Page 11 of Faithless

“What are you doing here?” Laura asks, her blond hair shining under the setting sun.

I force a wide, toothy smile, wondering if it looks as fake as it feels. All of our “couple” friends—or rather, business acquaintances—know about Mark’s infidelities. In a small town like Santa Barbara, it can’t be avoided. And while I’ve inured myself to their awkward smiles and somewhat piteous stares after they ask in a low voice how I’m doing, it doesn’t mean I enjoy these interactions.

After fifteen years of Mark’s infidelity, I’m sick to death of them.

Just as I open my mouth to answer Laura’s question, Mark preempts me. “I wanted to take the wife out to a fancy dinner.” With that, he steps close and sets his hand on my lower back. His musky scent drifts over me.

If I weren’t momentarily stunned by his unexpected closeness, I would scowl at him. The wife? I don’t think he’s called me that in even our phoniest moments at family events or company parties where we tried to seem like an actual husband and wife.

Laura smiles wide as her eyes drift to Mark’s hand on my back, and I sense her surprise. Mark rarely touches me. The only touch I get from him is during our infrequent, fevered sessions of hate sex. What is he doing?

“That’s lovely,” Laura says, and the lightness in her voice sounds as forced as her smile. “We’re having a Christmas Ball this year. I hope you’re planning to take the wife to that, because I certainly don’t want to be the only mom in my forties there.” She turns to me, giving me a pointed look. “Our event planner is already working on hiring a TikTok comedian as the entertainment. As in, he’s famous only from TikTok.” She grimaces. “I’ve seriously never felt so old. I feel like just yesterday Dane Cook was the big thing, and our kids probably wouldn’t even know who he is, right?”

I smile faintly. “I felt old even back then. I think I was pregnant with Maddy when Dane Cook was the big thing.”

I’m startled into silence when Mark curls his hand around my waist to my belly.

“We’re going,” he says.

When both Laura and I shoot him wide-eyed stares, he clarifies. “To the Christmas Ball, I mean.”

I jerk back, but he holds me tightly. His expression makes heat curl through my insides.

Oh God, that intensity. That determination.

I remember it from when we were first getting to know each other. My heart was frozen after Jason and I split up, and yet I always felt this heat in my gut when I saw this look in Mark’s eyes.

I knew he wanted me more than anything. I knew he would do anything to have me.

Even when I couldn’t fully appreciate it, it turned me on like nothing before. What made it that much more intense was that he knew how to make my body sing. Even as a young man, he was still six years older than me and had far more experience. He knew how to please me in ways my boyish ex-fiancé never could.

Oh God, I hope Mark doesn’t pull the sex card. I hope he doesn’t try praising and loving me in bed like he did all those years ago. Like he hasn’t ever since that morning I confessed my affair.

If that happens, I’m in trouble.

CHAPTER 6

Mark

* * *

I’ve got her. That look in her eyes…

She wants me.

She always has.

She’s a prudish woman, and she probably knows it’s going to be difficult to warm up to someone sexually when she’s only had me and one other person. She’s no doubt wondering if it’s worth it to start over when I could please her, even when I hate her.

I can play this woman like a mandolin. She’s complicated and requires a fine touch.

I’m going to use it.

I’m fucking her tonight.

I haven’t fucked her in six months. After the fifteen-year anniversary of the day she told me about her affair, I’ve barely been able to look at her. It always throws me off-balance, but for some reason, it hit me harder this year.

Maybe because I realized that after a decade and a half, it still hurts as much as it did on that sunny December morning…

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