Page 37 of Trashy Foreplay

We’re engaging in a standoff on either side of the dining room table. It’s a ridiculous oblong monstrosity taking up space with too many empty chairs, but at least we’re not so far gone that we’re sitting at opposite ends yet. I pin her with a stare full of unwavering challenge.

Go ahead and lie to me again. I dare you.

“I’m not going to do this with you.” She stands and grabs her half-eaten plate of food—dinner I had the audacity to cook for her in hopes of getting past this road block she’s put between us.

Because I’m at the end of my rope, and sick and tired of grasping at the fraying threads. I shouldn’t feelanythingfor another woman, but I do, and the longer Monica shuts me out, the more I want to say fuck it and throw out everything I’ve ever lived by.

I jump to my feet and round the table before she makes it far. Her fingers loosen around the expensive china, and I take the plate from her before setting it on the table with a calmness I don’t feel. Crowding her personal space, I palm her cheeks, hell-bent on stopping her from retreating this time.

“Let me in. Whatever it is, just let me in.”

Her lids flutter shut. “I was wrong to marry you.”

I take a step back, my hands falling from her face. “Why would you say that?”

“Because neither of us are happy.” Her eyes pop open, and I find her blue orbs glistening with unshed tears.

“I was happy,” I bite out with a glare. “And you were happy. Until you fucked someone else.”

She looks away, and that tells me everything I need to know. She might as well just admit to fucking around on me, because her continued silence is more incriminating than that photo.

“Why can’t you be honest? Is it that hard to tell the fucking truth?” I’m getting too worked up, my chest heaving as I fist my hands at my sides. Slowly, I unfurl my fingers and will the rage to cool.

“The truth won’t change anything,” she says, her voice little more than a soft whisper.

I gape at her, stunned. I have no idea what I expected her to say, but that’s the closest she’s come to admitting her wrong-doing. “Look at me.”

Clenching her teeth, she drags her gaze back to me.

“All I’m asking is that you meet me half way. If you made a mistake, just tell me. We can’t work through it until you do.”

“There’s nothing to work through.” She crosses her arms, and the ice is back in her eyes. “The only mistake I made was marrying you.” She turns her back on me and leaves the dining room, and her debilitating statement hangs in the air, the black cloud of her cruelty threatening to douse me with pain.

I push it down so deep I’m not sure it’ll ever resurface. Her infidelity didn’t destroy us. Neither did her lies. No, the ice around her heart—refusing to crack, let alone thaw—is the final nail in the coffin of our marriage.

My mind is nothing but chaos as I gather our dishes. Seconds later, I hear the click of the door to the master bedroom, echoing all the way downstairs. She’s locked it, I know she has, because I’ve tried the doorknob more than once these last few weeks, determined to get through to her. Even if it means sitting in quiet anguish to watch her sleep. To let her know I’m still here.

Waiting.

But she won’t let me in, emotionally or physically. The walls she’s erected between us are too high and thick, and I can neither hurdle nor bust through them.

After the dinner clean-up, I settle into bed with nothing but utter silence greeting me in the spare bedroom, and I’ve never felt so alone. I finger my cell, thinking of Jules and how eager she was for the touch of my hand yesterday. How simple things are with her, despite the complications we face every day at the office. I’m not sure how something can be so easy and difficult at the same time, but that’s how it is with Jules.

Wanting her is downrightwrong. But being with her is as easy as breathing. Before I talk myself out of a very bad idea, I pull up her name in my contacts and text her a question I’ve wanted to ask since I watched her walk away in the airport.

Me: Would you have let me kiss you on the plane?

I already know the answer, but I want…no, I need her to admit it. To acknowledge it. And I don’t give a flying fuck if I’m playing a risky game. My heart is pounding too hard to care about the dangers of crossing such a precarious line as I wait for her response.

Please, for God’s sake. Text me back.

Six agonizing minutes pass before my cell vibrates in my palm.

Jules: You know I would have.

Letting out a long breath, I settle against the headboard and wonder if she’s in bed, too. Is she wearing practical but entirely cute pajamas? Or is she naked, her sinful body a temptation between the sheets? Is her hair twisted in a messy up-do—the kind I’ve spied her wearing a few times since she started working for me—or is it wild and free, falling over her dainty shoulders in golden waves?

I envision her silky locks splaying her pillow, and my dick throbs, heavy between my legs. Thickening and growing the more I think about her. I’m headed straight for trouble, but I can’t seem to stop myself. Maybe we were fools to believe we could leave this line uncrossed.

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