I gulped the first glass of wine at record speed. Sensing my motives, Robbie refilled the glass and sat somewhat closer to me. I heard a cackle downstairs.
Millie. She had been successful with Robbie’s friend, housemate, and soon to be a business partner when they graduated. Owen seemed somewhat similar to me; a lamb in sheep’s clothing. I had walked in on Owen having a heated conversation with another man a few weeks previous to his first date with Millie. Both men had tears in their eyes, and the part of the conversation I overheard was, “we can’t hide this forever.” Something inside me knew what was meant by that. I related to that sentence and to the tension on an ethereal level.
When I had asked Robbie whether he knew someone who might be interested in Millie, Owen sprung to his mind immediately. Within days of their first date, Ashely and Owen became inseparable, much like Robbie and I. Everyone had a point to prove, a secret to hide. Robbie’s secret was the most simple of them all, he was a virgin and had lied to everyone around him about that fact.
He was incredibly overweight in school, which instilled in him a lack of confidence, so never approached any women. He only began to lose the weight in the last two years, but still didn’t know how to talk to women. The Big-V was hanging over his head, but every one of his friends had no idea it was there.
He opened up to me about on a night out after a few too many drinks, and I realized that I was as important to him as he was to me, regarding personal gain. Millie’s secret was a little more complicated. She needed to marry well because her father had gambled away their fortune, leaving them with nothing. From the outside looking in, Millie seemed wealthy, but the majority of her expensive clothes and accessories were stolen either by her or by her sister.
The girls had been raised to look a certain way and didn’t know how to give that up now that the family’s money was gone. Owen and I, we had sensual demons that we needed to keep buried underground.
Chapter Four
After the second glass of wine and a sip or two from the third, I began to feel brave. I looked into Robbie’s eyes and smiled before sitting up on the bed and taking my top off.
Robbie went to lean closer to me, but I stopped him and moved back further on the bed. I took my bra off. I felt cold and exposed, but I mustered up the urge to keep going, to keep doing what I was doing. I unzipped my jeans and exposed my pubic region to Robbie.
He began to moan, creeping closer to me, but stopping when I told him to. What seemed like a strip tease to him was actually my way of hyping myself up, chanting “you want this” to myself in my head, over and over.
I put my hand into my jeans and started to play with myself, hoping that would arouse me enough to follow through. Robbie was groaning, begging me to let him touch me.
“No, no, I need to get you right on the edge of your seat,” I told him, smiling at him. Part of me was enjoying how turned on he was, enjoying how much control I had over the situation. The other part of me was scared of committing sexually to him in case I ruined my chances of getting him to marry me.
“You know it takes girls longer to cum that boys, Robbie. So I need to warm up and get myself going so that we can both enjoy the ride”, I told him, speaking low and seducing him with my words. His eyes were wide with excitement. Making the most of his arousal, I started to play with my breasts.
He had taken a pillow from his bed and was holding it up to his mouth, groaning loudly into it, biting it with frustration. Robbie had never seen me naked. He had never seen any woman naked, in this proximity. I stood up on the bed and took my jeans and underwear off.
Now entirely naked, Robbie’s legs were shaking with anticipation. I sat back down on the bed and spread my legs wide open, “you can look, but you can’t touch,” I warned him.
I continued to rub myself, feeling myself getting wetter and wetter. “Take your shirt off,” I instructed.
Standing up to take his shirt off, I could see the outline of his erection in his shorts. The voice in my head got louder, “you want this, you want this.” Catching where my gaze was, he put his hand on himself, believing that I lusted after it.
I smiled, “Take your shorts off.”
He did without hesitation. And there it was, his erect penis. “You want this. You want this”, the voice kept shouting. I kept rubbing myself to keep myself aroused. I moved my hands back up to my breasts, and Robbie groaned again. For some reason, his arousal, his yearn for my body became a turn on.
Though I was certain I felt no physical attraction to him, I was aroused by his want for me. I invited him over to my body. Like a dog in heat, he lunged at me, cupping my breasts in his hands and sucking on my nipples. I continued to rub myself, knowing I would lose momentum for this if I stopped.
I wanted to want Robbie. I wanted to marry Robbie, and I wanted to live a comfortable life the way everyone expected me to.
Wrapping my legs around his waist, I guided Robbie inside of me. After three thrusts and a declaration of love, it was over. He had climaxed, and I was left feeling unfulfilled. That was how the next number of years remained for me.
Robbie and I married after a few years of dating. My family warmed to Robbie on account of the fact that he is actually quite a nice person, but they never warmed to the relationship or to the path I had chosen to take. As such, Robbie and I eloped, not wanting to make a big deal, but mostly because I didn’t feel comfortable enough to ask my father to walk me down the aisle.
As the years passed, I became more and more estranged from my family. We had moved to New York so that Robbie and Owen could have a better crack at the whip in a city that demanded a lot of lawyers. My parents visited after our first child was born, but chose to make phone calls and send gifts for the next two.
We never went to visit my family, and only called on occasions such as birthdays and Christmases. My life had become exactly what I wanted it to be, but I had never accounted for isolation being so intense.
Millie and Owen lived in the same building as us, but Millie had excelled at becoming a wife and mother and made links with other women in a similar situation. I would go along to various events with her and the other women, but I couldn’t mask my disdain at how superficial it all was.
Eventually, they stopped inviting me. Not long after the birth of our second child, Robbie and Owen went into partnership with a legal firm in London.
Financially it was a fantastic move, it meant that our kids would never have to worry about their education and they would be left with a nest egg after we had gone. For me, it meant that I became very dependent on my children for company, which wasn’t necessarily healthy.
Chapter Five
My father called one night when Robbie was in London. Something about that phone call made me open to him, not in full, but slightly. He encouraged me to take a course of some sort, whether it was online or on the weekends. He also implied that maybe I could hire somebody to look after the children and I could consider going into education full-time, make something of myself and meet like-minded people.
“You have the financial capacity to do it, Katie. Why not give it a shot? You’re still so young”.
Youth was on my side. I was married, a mother of two, but I was only 25. Rejuvenated by the phone call, I spent the next few days making lists and drawing up plans to make a proposition with Robbie when he came home.
“If I wanted to have a nanny raise our children, I wouldn’t have considered having them in the first place. Children need to be raised by their mother, not a stranger. Besides, what would you do in college? You didn’t do very well on your SAT’s”, Robbie said, smirking.
He had complete control over the situation, and over my life. I smiled at him, not wanting to argue, and resolved myself to a life a solitude.
We had our third child when I was 27. A little girl. Just like my own parents, I had two boys and a girl. I loved my kids, I loved all my children, but when Lola was born, I knew I wouldn’t let her make the mistakes that I had m
ade. I wouldn’t let her have her life defined by men, defined by her looks, defined by her gender.
I started to write lists of all the things I could remember my parents teaching me, and began to teach them to my children. I would buy the books I read, the films I watched, and the board games I played. I became completely invested in raising my kids the way I had been raised, and when it came to talking about relationships, I explained them clearly and coherently while feeling like a fraud. I wanted my children to do what I couldn’t; to live your life how you want to, and not feel constrained by what is expected of you.
By the time Lola started school, Robbie and me, though still married and still living in the same house, were becoming more and more estranged. The distance between us suited us both.
“I can’t emotionally connect with you,” he said to me one night, “I’m too concerned with expanding my business and making it successful that I can’t invest in you.”
Robbie had become quite the businessman, and not long after the London venture, he began to lose his humanity. Thankfully my family never visited. I couldn’t bear to have them see Robbie in this light, not when they were already so disillusioned by my decisions.
My yearning for more became even more insatiable. My want for passion, for heat, for human connection. With the children in school, I found there was a more time available to focus on myself.
One afternoon over coffee with Millie I told her that I would love to have a job. Smiling she said, “You know, I might just be able to help you with that.”
That very morning our mutual friend, Essie, had told Millie of a position that had opened in the office she worked at. Essie worked for a company that imported wine from Europe into the States. Wine. It couldn’t have been more than a sign if it tried.
I started at the office on a Wednesday morning. A bizarre morning to start a new job, but the position had come up quite unexpectedly, and it was a role the General Manager was eager to fill as fast as possible with very little fuss.
“A simple data entry position,” my friend Essie told me on the phone, “you’ll be great at it, and it will get you out of the house.” Being out of the house was almost insulting, implying that my house, my home with my husband and children, was a bad place to be. Certainly, I couldn’t argue, my house was a source of negativity, but there was a lot of love in the house, if only for my children and I.
The job Essie called me about started at 9.30 and finished at 4.00, which left enough time in my day to get my kids ready for school and meet them after it. It was the perfect schedule regarding finding my way in the professional world my husband so desperately wanted me to avoid while maintaining my mothering responsibilities.
Robbie had outright forbidden me to start this job, telling me that the children were his priority and he wanted them to feel secure in their lives. I told him that the position I was going for would not impact upon their lives in any way, and if it ever did, I would leave it for being their perfect mother. The morning I was due to start the job, Robbie was flying to London for the week.
“I’m incredibly disappointed in you, Katie. This is not what a marriage should be”, he scolded.
“Marriage?” I questioned. He walked out, knowing there was no answer to give.
Giddy at the prospect of creating my own life, making my own money, and having adult conversation for six hours of the day, I rambled into the office thirty minutes early after dropping the children at school. There were already some people at their desks. I scanned the room to look for Essie, but I couldn’t see her.
“Are you okay, honey?” a woman asked.
I followed the voice, but couldn’t figure out which of the women had spoken.
She stood up, “Sorry honey that was me! Are you ok?” she asked again.
“Oh, yes. I’m due to start here today, I’m just looking for Essie?” I explained.
“Ah, Katie,” she said, coming towards me, “you’re nice and early!”
She came straight up to me, gave me a kiss on the cheek, “Welcome Katie, I’m Florrie.”
I smiled, feeling a little overwhelmed by how nice she was, and perturbed by the chemistry I was feeling between us.
“I’m the General Manager here,” she told me.
Snapping into professional mode, I stood up straight and said, “How wonderful to meet you and thank you so much for giving me this opportunity!”
I must have sounded keen because Florrie started to giggle, “You’re welcome Katie, but it’s not as exciting as you seem. Let’s go and grab you a coffee and get to know one another”.
Chapter Six
Florrie was beautiful. There was no other word for it. She was stunning. She had long, thick, silver hair that she wore in a loose plait. She wore black jeans and a black top with red Jimmy Choo stilettos and a red cape.
Her eyes were a dazzling shade of green, nothing like I’ve ever seen before. She was wearing a red lipstick that was the exact shade of her cape and shoes. She was pristine and smelled like Chanel No.5. I was in awe.
There was a slight twang to her accent, but I couldn’t quite make out what it was. European perhaps?
“This is our coffee room, Katie. It’s here where we recant all our tales of woe and fix one another’s problems”, she laughed.
Eager to make conversation and not sound as flustered as I felt I asked, “have you worked here long, Florrie?”
“Too much time,” she laughed, “far too long! Well, you see, my husband owns the company, and despite my better judgment, I started working for him a year after we married, and have never left”, she smiled.
I smiled at her, somewhat jealous that she had a husband who wanted her to succeed independent of their marriage.
“What about you,” she asked, “what’s your story?”
I blushed, not because she was asking me anything I couldn’t answer, but that my answer would sound exactly as it was.
Ridiculous. “Well, I met my husband when I was quite young and married. We have three young children, and he believes I should be at home raising them, and not here working for you”, I blurted.
Florrie laughed, “Oh honey, you’ll do great here.”
The niggling craving I had for more in my life tripled in intensity when Florrie came into it. She stirred up sensations that I had suppressed for far too long, and nothing I could do could dampen them. I was instantly infatuated with her and harbored an insatiable need to be around her at all times.
Thankfully, she seemed to want to be around me a lot, too. Within my first week of working for her, Florrie and I had gone for lunch together twice. Long lunches. We would discuss everything, quite candidly, and as each moment passed chemistry between us grew much stronger.
Florrie instilled a sense of self-worth in me that I had lost many years ago. When we came to realize that her husband was one of Robbie’s most prestigious clients, she helped me use it to my advantage.
Within six weeks of working for her, Florrie had enabled me to convince Robbie to get a nanny in. This meant that I could have evenings free after work, and many of those evenings were spent in Florrie’s company, allowing her to wine and dine me, becoming intoxicated by the passion between us.
One afternoon I stepped into the pantry of the coffee room in work to look for some Nespresso capsules that Florrie kept hidden from everyone else. She had shown me where they were under the rule that I must make her a cup every time I made myself one. The rest of the office had full use of all the capsules apart from the limited edition Vanilla-Cardamom one that we had fallen in love with while perusing through the flavors in the Nespresso store near my house one evening after work.
It was nothing more than a private joke which we shared, but I loved having this connection with her. Unbeknownst to the two women who walked into the coffee room, I could hear every word they said. I sank, listening to them, my heart breaking into tiny little pieces.
“I guarantee you, they are dykes!” one told the other.
&nbs
p; “I don’t know, I think she might just be teachers’ pet. Do you think Florrie swings that way?” the other replied.
“Yes, don’t be so naïve, Florrie and her husband are nothing more than pals. There’s no passion between them at all. I actually heard that they don’t even live in the same house anymore”, she gossiped.
“Florrie and Katie are definitely a thing. Two, massive, lesbians. It’s so obvious you should see…” they were leaving the room, so I didn’t get to hear the end of her sentence.
I didn’t need to. The mere mention of the word “dyke” had unleashed emotions in me that I had first felt at 15 when Millie shouted it down the school corridor.
I made our coffees, went back to the office, sat down at my desk and tried too hard not to cry. My insecurities were completely taking over.
I sent Florrie an email, “Hi, don’t want to mention this out loud in the office, but, I’ve got quite a bad period. Would you mind if I went home to rest? Just don’t feel great”.
Florrie stood up and looked at me, “Good grief honey, you look terrible! Go home right away!” she exclaimed.
I caught a quick glance at the two women who had been gossiping. Having seen the coffees and the apparent state I was in, they had put two and two together and realized I had overheard their conversation. They dropped their heads rather than make eye contact with me.
I left the office and burst into tears. My illusions shattered. I couldn’t deny my feelings for Florrie, but I couldn’t bear being labeled by those women, particularly when I had no concrete evidence that Florrie felt for me how I felt for her. All I had was hope that she did, and a few subtle hints along the way, but nothing more.
I got to my house and let the nanny go home. I told her she didn’t need to come for the rest of the week because I would not be going to work.
She smiled but hesitated to leave, “Don’t worry, you’ll get paid for the week,” I told her sharply.
One Little Letter_A Bad Boy, Second Chance Romance Page 55
