Levels (The Swingtown Series Book 1)

by Jaime Whitley

  Copyright © 2015 by Jaime Whitley

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, distributed, stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form of by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, without express permission of the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes, if done so constitutes a copyright violation.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used.

  Edited by: Jess with Proof Reading By The Page.

  Formatted by: Brenda Wright with Formatting Done Wright.

  Book Cover Designed by: Jaime Whitley

  Acknowledgments

  These are going to be short and sweet.

  To my circle, Ferris, Skye, Tyf, Michelle, Heidi, Kathy, Jess, Gabbie, Stacey, and Tracy. I love you bitches and thank you for always supporting me!

  To my PA Tiffany, You’re the best PA ever, and I appreciate everything you do for me!

  To everyone in the lifestyle who took the time to talk to me and educate me on swinging, I appreciate all the time taken out of your daily schedules and all the knowledge you provided me with. To open up about something so personal and share your experiences with me is much appreciated. I have to say; you all have a heart of gold.

  Jamie, oh where should I start? Thank you for coming with me and remembering everything while I took notes. I hate the circumstance that brought us back together, but I’m glad we’re always able to pick right back up where we left off.

  Freddie, Thank you for always looking for errors.

  To the owners of a special club, I appreciate you letting me come in and see what a swingers club looks like and everything that is involved with running it.

  To my family, I love you to the moon and back. Never stop dreaming.

  To the readers, bloggers, I appreciate your continued support and couldn’t do any of this without you.

  Chapter 1

  When do you decide that enough is enough? That putting everyone else’s needs before yours isn’t okay anymore. When do you stop asking yourself if you’re settling with the life you’re living? There are different levels of being happy, where some needs are met to the fullest and others, well, let's just say some of the others are left collecting dust.

  I’ve always been a fighter, that person who never gives up. I’m always up for a challenge, and you will never see me backing down when I’m presented with one. After receiving some life-changing news today, I decided to fight a little harder and not give up on the one thing I’ve been craving the most. Intimacy.

  I have a husband who loves me. We’ve been through hell and back, managing to come out on top of it, so I know that we can tackle this together. I’m waiting for him to come home from another long day at work, and I’ve made his favorite dinner of lasagna, and even grabbed a six-pack of his favorite beer. I stopped at the lingerie store on the way home and picked up a baby blue satin slip with a low back, to wear tonight.

  I want the news I’m sharing with him tonight to end on a good note, not a sad one. I know with his support this whole thing will be a little less scary. I hear Justin’s car pull up and I suddenly feel sick. I always worry about what mood he might be in. He’s been so tired lately and working hard. Being in the Army is hard enough, but when you’re going through the SOCM course to become a medic, it can be really stressful. You’re cramming years of medical school into only two years. To say it’s tiring is an understatement. Some days I’m lucky if I even get a hello when he walks through the door. Pulling the lasagna out of the oven, I place it on top of the stove and light the candles that are sitting on the table between the plates just as the front door opens.

  “Hey babe, something smells good.” Walking over, he places a kiss on my cheek.

  “I made your favorite.”

  “I’m just going to shower real quick and change clothes. Give me ten minutes and I’ll be right down. If you want, you and the kids can start without me.” I’m a little annoyed as he walks straight upstairs and doesn’t notice that there are only two plates on the table. It’s obvious that the kids aren’t home, but he’s distracted, not noticing the little things like normal. Tonight though, I’m not going to let it sour my mood. Walking over to the island, I grab the bottle of wine I opened earlier and pour myself a glass. I lean back against the unit and wait for him to come back down. Hearing his feet hit the stairs; I walk over to the table with my glass of wine and take a seat at the table.

  “You didn’t have to wait for me, Katrina. Where are the kids?” He looks around the silent house back to the table, finally realizing it’s only set for two. He sits across from me, a look of confusion on his face.

  “Alex is spending the night at a friend’s, so I sent Gabriella to my dad’s for the night. I figured that it’s been a while since we had an evening alone together; I thought it would be nice to spend some time together, just us. Plus there’s something that I need to talk to you about, and I’d rather not discuss it around the kids.”

  “Oh, okay.” He’s a little hesitant with his words as he reaches across the table and scoops some lasagna onto his plate.

  “So, you know that I went to the doctor today, right?” Grabbing the bowl of salad, I fill my dish and slide it across the table to Justin.

  “Yeah, your annual. What about it?”

  “Justin, it wasn’t my annual. It was for the pain I’ve been experiencing in my stomach. Remember? I was seeing a new specialist. We only discussed this two days ago.” The annoyance comes through in my tone, but I can’t help it. Sometimes I feel like if it doesn’t benefit him, he doesn’t listen. I’ve always been fit. I visit the gym regularly, and I eat well, but lately I’ve been getting fatigued easily and even doing something as simple as a sit-up will cause extreme pain in my stomach. I notice that with each day I manage to drag myself to do some exercise, the flushing and fatigue gets even worse. Then the diarrhea started, and I knew it was time to see a doctor. Something was happening to my body that wasn’t normal, I felt like it didn’t belong to me, so I knew I needed to get it checked. I talked to Justin about my concerns, and he agreed that I needed to see a doctor. How this easily slipped his mind is aggravating.

  “Right, sorry babe. You know how it is with work. I have so much to remember, and it’s really important that I don’t fail this course.”

  “I know. I get it.” I do get it, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say it gets a little tiring of him forgetting everything when it comes to us.

  “You know, you say you get it but every time I forget something you’re always so quick to jump down my throat and give me an attitude about it. I sometimes feel like you don’t realize how stressful this school really is.” How did this conversation turn around to be about him?

  “Wait a minute. First off, I didn’t jump down your throat.” I try to keep my voice calm, not walking into his accusations.

  “You’re attitude says otherwise.” My attitude? My attitude? I swear if I show him how I feel at this moment he would accuse me of having more than just an attitude. He does this whenever he forgets something and always turns it around to make me at fault.

  “Justin, I don’t have an attitude. Trust me you would know if I had one.” Pushing my plate across the table, I’ve suddenly lost my appetite.

  “So you’re not going to eat now?”
His tone has me biting the inside of my cheek, trying not to tell him exactly how I feel. I need to talk to him, and I saw it going very differently from this.

  “Can we not do this tonight? I had a lovely evening planned out for us. Can we just start over?” Sitting back in my chair, I place my hands on my lap as my fists clench together. I should have known this night wouldn’t turn out the way I planned it.

  “Fine, we’ll start over.” Picking up his fork, he points it at my plate I pushed away. “Eat please.”

  As we sit and eat, the only noise in the room is the forks hitting the plates. I know I need to tell him about my appointment, but after the way our evening has gone already, I’m not sure if tonight is the best time for it. I know we said we would start the night over, but I have a feeling it’s better just to try another day. As if he can read my thoughts he places his fork down.

  “So what did the doctor say?” He takes a drink from the glass in front of him, but his eyes never leave me.

  “Well, he was worried about the pains and the weight gain and so he did an ultrasound and an MRI. He said he wanted to check what he couldn’t see from the outside, which was nothing.” I don’t know why I'm explaining things like this to him, he's training for all this, but nerves are making me need to fill the silence.

  “Well that’s good he’s looking at it from all possible angles. Did the scans show anything? Do they have any idea what’s causing all these problems? Or do they still think it's just acid reflux from all the previous visits with the old doctors?”

  Clearing my throat, I stumble on my words before being able to pull it together. “Well, um, they found a tumor.”

  He shoves another bite of lasagna in his mouth and just stares at me. I can't believe he's still eating and acting like there's nothing wrong. My attitude gets the better of me. "I can't believe you right now."

  "What?" Speaking through his mouthful makes me want to throw wine in his face. The one time I need him to be there for me, the one time I want him to give a shit and he sits there eating as if I told him they discovered a hangnail.

  "Are you serious right now? Did you not just hear me? They found a fucking tumor Justin. A tumor!" My voice is loud and at this moment I'm glad the kids aren’t here.

  "Babe, a tumor doesn't mean the end of the world. It might mean nothing. Not all tumors are cancerous. There’s no reason to stress yourself out when it could be nothing."

  My vision turns red as he takes a drink of his water and places another bite of food in his mouth. “Un-fucking-believable.” Pushing myself up from my chair, I throw my napkin on the table. I grab my glass from the table and the bottle of wine before I storm upstairs. My anger is starting to take over my body as I enter the bathroom, slamming the door behind me. I need to calm down, so I start running a bath, adding my favorite bubble bath as a treat.

  Waiting for the tub to fill with water, I fill my glass up with wine and wait. When the tub finally reaches the top, I turn the water off and slowly step in, letting my body adjust to the heat of the water. When my body is finally submerged into the heat, I rest my head back and take a nice long sip of wine. I’m not surprised that Justin hasn’t come to try and smooth things over. We’ve had a lot of struggles in our marriage and almost called it quits at one point. I’m thankful for baby number two, because if we didn’t have that surprise pregnancy, we probably would have been divorced by now. In a way, that baby saved our marriage. I know they say you shouldn’t have a baby to save a marriage but ours was falling apart at the time I found out I was pregnant, and it pushed us into counseling. That’s when we decided not to give up, and we came out of it stronger than before.

  As soon as things got back on track, Justin started the medical course, and things started to slip slowly back to the way it was again. He started bringing home the stress of his job instead of leaving it at work and sometimes he even took it out on me with the way he would talk. As the class went on, his days got longer, and as the days got longer, our sex life pretty much became non-existent. And not from a lack of effort from me, I would try to touch him, to make him feel good but every time I’m met with the same response. ‘I’m tired; it’s been a long day’ or ‘okay but can we make it quick?’ So pretty much it’s always a wham bam thank you ma'am kind of fuck, leaving no room for romance. Everyone has insecurities, and I can’t help but feel at times that he isn’t attracted to me anymore. After gaining a couple of extra pounds, I'm not happy with my body so how can I expect him to be?

  After soaking for about thirty minutes and finishing off the bottle of wine, there’s a knock on the door. Opening my eyes, I turn my head to the door where my blue satin slip is hanging, basically mocking me.

  “Are you going to be in there long? I’d really like to finish our conversation.” Justin asks through the door. Sure he can pick the lock and let himself in but that would require effort.

  “I’ll be out in a couple minutes. I’m just about to finish up.” Sighing, I think about leaving the bath. I don’t want to leave my little safe haven; I’m so relaxed, and I don’t want to walk out there and have another argument. I’m tired of arguing and just want sex. That’s all I wanted this evening, to tell my husband about my day and be comforted in his arms and have it lead to a little bit of intimacy. Is that too much to ask for, a little support and love from the man I love? Deciding not to give up on what I want, I dry off and slip on the lingerie I bought.

  Walking out of the bathroom, I’m a little disappointed to see that Justin is already in his boxers and under the covers ready for bed. He’s reading a medical book and doesn’t bother looking up at me when he hears the door open. Clearing my throat to get his attention, he looks up above the book smiling at me. Okay so maybe there is hope for me after all. Walking over to the bed, I lift the covers and slide into bed cuddling up next to him. He lifts his arm, and I snuggle right into his chest.

  “I’m sorry if you felt like I was insensitive. I just don’t want you to be stressing out and worrying. Until they have tested it and got the results, there is no point worrying. I don’t want us to go to that dark, ugly place unless we have to. But I have complete faith that it’s going to come back noncancerous. You’re too much of a badass woman to get cancer.” His words are soothing, but it doesn’t help ease the worry in the back of my mind.

  “But what if it does come back cancerous, then what?” He kisses the top of my head, and I snuggle in closer to him, enjoying the feel of his body.

  “Then we battle it together. We will do whatever it takes to make sure you kick that cancer’s ass and like everything else we’ve been through, we will come out of it on top.” He grabs my hand in his and brings it up to his lips kissing it.

  Lifting my body off his chest, I bring my lips to his, connecting them as he wraps his arm around my waist pulling me closer to him. I brush my tongue against his lips, and he opens his mouth slightly, allowing me access but only for a short minute before he pulls away as I’m sliding my hand down to his cock.

  “You look incredible, you really do. But I’m so tired and had a long day.” He takes my hand and pushes it off him to the side of the bed. “Tomorrow is a half day, and I won’t be as tired. I promise we will put this outfit to good use then. I've got to get some rest though because I have to be up at four thirty.” Kissing me quickly on the lips, he turns and faces away from me. “Goodnight babe, love you.”

  “Love you, too.” I murmur and slide out of bed. If he’s not going to give me the pleasure I need I might as well go clean up and give myself the pleasure my body is craving. Besides, it’s not like he’s going to notice I’m missing.

  After changing into sweats, I head downstairs to pack away the food that was barely touched. I clean up all the dishes and make sure the kitchen is spotless before going upstairs, heading towards the guest bedroom instead of ours. If my husband isn’t going to have sex with me, he sure as hell isn’t going to get to watch me pleasure myself.

  I slide my panties off and get comforta
ble on the bed, my head resting on the comfortable pillows. I close my eyes and let my mind drift. It lands on one of the many fantasies that I have, but this one is my favorite. As images play out in my mind, I slowly move my hand down my stomach, the muscles tensing under my feather light touch. I can feel my clit start to pulse even before my fingers reach it, the thought alone being almost enough to send me over the edge. I finally slide my fingers through the wetness that’s already there, rubbing around my clit so I don’t orgasm too soon, I want this to last. Sadly, it doesn’t take much these days to get me going since I’ve been so deprived. I decided to go old school tonight, not using one of my many toys. I gently flick two fingers over my clit, feeling the area swell under the attention, and with my other hand I tease my rigid nipple, pulling slightly to make them ache. The images in my head come faster. Bodies moving together. Skin rubbing on skin. The smell of sex surrounding me. I feel my muscles tighten as the final thought, the vision of release, is enough to have me reaching my peak, and I erupt into an earth shattering orgasm. I lie there, feeling my body convulse for several minutes before I have the energy to open my eyes. That orgasm was amazing, and very much needed, but even though my body feels sated right now, it still feels like something is missing. I don’t quite get that feeling of fulfillment I want. I sigh and get up from the bed, grabbing my panties and putting them on. I return to my bedroom and climb into bed, joining my husband who is already passed out.

  Chapter 2

  Four weeks later

  Today is the day. Today I find out how the rest of my life is going to be. I’m either going to walk away from here without a care in the world, or I’m going to have the battle of a lifetime on my hands. Things with Justin have pretty much been the same. Yeah, he kept good on his promise but the sex was over just as soon as it started. I know I sound selfish, but I wanted more. I want passion and an intense connection as we join together, not just feeling like we’re doing it for the sake of it. We can be so close sometimes, yet when we have sex, it’s like we’re millions of miles away from each other.