“You sound tired. Try to get some rest while the little princess is with me.”
“Yeah. I love you Luke. I want you to know that.”
“I love you Kimber. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight Luke.”
Kimber hung up her phone. She set her phone aside on the night stand and then laid her head on Luke’s pillow. She knew that soon his scent would fade completely and it made her want to cry. She did cry a little before she fell into a dreamless sleep.
Paul
The month that he had paid for at the economy suites had passed and Sierra didn’t change her mind about him coming home, so Paul paid for another month with a heavy heart. He looked at his marriage and wondered how it could have possibly gone so wrong.
He had never imagined marrying a woman like Sierra. He had imagined settling down and having kids with a girl that would stay home and raise their children and who was content to have sex twice a week like his parents had.
But when he’d met Sierra any thoughts of other women has been seriously blown out of the water. He’d seen her checking him out and was afraid that she only admired him because he was good looking, but he’d figured out that Sierra wasn’t someone that looked at people and thought about the way they looked first thing. She had been friends with her unique looking college roommate and still was. She was sassy and spoke her mind but she was kind too and she’d talked to everyone no matter what they looked like.
He had been afraid that she was a lesbian and chose not to be open about it because he had heard rumors and had actually been close enough to witness her turn guys down when they asked to take her out. It had taken him what had seemed like forever to get up the courage to ask her out. But they had always seemed to him at least to make the perfect couple. Their differences were complimentary and they agreed on all the things that really mattered.
He knew that she probably still felt like he was too old fashioned about some things but he thought that they compromised well too. He hoped that if his dream came true and Kimber’s child did indeed belong to Luke that they could work on their marriage, talk things out and make their marriage stronger than ever before. It killed him to think of losing her permanently and the thought of starting a relationship with another woman even years down the road, terrified him.
So he tried not to pressure Sierra, while still letting her know that he loved her. He kept the hope alive in his heart that they would reconcile without letting himself hope too much, because he was afraid that he wouldn’t be able to take it if his hopes were high and they were dashed completely if his relationship with Sierra ended in divorce.
Kimber
Kimber felt some of her uneasiness leave her as the days passed. It felt good to have been honest with Luke about her encounter with Paul and she felt like she wasn’t putting undue stress on the baby any longer. But her heart ached and their bed felt empty.
Alexis seemed to feel a lot better than she had during their first separation since Kimber had lied to her about where her father was and hadn’t allowed Luke to see their daughter. But Kimber knew that Alexis missed having Daddy around all of the time. Kimber certainly missed having Luke around too.
Their house seemed to feel his absence. Little things kept going wrong that she didn’t know how to fix. She felt like she was bugging him when she called him because there was an issue with the kitchen sink or the shower in their bathroom, but he assured her that she could call him anytime.
Kimber thought that he missed her just as much as she missed him, but she knew that the decision to come home had to be his and that he had to feel confident about his true feelings before he could return home and be her husband again.
Luke
Luke felt like he was living in the middle of a bad dream sometimes. He thought about his marriage and wondered how in the hell such a beautiful thing could have gone so wrong. Thoughts of his wife and the child she carried consumed his every moment when he wasn’t caring for their daughter.
There were days when he convinced himself that he loved Kimber enough that he could love the baby even if it wasn’t his and that he could be her husband ‘til death do us part like he had truly planned on when he’d said their wedding vows. But there were also days when he knew in his heart that he could not say with 100% honesty or even 90% honesty that he could raise another man’s child.
So with as much as Luke wanted to return home, and with as much as he loved Kimber, he stayed away. He kept Alexis at least every other weekend and sometimes during the week. He tried to write songs but they turned out all wrong. He was glad that he had done well enough at it in the past and had had other lucky breaks such as his inheritance from his uncle as well, that he had a good deal of money in savings. He wouldn’t have felt right about using Kimber’s money from the book store to live apart from her.
When little things started going wrong with the house, he thought at first that Kimber was causing the issues herself or making them up. But he realized that that was not the kind of woman she was, and also that her aunt’s house was old and they hadn’t updated it much since they’d lived there together. He thought that some home improvement was probably about due if he made the decision to go home, and patiently fixed all of the little issues that the old house threw at him while he was away.
But sometimes he did wish that he had someone to talk to about the way he felt about Kimber’s encounter with Paul. He found himself wanting to call Sierra more and more as time went on. It wasn’t that he wanted to screw things up even more by creating an immense pile of shit and starting another affair with her, it was that he knew that she had to feel at least some of what he felt.
Sierra
Sierra was a little drunk when the phone rang. She sighed, figuring that it was Paul and that there was something about their son that worried him or he thought he wasn’t doing right. He was certainly less uptight than he had been when she was pregnant or right after their son was born, but he still drove her crazy sometimes thinking that he wasn’t being the father that he should be. He was a wonderful father, and even with as much as she felt like she hated him sometimes, she would never try to take Nathan away from him.
When she looked at the caller ID, it read ‘Lucas Stone.’ Her heart started to beat fast. She was worried that there was something wrong with Kimber or the baby. She couldn’t hate Kimber or wish any ill will towards the child that she carried.
“Hello.”
“Hi Sie. I’m drunk.”
Sierra laughed. “I’m getting there too. Is everything okay?”
“Yep. I’m sorry for bugging you. I really didn’t think before I dialed your number. For all I know you’re sitting next to your husband right now and my calling is just going to start another fight.”
Sierra sighed and took a sip of her wine. She knew that she was probably drinking too much lately, but she felt so on edge all of the time. Nathan seemed to be getting another new tooth every time she turned around and teething made him so miserable. She was sure that it would have been hard enough on her as it was without having to deal with the fact that Paul may have impregnated Kimber.
“We’re still separated. You and Kimber too, I guess.”
“Yeah. It sucks huh? Do you ever think about them together?”
“I can’t because it would drive me crazy. But it’s pretty screwed up that we feel this way when we messed around for months though.”
“Yeah. But you were pregnant and we were in love. Well, we weren’t in love at the time when we were making love but you know what I mean Sie-you were there too.”
She laughed. “Yes I was. And I made the first real move. I just felt so unattractive and I had to know that someone still wanted me. Damn. I’m sorry Luke. I didn’t mean it like that. I wouldn’t have gone to bed with any other man. Or at least I sure as hell hope I wouldn’t have. You meant something to me. You’ll always mean something me to. Paul still doesn’t get it. He doesn’t understand how I can still love you and desire you whe
n he’s the one that I want to be with.”
“Kimber doesn’t get that either. Do you think we should feel better or worse that they just had sex when we made love?”
“Hell, I don’t know. Probably better. If there wasn’t a baby in the middle of all of this, we wouldn’t be separated right now. I would have kicked him out for a couple days and yelled at him for being an asshole and talked him into having a lot more sex, but that would have been that.”
“Yeah. We don’t really have a right to say anything when we did what we did. But it makes me sick to think that Kimber is carrying your husband’s baby. It would piss me off to no end that she was carrying another guy’s kid anyway, but the fact that the child growing inside of my wife’s body might be YOUR husband’s Sie, damn that’s. . . I can’t describe it.”
“I know. That complicates things even more. If our spouses have a kid together, that means that if we stay married to them, we’ll have to see each other. And that’s going to drive everyone crazy. They’ll be thinking that we’re plotting to run away together or create a baby together so that they’ll understand the way that we feel. That will have us all headed for divorce court sooner or later anyway. Do you think that you’ll divorce her if the baby is Paul’s?”
“With the way I feel right now I think that’s the only fair thing to do. I love my daughter and I love Kimber, but I can’t pretend that it’s okay if her child isn’t mine. I think that it would be hard enough if we had separated for more than a few weeks and she had ended up pregnant with someone else’s kid and been honest about it from the get go. We were technically separated when it happened but it still really sucks. She pretty much told me that it was a great fuck too.”
Sierra almost choked on the sip she had just taken of her wine. She swallowed and took a sip from the bottle of water that was sitting next to her wine on the table. “What? Okay, I’m not saying that Paul is a bad lover. But he doesn’t want sex the way I do. He never has. Maybe if I hadn’t met you that would be okay with me. But sex with you is so incredible. Even when we weren’t saying I love you, and when it was down and dirty screwing it was making love because it was this beautiful joining together of our bodies.”
Luke cleared his throat. “I know Sie. That’s one of the reasons that it was so easy for us to pretend that our affair was justified. You throw that together with the fact that we still love each other and it seems pretty damned easy to think that it was okay. But it wasn’t and we both know that. If Kimber and Paul had had a history together and felt for each other what you and I feel for one another, it would be really weird, but maybe it would be easier for us to understand? Hell, I don’t know. Sometimes, sex is one thing and making love is another. Sometimes it’s not. Maybe I would feel better if your husband hadn’t just fucked my wife and maybe I wouldn’t. I am so damned confused that it’s driving me out of my mind.”
“I know what you mean Luke. Do you think that if the baby is yours you’ll go back to her? That your marriage will be the way it was? There’s a part of me that wants that so badly for Paul and I, but I’m so afraid that things will never be the same.”
“Life will be a lot less complicated all around if the baby is mine-that’s for damned sure. My heart aches to think about divorcing Kimber. I love her so much. But I can’t go home right now. It kills me to see the pain I’m putting her through when I pick Alexis up and drop her off, but until I’m 100% sure that I can act like a man and love the baby the way it should be loved whether it’s mine or not, I can’t go home.”
“I don’t think I could love Kimber’s baby the way I love Nathan either. The thought of divorcing Paul really sucks, but I’m not going to hurt an innocent child to keep my husband in my life.”
“Yeah.” Luke sighed. She heard him light a cigarette and take a drink.
“You’re smoking again?”
“Yeah. But I’m not dumb enough to do it around my daughter. I’ve been drinking way too much too and my song writing has definitely bit the big one lately.”
“I’m sorry Luke.”
“Not your fault babe. Fault is such a damned stupid word anyway. ‘It’s your fault’ ‘No it’s your fault’. Boo fucking hoo. Get over it and admit what you did wrong and get past it. Or if you can’t do that then walk away.”
“Even if it breaks your heart.”
“Yeah. It’s so good to hear your voice Sie. We should talk more often.”
“Paul would freak.”
“Yeah, Kimber probably would too.”
“I’m horny Luke.” It slipped out of her mouth. She wanted to take it back, because it hardly seemed appropriate.
He chuckled. “Did you say what I think you said Sie?”
“It’s nice to know that my sexual frustration amuses you Luke.”
“Oh honey, your sexual frustration hardly amuses me. I’ve been pretty damned sexually frustrated myself lately. And the sound of your voice still gets me hot.”
“Yeah, I think we should probably keep that between the two of us.”
He chuckled. “When you demanded to talk to me the night that all of this crap started I heard your voice and wanted to cry. I think that I prefer the sound of your voice turning me on to it making me want to bawl like a baby.”
“You wanna have phone sex?” She was kidding, but when she thought about it the idea started to sound more and more attractive.
“Um.”
“I was kidding. Well, sort of. If the fact that you would be thinking of your wife is what makes you not want to do it, that’s okay. I’ll be honest with you and tell you up front that I’d be thinking about Paul.”
Luke chuckled, but it sounded uncomfortable. “I don’t know Sie.”
“It’s okay Luke. You don’t have to talk dirty to me. I’ll be really pathetic and find some free porn on the internet.”
“Damn Sierra. You really are horny.”
“Women watch porn.”
“I know, but thinking of you sitting in front of your computer screen watching something like that kinda freaks me out.”
“Luke I am going to hang up on you now. You’re starting to sound like Paul.”
“I’m sorry Sie. I’ll talk dirty to you if you want me to.”
“Now you’re making me start to feel weird.”
“Baby you were the first woman that I was really intimate with. That probably sounds really dumb since I had a lot of sex before we were together, but it’s true. I screwed those other women, plain and simple. It was intimate of course, but without really being intimate. If you’re horny and want to have phone sex with your old lover while you think of your husband, then we can have phone sex. Your voice really does get me hot.”
“It’s starting to sound pathetic Luke. Almost as pathetic as touching myself while I watch some unattractive people have uncomfortable looking sex on the internet.”
“What are you wearing baby?”
Sierra laughed. “So cliché Luke.”
“C’mon sweetheart. You’re alone right?”
“Yeah. Paul has the baby.”
“I’m alone too. We’re both lonely and horny. It’s harmless. Our respective spouses wouldn’t even really have a valid reason to yell at us because it’s them we’re thinking of.”
“Paul would never have phone sex with me. When he went away for a week, I begged him to and he wouldn’t.”
“Pretend that he’s not so damned uptight. I know you can talk dirty Sie. You’ve got a mouth like a man in the bedroom.”
“You made me that way. Okay Luke, let’s do this.”
And they proceeded to have phone sex. Sierra still felt a little weird after they had finished, but it felt strangely satisfying too. It had nothing to do with any kind of petty revenge. It wasn’t as if Luke had been able to touch her through the phone line.
They hung up soon after, promising to talk more often, but she figured that their encounter had ended up feeling a little weird for him too. She showered, drank another glass of wine and went to b
ed, wondering when she would stop missing her husband almost as much as she missed her son when he was away from her.
Luke
Luke groaned when he woke up and the headache of hangover hit him. He lit a cigarette on the way to the bathroom, used the toilet and washed his hands and face. When he dropped back onto the bed, he realized that he had called Sierra the night before and they’d had phone sex.
“Shit.”
He was beginning to believe more and more as the days passed that he could be a father to the baby whether or not it was his. It really sucked to think that his impulsiveness and soft spot for Sierra would make Kimber not want to let him come home. He knew that she wanted him to come home. She held onto him so tightly when he hugged her goodbye. But he wasn’t sure exactly how much it would bother his wife that he and Sierra had had phone sex.
Then again he thought it wasn’t as if either of them had mentioned meeting for an in person encounter. Kimber had been the one he’d been thinking of when he’d been pleasuring himself. The sound of Sierra’s voice did get to him, but it was an accepted fact in Luke’s mind that Sierra would probably always turn him on.
He put his cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray, got up and took a shower. His head felt a little clearer. He wondered if he should call Kimber right away and confess to his phone call with Sierra or whether it would upset her unnecessarily. He still wasn’t 100% positive that he could be the type of husband that she needed him to be and he wanted to feel completely sure of himself before he asked her about coming home for good.
Paul
Paul’s work days seemed to take forever. He felt so distracted and wondered if he should talk to a therapist, or make a confession to a priest, though he hadn’t regularly attended church since he was a child. But he kept his mouth shut and kept his thoughts to himself as the days passed, unless it was to Sierra. He felt like he had lost not only his lover, but his best friend too. He and Sierra were so different, but when he was honest with himself she was not only his wife, but his most cherished friend as well.
Misty Reigenborn Romance Boxed Set Page 20
