Bad Twins

by Rebecca Chance

  He had been reluctant, but Bella had put her foot down. She actually thought he was grateful, now, that she had insisted. It gave a structure, added even more routine to the sex, which was what he preferred, while she could relax, knowing that at least he would be able to sustain his erection as long as necessary.

  But why did it go wrong after we were married? she found herself wondering. Was it just that he’d caught me, and he didn’t need to make an effort any more? Or is it some sort of weird stereotype, that once a woman’s a wife you shouldn’t think about her sexually any more, the madonna/whore thing?

  Bella climbed into bed, pulling up the sheet and blankets and coverlet. No duvets here: the bed coverings were all in keeping with the style of the house. The blankets were pleasantly heavy, weighing her down. Thank goodness. That would help her to fall asleep faster. She was used to soothing herself to sleep now with memories of Ronaldo. Romantic ones, rather than sexual. But as she closed her eyes, it wasn’t her lover’s handsome face that she saw. It was her husband’s, having just whispered the words: ‘Shall I go and shake hands with my little blue friend?’

  If I ever hear Thomas say that again, she thought, I don’t know if I’ll be able to stay married to him one minute longer. I honestly don’t know how I can stick it out until Daddy makes his decision about which one of us to promote to CEO.

  But I have to! Daddy’s so furious with Conway for screwing up his marriage that I can’t announce that I’m leaving Thomas – let alone for the housekeeper’s son! – and expect to have any chance of getting the top job.

  I have to put up with it till then. I have to.

  But if he says ‘little blue friend’ one more time, I think I’ll scream my head off.

  Chapter Fifteen

  ‘Ready for bed, darling?’

  Paul smiled at his wife, who was sitting at the dressing table working her way through her very elaborate skincare routine. At that moment, Charlotte was mixing equal amounts of Vitamin A serum and Vitamin A cream on her palm and smoothing the blended result onto her cleansed and toned face. Beside her was a glass of Evian and a small pile of pills, some for tonight, some ready for the next day: biotin and keratin for strengthening nails and hair, milk thistle for liver function, concentrated vitamins for skin nutrition, cambogia fruit with chromium for metabolic support, plant phytonutrients to protect against free radicals.

  ‘Nearly,’ Charlotte said, reaching for the night moisture cream that was the last layer to be applied to her face. ‘Just need to take my pills. Have you had yours yet?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Paul said, and certainly his smooth, moisturized, blemish-free skin was testimonial to his own skincare regime. He had applied body lotion, as he did morning and night, and his long limbs gleamed as he crossed the room and climbed into bed naked. ‘Isn’t it extraordinary, being here? Under Jeffrey’s roof?’

  ‘I can’t work out what game Adrianna’s playing,’ Charlotte said, removing the top of her tube of night cream; she never bought moisturizer in pots, because she believed that when you repeatedly put your fingers into face cream you could add bacteria to it. Besides, the pots let in light, which weakened the active ingredients.

  Charlotte was quite willing to admit to a mild form of controlling behaviour, or at least a compulsion to research absolutely everything that entered her life so she could make the best decision possible. She monitored the decor of her Sash hotels on a regular basis so that she could make sure that the decorative pillows, the flower vases, even the books carefully selected for the lounge coffee tables, were arranged exactly as she had prescribed.

  ‘Game?’ Paul sat up, propping his back against the upholstered, padded headboard. ‘Mmn,’ he said in parentheses, relaxing against it. ‘This is terribly comfortable.’

  ‘Unhygienic,’ Charlotte said briefly, looking at him in the mirror. ‘It’d need replacing much too often. Much too expensive.’

  ‘It’s always hotels with you,’ he said fondly. ‘Everything comes back to that.’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t stand a fabric headboard at home, either,’ she said, shuddering slightly. ‘You put body lotion on, then you get into bed – no matter how many pillows you put behind you, some’s bound to get on the material. Or your many and varied hair products! I see those cheap, nasty faux-suede headboards on sale for poor people and I just want to vomit. They’ll be greasy in two weeks. You know, the beds with built-in TVs in the base. So vulgar.’

  ‘It’s such a bad idea to have a television in the bedroom!’ Paul said, shaking his head. ‘Just terrible for the sleep cycles. And I’m sure it’s bad for the energy currents too. All that extra wiring so close to you when you sleep and really need to recharge.’

  Charlotte had perfected the skill of keeping her face impassive when Paul came out with his latest new-age, hippy gibberish. She hadn’t married him for his brain, after all; she had enough of that for both of them.

  ‘Adrianna’s playing a game,’ she said, returning to the subject she had raised. ‘There’s got to be something going on beneath this cosy weekend charade we’re all acting out. Is that how she snagged Daddy – by telling him how family-friendly she was?’

  She answered her own question, as she was really talking to herself in the mirror.

  ‘No way! No man leaves his wife for that kind of reason!’ she continued. ‘So why is she bothering with all this? Who wants to get on with her husband’s kids, for goodness’ sake?’

  ‘Maybe she really is family-friendly?’ Paul suggested. ‘I know she’s very poised, but she was so thoughtful with the children. Apparently Jade shipped every single one of the boys’ things to her new house, so Adrianna made sure she restocked the playroom wonderfully. She even told her secretary to let us know we didn’t need to bring anything apart from the kids’ cuddle toys if we didn’t want to, remember? Very considerate!’

  Having worked in her night cream, Charlotte embarked on the process of taking her evening pills.

  ‘It’s weird,’ she said between swallows of Evian. ‘Because it’s so unnecessary. Daddy simply doesn’t care. Right now, she could do anything and he’d go along with it. He’s completely obsessed with her. Why isn’t she just making him – I don’t know, take her to Paris for the weekend to shop till she drops, or inviting her friends down here, rather than throwing a boring family party?’

  ‘Darling,’ Paul said fondly, ‘I know you’re always planning and thinking and scheming, but honestly in this case I think you’re going too far. Adrianna actually seemed to enjoy getting to know all of us, making us cocktails, planning activities for the children tomorrow. Pony grooming and riding! They’re so excited it was very hard to get them to sleep!’

  ‘Mmn,’ Charlotte said as the plant phytonutrient capsules went down. ‘I just don’t believe it. I don’t understand her, and I really don’t like that. It’s as if she’s sizing us up for something. But what would that be?’

  She took her last pills.

  ‘So maybe there isn’t an ulterior motive?’ Paul suggested. ‘Maybe she isn’t close to her family, and she wants to bring her future husband’s together?’

  Charlotte looked at her husband with affection. Considering Adrianna’s dazzling good looks and her overt sexuality, other men might have defended her simply because she was so attractive, but Charlotte knew her husband too well to assume that. Paul had been modelling with some of the most beautiful women in the world since he was twenty, and was immune to being swayed by female pulchritude.

  ‘Paul. Darling,’ she began.

  Charlotte stood up lithely, as befitted a woman with an extensive exercise and stretching schedule, and walked towards the bed.

  ‘She’s a glorified nightclub hostess,’ she said. ‘All this talk about bartending! You can’t tell me Farouche hired her because of her crazy drink-prescribing gimmick. And Daddy certainly isn’t licking his lips every time he looks at her because of her bartending skills. It’s the classic thing with rich men.’

  She pul
led back the covers on her side of the bed, briefly observing the sheets and blankets and assessing their quality and cost; as a hotelier, she couldn’t help herself.

  ‘The first wife’s more or less the same age as they are, like Mummy was,’ she explained. ‘Then they trade her in for a trophy twenty years younger with some accomplishment they can boast about – gallery girl, lifestyle journalist, beauty PR. Thin, wears black, has an artistic haircut, makes them look intellectual. Then they get bored with that, and they need a lot of help getting it up, so they go for a porn-star lookalike Eastern European model who’s built up plenty of technique getting herself out of her home country and into a job where she can meet ageing billionaires. A professional who’ll do all the work while he just lies there, because he’s scared of putting his back out.’

  ‘Darling, that’s your father you’re talking about!’ Paul said uncomfortably as Charlotte got into bed beside him.

  ‘Father,’ she said sarcastically. ‘He stopped being our father that day he moved us out and Jade in! Really, Paul, the way you hover over Posy and Quant – remember how you used to check to make sure their poos were the right colour and texture? You of all people should know he’s not a father.’

  Paul’s expression indicated his inability to argue with this. Especially as he did still check his children’s poos on a daily basis, but kept it secret from Charlotte because she’d constantly mocked him for doing it.

  ‘Still—’ he tried.

  ‘You know that crime novelist I like? Laura Lippman?’ she continued. ‘There was a really clever line in her latest book. She says that men of a certain age eye up women with big strapping builds, because they know they’re getting on and they want nurses who can lug them in and out of wheelchairs. That’s exactly Adrianna’s appeal! She’ll help you get in and out of the bath and then give you a killer blow job.’

  Paul winced. He was very sensitive to crude talk. Charlotte was usually more careful around her husband, saving her dirty mouth for her team at work and her lover Lee. But not only had she drunk quite a lot at dinner, she had also indulged afterwards in Vanbrugh Manor’s superb selection of digestifs. Adrianna was such a perfect hostess that it had thrown Charlotte off-kilter, causing her to lose her customary self-control.

  ‘Let’s fuck,’ she said, rolling towards her husband. She knew he didn’t like that word. Paul was legendary in the modelling world for being visibly uncomfortable when people swore or made ribald jokes; he was regularly teased for it. But tonight, tipsy, on edge because she couldn’t get a handle on Adrianna’s behaviour, Charlotte wasn’t in the mood to make nice for Paul.

  Ignoring his pained expression, she slid on top of him and started kissing him. It wasn’t long before he responded. Paul was entirely predictable, which, as far as Charlotte was concerned, was an ideal quality in a husband. Despite his tendency to kiss her tenderly during the act and stare into her eyes in a way that frayed her nerves, they had regular, very satisfying sex. She had trained him not to keep asking if she liked it, thank goodness, but when he went down on her he simply could not break himself of looking up from between her legs, his blue eyes doglike as he stared worshipfully at her face.

  She coped by closing her own and just concentrating on her own pleasure. Still, knowing that he was watching her the whole time was fantastically annoying, and she needed to balance it out by, once she had come enough, climbing onto him and assuming the reverse cowgirl position. Paul’s need for eye-to-eye contact would have been okay if he’d been doing a hard, sexy, look-at-us-fucking stare, but Paul didn’t fuck. He made love. And Charlotte’s preference was definitely for the former.

  Straddling him, working faster and faster, her hands braced on his lean thighs lightly dappled with dark hair, so unlike Lee’s, which were much hairier and more solid with muscle – male models needed to be lean in order to fit into the sample sizes – she had a flash of wistfulness for her lover. It was no coincidence that she had mentioned Adrianna’s getting Jeffrey to take her to Paris for the weekend. Charlotte had a rendezvous with Lee there next week, and was counting the days.

  Still, sex was sex, and Paul had a great body and a very nice cock, whose curvature actually worked better than Lee’s for reverse cowgirl. Charlotte was an extremely practical woman.

  A cock in the hand’s worth two in the bush, she thought, even as she started to speed up, shuddering with pleasure at the way Paul’s dick was butting inside her, hitting the place that made her begin to groan in an animalistic, steady rhythm. No, that doesn’t work at all! A cock in the bush is worth two in the hand – maybe . . .

  And then the thought of two cocks made her imagine Lee here too, kneeling up in front of her so that his cock was butting against her lips, and as she drove herself down on Paul, she was opening her mouth to Lee, sucking eagerly on him, gasping for breath as he filled her completely. This was such a deliciously transgressive fantasy, her husband and her lover, Lee’s hands in her hair now, forcing her further onto his cock, Paul pumping his hips up, both of them competing as to who could fuck her harder, the furthest thing possible from making love . . .

  The noises she was making were out of body now, completely beyond her control. Charlotte was quite unaware of the presence of her children in the next-door room, or her husband starting to try to shush her. The idea of Lee and Paul, fucking her simultaneously, driving deep inside her, was so powerful that she bucked madly on her husband as if she were riding a mechanical bull. He pushed himself to sit up, realizing that she was not hearing him, worried now about the kids waking up, and the movement, the unexpected switch in angle of his cock inside her, catapulted her into orgasm.

  Paul clapped one hand over her mouth, something he would never normally have done, as it was very disrespectful to women; but they were not in their master suite on the top floor of their modern, sound-insulated house, where they could safely make a reasonable amount of noise without disturbing the children. They took priority for him, as always. To Charlotte, however, it was an extra fillip, a rare, delicious touch of the BDSM she enjoyed so much and that Paul would not have dreamed of countenancing.

  She sobbed happily against his palm even as she ground down for the last time, feeling his own release shoot out inside her in response, hot and wet. She kept moaning just for the feel of his hand gagging her mouth. As her body relaxed, beginning to go limp, her fingers losing their grip on his thighs, Paul took his hand away and started to whisper apologies that his wife barely noticed.

  Because Charlotte was forming a delicious picture for her encounter with Lee in Paris: a threesome with another guy. Could they pick someone up in the hotel bar? Too risky? Yes, much though she loved the idea. But Lee was bound to know someone, considering the circles he ran in . . . God, if he could find someone who looked like Paul, that would be incredibly sexy! She knew that Lee would love this idea, as he loved everything perverse, original, unique. Surely fucking a woman together with a man who looked like her husband had to be unique for Lee?

  Paul’s arms were wrapped around her now, tenderly embracing her, his chest against her back. He seemed to have finished apologizing and was murmuring endearments and loving words into the back of her neck. He always did this afterwards, and didn’t require much response from her, as she could easily pretend that she was too overwhelmed by the continuing wonder of marital sex to be able to speak. She put her hands over his, heard him sigh happily at the connection, and thought: And when we find that guy who looks like Paul, I’m going to beg him to spank me till I’m red. What a lovely change that’ll be – a fantasy husband who’s rougher than my lover! God, I can’t wait to text Lee and get him to set it up!

  Chapter Sixteen

  She was running. Not jogging, but running flat out, practically a sprint, her legs pumping the soft ground, following a narrow track on a grassy lawn, speeding as if the hounds of hell were on her heels, her eyes fixed unwaveringly on the ground ahead. Since the track was uneven and rutted, one false step could see her turnin
g her ankle out here, and it would be a long way to limp back.

  The track curved around a high stone boundary wall, and in the distance the long straight drive bordered with lime trees, which led directly to the house, came into view; but it was still far off. If anything, her pace increased as she headed for the avenue, her knees coming up like pistons, her elbows stabbing back. She ran like a superheroine in an action film. The man observing her from his hiding place thought that she looked as if her feet were going to leave the ground entirely, like a plane speeding up for takeoff.

  The wall was bending towards the track now, forcing her into a looping circuit towards the ornate entrance gates and the start of the linden avenue. To avoid a knee-wrenching sharp, right-angled turn onto it, she struck out over the grass, which was soggy with dew and recent rain and slowed her down, the muddy terrain catching at the flanges of her trainers. So she hit the tarmacked drive not quite like a bullet being fired from a gun, and as a result, when the man unexpectedly stepped out into her path from behind one of the lime trees, she did not actually mow him down.

  She had only a few seconds to react, and she made the most of them. She was going much too fast to stop without injuring herself, but she could fractionally alter her course, and she did that, heading to his side with one hand coming up in a fist, aiming for his throat. Women are often advised, in self-defence, to hit an attacker in the larynx, but the drawback is that they are rarely tall enough to reach it. Adrianna had no such problem, and if her blow had made full contact, she would at the least have completely disabled him, at the worst have knocked him down.