by Rachel Lyndhurst; Carmen Falcone; Ros Clarke; Annie Seaton; Christine Bell
Then again, maybe she was just horny. She tried to remember the last time she had sex and got two years back before stopping with an inward groan. It was depressing, but it did give her some hope that it wasn’t about Owen at all. She’d read in Cosmo that women hit their sexual peak in their thirties. So what if she was a couple years shy of her thirtieth birthday? Maybe she was an early peaker and Owen’s interest, feigned or not, had awakened something in her that had been dormant for so long. That had to be it. Not the man himself, but a handsome, sexy guy in the right place at the right time.
“Pay attention,” Owen said.
“I am,” she said, a little louder than necessary. The woman seated to her right gave them the stink-eye and Lindy mouthed a sheepish apology.
“Miranda will be coming around with a box and some labels. We ask that you please write your name on a label, affix it to your cell phone and set it in the box.” Nico laughed at the groans and held up a hand. “I know some of you have pressing business, and this is not mandatory, but it symbolizes to your partner how committed you are to the process. Alternately, from this point forward, we ask that you refrain from bringing any cell phones to couple’s activities. You have several breaks during the day to go back to your room and make calls.”
“Now,” their host concluded, “enjoy a light brunch, get to know one another a little. Then each couple will meet with an advisor who will give you your questionnaires and create a schedule for you. Tonight the group will reconvene here for dinner and to play some games. Until then, treat one another with respect, and always speak with love in your heart.”
Owen swore under his breath, and she elbowed him in the ribs.
“He’s a right prick though, isn’t he?” His nostrils flared even as his accent thickened.
“You better chill out. He’s coming this way and you’re going to blow it.”
Nico was working the small crowd, introducing himself to each of the dozen or so couples in turn. He reached them and treated her to wide smile.
“Mrs. O’Neil. Mr. O’Neil. Pleasure.” He shook Owen’s hand, then took hers and pressed a light kiss to her knuckles.
“Stephanopoulos,” Owen said with a nod, although the accompanying smile was more like the baring of teeth.
“We’re thrilled to have you here. I look forward to working with you both as your journey progresses. Did you want to surrender your phones?” He held a finger up to Miranda, prepared to beckon her over.
“’Fraid not,” Owen said flatly. She caught his gaze and gave him a dirty look. He seemed to thaw a bit and added, “I’ve pressing business, but it is a great idea for those who can.”
“We’ll leave them behind during sessions, though. Right, darling?” Lindy said, smiling brightly at Owen.
“Of course.”
“That’s fine,” Nico said, seemingly unaware of Owen’s initial surliness. “And please, should you need anything at all, don’t hesitate to ask me.” The words were harmless, but the flicker of heat in his direct gaze as he bid her farewell sent Lindy’s sleaze-o-meter whirling.
Owen took her arm and led her to a long table that fairly groaned under the array of food spread out. “I think he likes me,” she said through the side of her mouth as she filled her plate.
“Maybe that’s the con. He seduces unhappy wives out of their husband’s fortunes.”
“Or maybe he likes me,” she countered waspishly.
They’d just reached the fruit station when a male voice boomed, “Howdy!” A robust man in his early fifties held out a meaty paw. “The name is Calvin Cedarhurst. This is my wife, Bitsy.”
Bitsy Cedarhurst was about the most aptly named individual Lindy ever had the pleasure of meeting. She was a mousy slip of a thing with a sweet smile, and Lindy warmed to her instantly.
“Nice to meet you both. Let me guess. Texas?”
“You got it, pretty lady.” He gave her a wink and turned to Owen. “How about y’all?”
“Long Island is home base right now.”
“Never been. Worth a trip?”
“It’s lovely in the springtime, but you might want to pass this time of year,” Lindy said with a polite smile.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” He tipped an imaginary hat her way and ushered Bitsy toward the pasta bar. “It was a pleasure meeting you. Me and the wife are going to get some food.”
She and Owen sat with their plates, but before she got a bite in, another couple approached them, this time led by the woman who had visually “shushed” her during Nico’s welcome speech. Lindy pasted on a polite smile.
“Do you mind if we sit with you?” She didn’t wait for an answer, settling into the chair across from Owen. “All the other seats are taken. They really should’ve planned better,” she griped, barely taking a breath before continuing. “This place is much smaller than I expected, too. Marty’s secretary gave us the name, and believe me, she’ll be hearing from me once we get back.”
Marty sat down next to his wife and gave them both a nod of greeting. He couldn’t have been more than forty, but the overall weariness he wore like a cloak gave him an older vibe. He had a nice face, the kind that if you saw him on the street and needed directions you’d feel safe stopping to ask him.
“I’m Lindy,” she said, swallowing hard before continuing, “And this is my husband Owen.”
“That’s Marty and I’m Jordan.”
Lindy filed the names away. Marty might not stick in her head, but Jordan rhymed with warden, and that’d be a keeper for sure.
“I’ve been thinking it’s time to let her go anyway,” Jordan the Warden confided. “Whenever I call she puts me on hold forever. Marty is my husband, and if I need to speak with him, I need to speak with him immediately. I always say, good help is hard to find. Don’t you agree?”
Marty didn’t react much other than to look away. His wife was an absolute steamroller, and Lindy resisted the urge to hug him. She let out a nervous chuckle, weighing her answer. What would rich folks say here? “I rally do. In fact I was saying to Owen the other day, we need to get rid of the whole lot and start fresh, don’t we darling?” Her voice had dropped into Myrna Loy mode and she saw Owen’s wince out of the corner of her eye.
“Don’t…no. Not that,” he muttered under his breath with an almost imperceptible shake of his head.
She felt her cheeks flush and cleared her throat before continuing in a more normal tone. “As I was saying, it’s a constant battle.”
Jordan nodded sympathetically while Marty appeared to contemplate eating a bullet.
“So, Marty, what type of work do you do?”
He opened his mouth but The Warden beat him to the punch. “He’s a surgeon specializing in facial reconstructions. Tell them, Marty,” she said. It was a fake out, though. She had no intention of letting him talk. She again took the stage, telling them story after story about wild dogs attacking toddlers and a gory table saw incident. By the time they were through, Lindy had barely touched her food but had no appetite. She was considering feigning a headache to get away from them when an attractive blonde in a conservative updo approached their table with a smile.
“Mr. and Mrs. O’Neil? I’m Sarabeth and I’ll be your advisor. If you’re through eating, why don’t we head into one of the conference rooms and have a little intro session?”
Lindy and Owen nearly knocked each other over in their haste to get away from their companions.
“We’ll save you a seat at dinner!” Jordan called to them as they followed Sarabeth out of the great room.
Owen slipped an arm around Lindy’s shoulder and bent low. “Kill me first,” he muttered.
The warm puff of air caressing the shell of her ear sent a shiver straight down her spine, but she managed to force a smile.
“Right in here,” Sarabeth said, waving them into a small, sparsely appointed conference room.
They sat around a glass table and their advisor set a sheaf of papers in front of each of them. “As you know fr
om our brochure, we’ll be meeting three times a week to work on communication and any issues that you might be having right now. The first thing we try to do here at the center is to establish some goals. I’d like you both to take a minute to jot down what you hope to get out of this experience. Then, on the same sheet, I want you to write down the one thing that’s non-negotiable in your relationship with one another. Any questions?”
They both shook their heads.
“Go ahead, then.”
Lindy and Owen had talked about what reason they would give for being at the resort, agreeing to keep it vague, so that wasn’t an issue. It was the other question that caught her off guard. She risked a glance at Owen. He’d already set his pencil down and was staring out the window. What had he said earlier? It was easier to maintain a lie when it was close to the truth. With a shrug, she turned back to her writing.
Another minute passed before Sarabeth spoke again. “Okay, that’ll do for now. Turn your chairs and face one another.”
They both did as she’d requested, but Owen couldn’t hide his disdain for the task.
Sarabeth patted his hand gently. “Don’t worry, it’s not so bad. You’d be surprised. By the end of week one, many men are happy to share intimate thoughts with their wives face to face.”
He gave a derisive snort. Lindy tried to imagine how she would’ve felt if she was, indeed, Mrs. O’Neil and sniped, “Really, Owen. Is it going to kill you to be open-minded for once?”
He sent her a warning glare beneath his thick black lashes, but it didn’t have the desired effect. A thrill of anticipation rushed through her. This could be fun.
“I’m here, aren’t I?” he growled.
“So like a man to think that’s enough, am I right, Sarabeth?” she said with a conspiratorial eye roll. “All you’ve got to do is show up, and you’re off the hook. I might let you slide with that attitude in bed, mister, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you do it here. It’s time to repair some of the damage you’ve done with your apathy, don’t you think?”
Owen’s eyes went wide before narrowing and taking on a devilish gleam. Suddenly, every nerve in her body stood at attention, and her brain silently screamed, “Abort! Abort!”
“Not to say that I’m p-perfect,” she stuttered, frantically trying to back-pedal. One look at Owen’s lethal smile, and she knew it was too little, too late.
“Apathy? Darling, I’m not apathetic, I’m knackered. Your appetites are…unconventional to say the least, and by the time the props are put away, I need to rest. As much as I want to please you, it’s unreasonable to expect it three and four times a day.” He leaned close, letting his gaze trip over her lips and down to pass over her breasts like a caress. “And, frankly, some of your requests make me feel,” he wrinkled his nose and dropped his voice to a whisper, “so dirty.”
Lindy squeezed her eyes closed, wracking her brain for a coherent response, but she couldn’t manage more than a choked gack before Sarabeth interceded.
“This is all really good stuff.” She cleared her throat and pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose. “Thank you both for your willingness to share your truths with me, and one another. What say we put a pin in that, and once we work through some of the basics we can revisit this topic later in the week, hmm?”
The room positively hummed with tension, but her sure smile never wavered. She jotted down some notes in the file in front of her before continuing. “Okay, back to the exercise. Owen, why don’t you go first? Tell Lindy what you hope to get out of this experience, and the one thing you expect from her in your marriage, above all else.”
She stared sightlessly at the sheet of paper trembling in her hand. She could sense Owen’s gaze drilling into her. Antagonizing him had been a crucial misstep on her part and she had no clue how to get back on safer ground. She’d poked the beast, and now he was awake and on the prowl. Aside from brief flashes of it that were quickly masked, like when she’d sprayed him in the mouth with perfume, or when they’d kissed earlier, he’d come across as confident but affable most of the time. Smart move on his part. If she’d seen more of this side of him—the wilder side—she would have never taken the job. It was hard enough being around him when he was on a leash. Without the civilized veneer in place, he would eat her alive.
As she met his knowing gaze, heat sizzled between them, building an ache low in her belly, and she couldn’t for the life of her recall why that would be such a bad thing.
…
Owen couldn’t take his eyes off Lindy as she regarded him with a heady mix of want and trepidation. Good. She should be afraid. Hell, he was so close to the edge he was scaring himself. She dampened that smart mouth of hers with the tip of her tongue and he stared, enthralled. His body amped to high alert, and it took every ounce of his willpower not to pounce on her.
Sarabeth cleared her throat delicately again, breaking the spell. “Owen?”
Focus.
He came back to reality with a thump and tore his gaze from a relieved looking Lindy. “Sorry, yes.” He glanced at the piece of paper on his lap. “I’m here to connect with my wife the way we used to earlier in our marriage.” A bit of fluff that actually said nothing at all, but he couldn’t imagine many of the other men coming up with anything better.
Sarabeth nodded encouragingly. “Very good, Owen. Over the next few visits we’ll try to pinpoint the things you miss most about that time, all right? Now tell us the one thing you expect from Lindy in your marriage, above all.”
“Loyalty,” he said instinctively. Lindy shot him a puzzled look. That hadn’t been what he’d written down and she knew it. He’d better learn to separate Owen Phipps from Owen O’Neil, or he was in danger of revealing more to his accomplice than he’d ever revealed to anyone.
“Now you, Lindy.”
“I’m here because life’s too short to be unhappy, but we made a commitment. I don’t just want to make it ‘work.’ To me, that means settling…jury-rigging it up until it functions. That’s not what I’m looking for in my forever relationship. I want to fix it until it’s right and really…good.” Her voice rang with sincerity, and Sarabeth gave her a beaming smile.
“Excellent,” she said, scribbling furiously in her book.
It sure was. A pretty reasoned approach to a relationship. Why should a person settle for “so-so” if, with a little elbow grease, true contentment could be achieved? Maybe a re-assessment of his own thoughts on choosing a partner was in order.
Filing that away for later examination, he regarded Lindy through new eyes. Her funny, oddball charm camouflaged how together she really was in some aspects. He found himself not only enjoying her company immensely, but also respecting her ideas more with each passing hour.
“And what’s the non-negotiable for you?”
“I want a man whose face lights up when I walk into a room.”
Sarabeth’s eyes went suspiciously soft for a second, the encouraging therapist-mask faltering. “Yeah,” she breathed. “That’s exactly it, isn’t it?”
Something intangible passed between the women and Lindy nodded slowly. “Simple as that.”
Right when he’d given her credit for being sensible she had to go and parade around some nonsense. “Not to burst your bubble, ladies, but that’s nothing more than drivel out of a romance novel. In real life, you give someone that kind of power you’re leaving yourself open to world of hurt. More than half of marriages don’t last, and of those that do, most probably aren’t happy ones. If your sun rises and sets on a person and they call it quits, where does that leave you?”
The women exchanged a nervous look, but neither responded.
“I’ll tell you where. Alone in the bloody dark.”
Chapter Six
“That went well,” Lindy said, forcing as much enthusiasm as she could muster into her tone.
“Did it?” Owen’s voice was deceptively soft and he closed their suite door behind him.
Since early that
afternoon, right about the time she’d suggested he was lame in bed, he’d been exuding an energy that had her so on edge, she could hardly stand it. Fortunately, after their session with Sarabeth, they’d been separated for some “me-time” workshops. One was geared toward the husbands, the other toward the wives. It had been a blessed reprieve. She’d hoped by the time they were alone again, the whole pissing match they’d gotten into in their therapy session would have blown over.
No such luck.
“Yeah. Especially the confidence-building session I was in with the other women. I think I made some good connections with a couple of the wives that I can start to mine over the next few days and see if they’ve been approached about investment opportunities or anything.” She shucked off her shoes and padded over the plush carpet to the bar for a seltzer, determined not to look at him.
“I agree. The men were fairly talkative in mine as well, but I’m not interested in that right now. I’m much more interested in discussing our meeting with Sarabeth. You think that went well, Lindy?”
She took a gulp of soda and set it on the bar. “It was our first consultation and all, so we have to work out some kinks.” She cringed at the word choice, recalling Owen’s “confession” about her “appetites” to Sarabeth. “Bu-ut, all in all, not bad. She definitely believed we were a couple, which is all that matters, right?”
Owen held her gaze, advancing closer. “In a perfect world, yes.” He kept coming at her, with slow, purposeful steps.
Her teeth chattered and she took a tentative step back. “Cool. So we’re all good here, then.” She held up two thumbs and wheeled around, heading for the bedroom. “I’m going to take a shower, probably a long one. Feel free to, you know, go somewhere or whatever,” she called over her shoulder.
