to ask you if you’d become a completely different person, but that’s not the same question.” “No, you’re right—it’s worse.” The hint of panic in his voice put her on edge and she tried to backtrack over the conversation. What did it matter, if he’d become a different person in her eyes? A completely different and absolutely awesome adventurer in Sex Land? Oh yeah right. It mattered because he didn’t know she found it awesome. “Hon—no, no. I meant that… I meant that in a good way. I like this new person who has dirty online chats and enjoys getting…things…from people. It’s what I’ve always wanted, for you to share this stuff with—” She jolted, when Kieran cut in suddenly. Though not before she saw the relaxed smile all over her husband’s face. The relieved smile all over his face. “Still not quite able to say the real words, huh, Bea?” For a second she couldn’t remember what she’d said. What little sliver of weakness she’d left for him to pounce on. But then she recalled the word things and the word people, and for the first time really started to wonder why she skirted certain dirty ideas. It couldn’t be because of Tommy and a sense of his boundaries. Tommy had just told her he didn’t want boundaries anymore. Tommy had told her he was happy with the way things had gone, that this was what he wanted. So why? Why had his walls come tumbling down, and hers hadn’t? Because they were walls. Any fool could see that. Kieran had seen it weeks ago, and he wasn’t about to let up on it either—the way he hadn’t let up with Tommy. Tommy was hers now, because of Kieran. Or maybe Tommy belonged to both of them, because of Kieran. Either way, she had to try giving as much of herself over to this. She had to. “He likes it when you blow him,” she tried, and it was easier—much easier—than the fuck Kieran had once forced her to say. For a start, she didn’t actually feel forced. “You think?” Kieran offered. Like a choice. Like another choice—you guys can back out of this, if you want. We don’t have to go into who likes what and where. “Yeah, he likes it. I like it too.” Kieran’s hand ran up over her hip, too sudden. Too sudden and too thrilling. Every little sexual part of her lit up, as though she hadn’t had the most amazing and exhausting screw of her life only a few hours earlier. 64
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“Yeah, you know why?” Kieran asked, and a million reasons flew through her head. Because guy-on-guy is hot. Because I’m warped inside. Because I actually enjoy sharing my husband with someone else. Though only the latter even remotely fit. The idea of sharing felt right, and good, but it didn’t have the backup it needed until Kieran said, “Because you’re a dirty little minx who needs two men to satisfy her.” Of course she couldn’t deny it. What sort of girl could honestly reject the notion that two guys servicing her really did it for her? But as it turned out, she didn’t need to—a sweeter notion occurred instead. I don’t want to reject it. I want to embrace it. She wanted to embrace them both, all of the time and most especially—right now. “Is that what you are, Bea?” Tommy asked, but he didn’t wait for an answer. He just kissed her instead, so soft and sweet and just as bad as Kieran’s kiss had been earlier. Kieran’s kiss had woken her up inside, shook her around and made her realize how deep her feelings ran for him. This kiss reaffirmed a love she’d felt for a long time. “Touch her,” Kieran said, but Tommy had already started in on just that. He had his hands on her breasts, fondling and stroking and finding her already stiff nipples, to chafe and worry and pluck. She wasn’t surprised when Kieran pulled the straps of her nightie down, and Tommy leaned in to lick over the taut little points. They’d already spent months in secret training with each other. Now everything just ran like clockwork. Magnificent clockwork that made her arch her back and press her arse right into Kieran’s obvious erection. “Can you feel how hard I am?” he murmured in her ear, but really he needn’t have bothered. The dirty talk was appreciated, but honestly—did he think she couldn’t feel the solid shape of him? It felt the way his elbow had, when he’d turned and pressed it into her spine. It felt hard and unyielding—though she could hardly blame him for it. He’d backed right off after the whole “I’m going to lick you while your husband fucks you” thing, even though she’d seen how hard he was all the way back then. Now it was five hours later, and by God he had to be aching for it. It made her ache, just thinking about it. Or maybe it was just the feel of Tommy’s hot, wet mouth, sucking hard on her left nipple. Which made her moan loudly without her own permission, and squirm back into Kieran’s cock, and generally make herself as shameless as Kieran had implied she wasn’t earlier. “I’m gonna come on you if you keep making noises like that,” he said, like a threat.
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A threat! As though an idea like that could ever frighten her now. Nothing frightened her now. She wanted Kieran in her and Tommy sucking and licking at her and just everything, everything. “Fuck me,” she said, and this time it was Kieran making the noises. He groaned gutturally into the side of her throat, then chased it with a wet kiss. With his tongue, running over the tender skin there. And finally a bite, just to give her that extra kick she so sorely needed. But he didn’t move to take her. He didn’t reach for the condoms she knew would be in the pocket of his jeans, and after a moment of agonizing frustration he only whispered soon, in her ear. As though he had something better in mind, for starters. And as it turned out, he did. “But first I want him to fuck your arse.” She didn’t know what sparked the most pleasure through her body. The idea, or the feel of Tommy running one slippery fingertip over one nipple, as he sucked and licked at the other. She rewarded both with a gasp, however. “Yeah, that’s right. You like that idea, huh? You want his big cock in you there, filling you up, making you twist and moan. Say it. Say it for me.” “I like it.” “What is it you like, Bea? Say the words.” “I like the idea of his cock in my arse. I want it in me. Ohhhh God. God that feels so good, baby.” She got lost in the sensation for a moment, each sweet pull on the stiff peaks like a strummed wire, connecting directly to her clit. But Kieran pulled her back, easy enough. “That’s it. Suck her nipples,” he said to Tommy, and then even more jolting than that he cupped one of her breasts and offered it to Tommy’s greedy mouth. And when he took it, when he sucked and licked in the exact place Kieran wanted him to, it looked almost like…almost like Kieran had cupped Tommy’s face in his heavy-knuckled hand. The sight was arresting, to say the least. As was Kieran murmuring in her ear again, asking her all sorts of questions she couldn’t fathom the answer to. “You want me to get you ready?” he asked, but he didn’t stop there. “Maybe lick you there? You read those words I typed to him, right? You were watching like a filthy little spy, cunt probably as wet as it is now, your head full of that one dirty image.” Me on all fours, she thought, unbidden. Me on all fours, and him spreading my cheeks apart to lick over my tight little arsehole. “Fuck, fuck. Kieran.” “That’s good, my dirty girl. Tell me how much you want it,” he said, and then he reached back, as though to grab something.
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Of course she knew what he was grabbing. She didn’t keep many things on her bedside cabinet, but body oil was definitely one of them. Body oil kept your elbows supple and it replaced moisture after a shower. And oh—it also happened to be great at lubricating things. “I like that you keep a hint right by your bed,” he said, and she had the ridiculous urge to protest. The body oil wasn’t for anything rude. It was for her elbows. Her elbows. Only when Tommy asked her if she’d always hoped he might reach over one night and grab the bottle, she found she didn’t want to say no. Quite the contrary. She wanted to say all the things that had been inside her, for months. “I used to imagine rubbing it all over your gorgeous body,” she said, because that was the truth. And maybe what Kieran said next had a grain of truth too. “Possibly inside his body too, am I right?” Tommy shuddered. But she didn’t think disgust brought it on. She wasn’t even sure if he could be disgusted anymore. He looked too far gone, too wasted by whatever this was, and when he did speak it was only to ask for more. “Tell me what you’re doing,” he said, and Kieran did. He aimed all of his words at Tommy as he slid two newly slick fingers between the cheeks of her arse. Of course she flinched when he did it. The liquid felt too cool and so obscene, and he didn’t hesitate when he got to her tight hole. He just squirmed two fingers against it, teasing and teasing until she thought she might die of shame. Or maybe of something sweeter. Pleasure, perhaps—exquisite pleasure. “She’s so tight,” he told Tommy, and even that was pleasurable. His voice sounded so hoarse and lost, as though desire had caught him around the throat. “Lick her. Lick her until she opens up for me.” But Tommy didn’t exactly do as he’d been instructed. He didn’t lean forward and mouth over her tight nipples. Instead, he slipped one big hand between her legs and found the swollen bud of her clit. Rubbed it just once, just ever so delicately—though delicately was more than enough. It made her buck and twist and almost fall headfirst into orgasm, but more importantly it pushed her back against Kieran’s teasing finger. And then it was just a matter of applying a little more pressure and he slid all the way in. All the way into that narrow passage, two fingers instead of one, the sudden sense of being filled and spread open in a place she’d never so much as had a featherlight touch like a shock of icy-cold water. Her stomach dropped, but she couldn’t say why. Because of the shame of it, the delicious, liquid shame? Because it was someone else touching her there first—someone who wasn’t her husband? Or was it because of the way Tommy looked at her the moment Kieran slid inside her—so awestruck and excited and God, so ready.
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She could see his thick cock thrusting up at her, close to her belly but not enough to feel its heat, and then Kieran twisted his slick fingers inside her and whispered in her ear, and that stomach-dropping sensation got worse. “Feels big having something here, doesn’t it? How do you think it’s going to feel to have that thick cock of his shoving into you?” She moaned in response. Couldn’t find any words. The stomach-dropping sensation had become a desperate, teetering-on-the-edge-of-orgasm sort of sensation, and all it took was Tommy’s finger gently stirring over her clit, while Kieran rubbed and fucked into her and found nerves she hadn’t even known existed. “She’s close,” he told Tommy, and she felt glad of it. He found the words when she couldn’t, and moved her when she didn’t know how to, and suddenly she was on all fours on the bed—just the way she’d imagined. Tommy’s hand went away but Kieran’s didn’t. Somehow, Kieran kept those maddening fingers buried deep inside her, everything getting slicker by the second because he kept trickling more and more slick liquid down over that sensitive groove. And he’d started separating his fingers too. Stretching and preparing her for something she was never going to be able to take. It just wasn’t going to happen—no way could Tommy fit, no way. “What are you waiting for?” Kieran asked, and though her mind continued to balk her body didn’t. Sometime in the last minute or so she’d started thrusting back onto Kieran’s fingers like an animal in heat, and when he said those words she bucked faster. Moaned louder. “Come on, man—look how ready she is,” he said to Tommy, and then she felt his weight move on the bed. Felt his trembling hands clasp her hips. “Fuck, I can’t do this,” she heard him say, but it sounded like a lie. And even if it hadn’t, Kieran was there to murmur dark things in his ear. “Why? Doesn’t she look like she wants it?” he asked, and as he did so he slid his fingers back and forth, back and forth. She could only imagine how filthy it seemed, how spread open and slick she must have looked. “Tell him how much you want it, Bea. Tell him to fill you with his hot cum.” She didn’t hesitate this time. And there were no words to substitute for the ones she needed to say. “Oh fuck yeah, take me, take my arse, fuck me there, Tommy—please.” She rocked back, only this time there was nothing to rock back against. Kieran pulled his hand away, fingers sliding slickly from her clenching hole, and then there was just the heat of Tommy’s body, so close but so far. “Please,” she begged, and for one teetering moment she felt sure he wasn’t going to do it. She could hear him sighing, in the exact same way he’d sighed so many times before. And she could feel his fingers digging into her hips, as though he could have just pushed all of this away from himself, if he only tried hard enough.
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But then she felt the blunt head of his cock, pressing and pressing against that tight passage, so thick and unyielding she didn’t think it would ever get inside. She pushed back against him, hands bunching in the sheets, body tensing like nothing she’d ever experienced. He wasn’t going to fit, he just wasn’t, he wasn’t. Or at least she thought so until Kieran ran one soothing hand down over her back, so gentle she could hardly believe it was him. Then Tommy urged his cock against her and she pushed into that tense feeling, and that was it. He slid all the way, slow as syrup and twice as sweet. “Ohhhh Jesus,” he moaned, but that was fine. She knew exactly how he felt. Every nerve in her body had suddenly found its way to that one point of connection. To the clench of her muscles around his stiff, solid prick. She couldn’t adjust. Couldn’t process. Kieran asked her how it felt and she could only manage a cry of pleasure—though all the sound did was make Tommy suddenly stiffen and ask her if she was okay. “I’m fine,” she tried, but it came out hime line. It made her thankful that Tommy had lost some of his inhibitions and his wariness, because she couldn’t give him the reassurance he needed. But he still somehow found the wherewithal to say, “I’m sorry, hon. I’ve got to move. I’ve got to, I need it. Oh fuck you feel so tight and hot.” She moaned louder for him, bucked back harder, gave him the yes she couldn’t quite reach with her mouth. And then he rolled his hips and God, God. Why had she encouraged this? She couldn’t stand it. It poured too much sensation through her. It made her skin buzz and her clit jump and oh Lord. It was the slickness of it she felt. The slippery, silky slickness, as he eased back and forth, back and forth. She hadn’t thought it possible, but felt almost certain she was close to coming. Just a few more thrusts and she’d be there. And especially so when Kieran turned her head and kissed her. He did it frantically too. Not like before—that slow, languid, emotion-filled thing. This was desperate and wet and open-mouthed, as though something had broken free inside him too. He didn’t have to hold back a little now—the way he’d done in the living room. He could take something for himself if he wanted to. And yet he still pulled away when she reached for him. As though dirty talking and touching other people was fine, but having them touch you? Having another man’s wife touch you? Possibly not as okay as his brash exterior would seem to suggest. Of course, she thought of him saying those words to her in the office. About how he’d never mess around with someone else’s wife, and the like. But it just seemed so far removed from what they were doing here, so small and immature and beneath him, that for a moment she couldn’t quite believe he’d done it. He hadn’t moved away. She’d just imagined it.
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Or at least, she told herself so until Tommy said, loud and clear, “What’s the matter? Don’t you want her?” It made her think several things all at once. That Tommy had his eyes all over them both, greedily drinking in everything they were doing. That Tommy was generous, so generous, oh such a good husband to her in every way. And finally, and most deliciously, that Tommy had somehow surpassed Kieran in the filth stakes. She didn’t know when—quite possibly it had been years ago, judging by all the things she didn’t know about him—or how, or why, but she knew this much— She loved her gorgeous husband. “Take her,” he said, and his voice grew firmer by the second. His voice sounded like Kieran’s, in fact, when he delivered the kicker. “I bet she wants it. She definitely wants it. You take her pussy while I take her arse. Go on.” Surprisingly, her reaction to this little bombshell wasn’t half what Kieran gave in response. His head went back against the bed, mouth open, body rolling all the way down as though Tommy had pushed the words into him and set them alight. She had to take his arm and shake him, beg him to do it while there was still sense enough in her to ask. It seemed to take him an absolute age to get to it. And all the while Tommy stayed still, lodged deep inside her and unwilling to give her the slightest bit of friction. She almost fell to rocking, thrusting, clawing—anything at all to get the pleasure she craved—but then she felt Kieran fishing for something on the bedroom floor and heard the snap of rubber. Then finally, finally his voice, through the half-darkness. “I’m gonna last about thirty seconds here.” A laugh wormed its way up through her, but she couldn’t tell if it was full of mockery or full of joy. The latter, she suspected, because Kieran had his hands on her and Tommy had his hands on her and everything seemed so much righter and sweeter than she could ever have wished it to be. She’d been given a big cake. A big cake, and by God she got to eat it too. Though it felt much more like heated steel going in, she had to say. Kieran pushed her up and Tommy held her fast with two now-sweaty hands, and then Kieran lay beneath her while Tommy remained behind. The weirdest details came to her once Kieran had settled there. Like how his legs must be tangling with Tommy’s, and the look of him beneath her, pale eyes glinting in the dim light. She couldn’t tell if he was happy or sad, though when he put a hand in her hair and brought her lips to his she got some idea. His kiss felt like something desperate, something despairing. She could taste salt in his mouth and had no idea why. And then he said, “Will you still look me in the eye in the morning?”
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So faint it was barely audible. And she had even less idea of what to make of that than she’d had about the kiss. She did, however, understand the press of him between the slick lips of her sex. Oh yeah, she understood that all right. He felt big—as big as Tommy, at least—and when he found her waiting cunt she couldn’t help jerking back. Just a little. But it was enough to stop him. “I won’t if you don’t want me to,” he said, and it was so much at odds with the Kieran she thought she knew that for a moment she wanted to stop. For a moment, and then Tommy put a hand on her back, a calming hand, and his words got all mixed up with Kieran’s until she couldn’t think of anything, anything but the thing she’d wanted since the moment he’d said to her, No force on earth would make me want to fuck anyone but you. “It’s all right for you to want it,” Tommy said, so warm with sincerity she couldn’t stand it. She just had to slide forward a little way, reach between their bodies and find his stiff cock, and then…and then… All three made a sound at the same time. She could hardly tell one from the other— though that wasn’t a surprise, considering how Kieran felt, sliding slowly into her body. Like being split in two, she thought, then hotter on its heels, like being filled with pleasure. She expected it to burn, but it didn’t. There was only a sense of being stretched, and shared, and then more of that lovely slick feeling when they both slid back and forth. Of course they didn’t mean to. She could tell they didn’t. Both of them seemed to be barely breathing, never mind moving. However, when she leaned forward just a little— to get into a position that didn’t put so much pressure on her trembling arms—both were drawn slowly out, and then there were more noises. A shaking gasp from Tommy, a strained groan from Kieran. The latter had his eyes tightly shut too—like something Tommy would do. While behind her Tommy gripped her hips more tightly, and told her how badly he needed to move. “I’ve got to,” he said, and then he sank slowly back in while every nerve ending in her body sang. And judging by Kieran’s reaction, most things inside him sang too. He trembled, and she simply had to know—could he feel it? Could he feel Tommy’s cock sliding against his own, through so thin a barrier? “Tell me,” she said, and his eyes snapped open. For once, they didn’t seem pale at all. They seemed dark and full of things she couldn’t name, and when he spoke his voice shook. “You feel so good,” he said. “You both feel so good.”
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He didn’t seem capable of more. But it was enough to hear him say both. Both, as though he wanted Tommy as much as he wanted her. As though they came as a pair and now they were three and oh God, oh God he was right. Everything felt so good. Her orgasm was welling up from that too-filled space between her legs, where everything rubbed against everything else and her clit swelled against Kieran’s belly and the slow slide almost drove her mad. And then Tommy panted that he was going to go over—only he said it in the filthiest possible way. He said, “I’m gonna fill you with my cum, baby. Are you ready?” She thought, Yes, yes, yes, I’ve always been ready for this. Rolling waves of pleasure made their way through her body. She felt her pussy and her arse clenching tightly around them both, bit her lip until she tasted blood, the great hot pulses of her orgasm so intense it almost verged on pain. And it went on and on too. It bloomed anew when she felt Tommy swelling inside her, spurting hot and wet and copiously enough to leak down her thighs—so rude, God, so rude. She called out his name the moment she felt it, but the pleasure hadn’t yet had its end. Fresh sensation shivered through her sex when Kieran grunted—guttural and beastlike and glorious—and jerked, his thrusts suddenly erratic and too rapid. His cock shoved hard against all the places she wanted it most and she couldn’t help it. She had to call out his name too. And as she spread herself over him—slowly, so slowly and filled with the kind of lowdown trembles she’d never experienced after sex—she realized it clearly enough. She would never be able to say one name without following it with the other, ever again.
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Chapter Seven There were a lot of things she wanted to say to him when she found him by the bike stands. Chief amongst them being, Why have you avoided me for the past three days and, It’s raining on you, you great idiot. But when she finally got there and leaned up against the smooth metal, hair getting just a little bit wet from the drizzle and heart pounding away as usual, there was only one question she wanted to ask. It had buzzed around inside her head for too long already. It needed to get out, and when he turned his head and looked at her, half-smiling, half-not, she let it emerge. “Why do you do all of it?” He grinned his shark’s grin, which was better than what she had expected. Tommy had suggested awful things like he’s worried you think he’s a giant pervert and maybe he’s conflicted about his sexuality, and no matter how much she’d laughed them off, they still lingered in the back of her mind. So the grin—yeah, the grin was a relief. The grin might even possibly lead to what Tommy had asked for the night before—more. Of course he’d also outlined and set up a chart and a guidebook for any further forays into Threesome Land, but that was to be expected. Nobody wanted to venture into Threesome Land without at least some idea of what they were doing. They’d already tried that once, and it had left all kinds of messy things behind. Did she have feelings for Kieran, did Kieran have feelings for Tommy, did Tommy want her or both of them or who the hell knew? She didn’t. The only thing she could make out clearly was how intense and incredible it had felt to be with both of them and have them be with her. But that just felt selfish in the light of Kieran’s avoidance of her and the reply he now gave her, soft and simple. “Did it make you happy?” Of course, she knew what he meant. It wasn’t really a question. It was a pointed remark, aimed right at her gut. I want you to be happy, it said, though she couldn’t quite face it yet. She had to try to divert the conversation away and find his true purpose, his real purpose for starting all of this with her husband. It couldn’t possibly be her happiness. “Yes, but—” she tried, but he interrupted her before she could finish. “Well then.”
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She wanted to roll her eyes and couldn’t. She had to go with throwing her hands up instead. “Oh you’re so selfless!” The urge to kick him swelled up inside her. But the urge to kick herself won the day in the end. He wasn’t putting on an act, for God’s sake. He wasn’t trying to seem generous and wonderful. In fact, she kind of suspected he just was generous and wonderful. He looked like lust incarnate, like he’d just rolled out of someone else’s bed, but he also looked like her Kieran, full of questions he was just waiting for her to answer. “I’m not selfless. I’ve led a criminal, selfish life. Not sure I’ve ever cared about anyone.” She watched him put his cigarette to his lips. It looked damp and forlorn, the way she felt, suddenly. “So it came as quite a shock to me to realize that when you love someone, it comes above all other things. All the other little pieces of your life. You just want them to be happy.” That urge to kick herself became something sullen and stubborn. “Don’t say that,” she said, though couldn’t fathom why. His words were as lovely as the ones Tommy had spoken on their wedding day—though in an entirely different way. Tommy was hearts and flowers. Kieran was a frosted-over lake, with burning heat just below the ice. They added up to the same thing though. “Isn’t it true? Don’t you want that for Tommy?” he asked, as though he didn’t understand. As though she’d told him not to say something like that because the words made no sense, rather than the real reason. Because they felt so cold and hot at the same time. She looked up at him then, looked right into his eyes as though they weren’t colorless and cold anymore. And in truth, she wasn’t even sure how she’d ever thought such a thing. His eyes were more like Tommy’s really—so blue, such a brilliant blue. “I want it for you too,” she said, and meant it. All this time she’d worried about Tommy and how he felt—when really he seemed to be getting along just fine. Better than fine, in fact. He’d made charts. He said actual words during sex. He wanted sex more than once every decade. But Kieran… Kieran looked as lonely as an island in an ocean that didn’t exist. “Well, that’s where my sad tale of woe and unrequited love has to disappoint you. Apologies.” And he said things like that too. Didn’t he get it? He had to get it. He had to know that they weren’t two anymore. They’d made a three instead. It had to be so—Tommy had written it, in the guidebook. “I won’t ever leave him for you,” she said, only he rushed on before she could finish. He said, “My point exactly.” 74
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In some bitter, burned-up sort of tone. That island of his getting further and further away suddenly. The cigarette at his lips, again. It was almost a delight to the say the words she’d planned to, before he’d interrupted. “But I don’t think I have to.” He snapped his attention to her then, as intense as he’d been the night before. “I mean—if you’d be happy with that.” “Are you serious?” She fought the urge to roll her eyes, again. “I’m completely serious,” she said, but he still couldn’t seem to grasp it. “You want to be part of something with me and him and you, and you and me and him, and so on and so forth.” “I can see a lot of mingling pronouns in our future. If you want it, that is?” He gave out a little chuff then, the sound caught somewhere between disbelief and rue. His eyes were smiling, however. The shark’s grin had gone, and in its place was a great warmth shining out past his usually cold gaze. “I thought you’d hate me,” he said after a moment. Because he was an idiot, maybe. “Hate you? For what?” “For worming my way into your life, or something like it.” She had to laugh then. She had to shake her head and sock him on the shoulder— the way she’d done so many times to Tommy, when he didn’t seem to know quite how brilliant he was. “Is that what you call it?” “I don’t even know what I call it.” He glanced down at the hand she now had on his arm. She hadn’t meant to keep it there after the shoulder sock, but somehow it ended up remaining, even so. “I think it starts with L and ends in E,” she said, because it was true, wasn’t it? He’d practically said it already. He’d told her that he wanted the person he loved to be happy, that love came above all other things. And it did. It did so much that when he said, “Does it start with L and end in E for you?” She didn’t hesitate to answer. “You know it does. For both of you.” It didn’t even sound weird coming out. The word both and the word love and maybe his arms around her too. He kissed her then—right there in front of their place of work. But not even the thought of prying eyes could take away the sweetness of it, the comfortableness of it. All the upside-down and inside-out feelings were gone. This was right. It was the way things were supposed to be.
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“So what are we saying here? Once a week and twice on Sundays?” he asked, when he finally pulled away. And of course she thought of Tommy and his charts. She thought of him and laughed out loud. “Yeah, I think maybe we can manage that.”
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About the Author Charlotte Stein has been writing for over ten years, and perving on hot dudes for even longer than that. However, it’s only recently that she’s had the courage to pair the two together and pen some critically acclaimed, steamy-hot erotic romances. She lives in Brit-land with her very own hunk of manbeef, and their imaginary dog. You can find her at www.themightycharlottestein.blogspot.com, usually in the middle of rambling about nonsense, squee-ing over her totally unexpected life as a writer, and generally lusting after seriously sexy men.
Charlotte welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website and email address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.
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Also by Charlotte Stein Closer Giving The Horizon
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