Revenge Sex: A West Coast Hotwifing Novel, Book 1

by Jasmine Haynes

  His relationship with Ruby precluded other women. She played, he didn’t. That’s how he liked it: no jealousy on her part, no bitch fights, just hot sex, and his life on an even keel.

  That didn’t stop him from appreciating Jessica as an extremely attractive woman. He didn’t, however, allow himself sexual thoughts about her. If they managed to steal beneath his defenses, he ruthlessly shut them down. She worked for him, and he’d never compromise one of his employees, nor would his assessment of her physical attributes affect his decision about the controllership.

  Jessica sat ready, her pen poised.

  “Henckel wants more on the antiglare reserve,” he told her. They’d developed a film that eliminated monitor glare, but there’d been issues with scratches. Until that was resolved, they had a reserve against returns. The junior board member, Henckel, always wanted to know more. It made him feel important. “Email him the spreadsheet calculation.”

  “Sure.” Jessica jotted a note. She made a few more tick marks on her pad as he ran down a couple of other to-dos. When she wasn’t writing, she clicked her pen. She didn’t meet his eye, and he could hear the soft tap of her heel on the carpet as she jiggled her knee.

  Maybe the closed door made her nervous. She probably suspected he wanted to talk about the controller position.

  “Is that it?” she asked, then pursed her lips as if she regretted the question.

  “As far as the financials, yes.”

  She jumped to her feet before he had a chance to bring up his issues about the job. She paced two steps to the door, then turned abruptly and came back to the edge of the desk. He’d never seen her like this. She wasn’t a jumpy person. Something had been bothering her yesterday; today it was worse.

  “Jessica.”

  She puffed out a sharp breath. “I don’t know exactly how to bring this up, so I’m just going to say it.” She inhaled as if she needed the extra air. “I saw Ruby having sex with Bradley on your desk two nights ago.”

  He opened his mouth, shut it again. His chest was suddenly tight, and his only thought was that she must have been mistaken. “That’s not possible.”

  Ruby like to flirt with his rules, but there were two she would never break. First, she was never to date anyone from work, and second, no sex at the office. Both circumstances could be compromising, especially since they were both employed at West Coast. It was a small company, prone to gossip, and their sex life was private and separate. She would not have sex at the office, not in his office, and certainly not with Bradley Palmer.

  “Open the bottom drawer.” Jessica pointed to the left-hand side of his desk.

  He slid it open, saw nothing.

  “Check at the back,” she said.

  He bent slightly to see. Something purple. Lacy. Miniscule. He pulled out the thong Ruby had worn on Wednesday. The thong she said she’d left behind in a hotel room as a memento. Knowing she was going on a date, he’d watched her dress that morning,.

  Maybe she’d put it there Thursday morning for him to find later, so they could do a little reliving. But then he remembered the photo of his sons. Thursday morning he’d found it knocked over, he’d assumed by the cleaning staff. Now, there was another possibility. His blood pumped faster.

  “She told me that you know about the things she does,” Jessica went on as if he’d been silent way too long. “And that you’re okay with it all. But I wasn’t sure...” She trailed off uncertainly.

  Goddammit. There was no doubt now, and he was pissed Ruby had put him in this position. “Sit down.” He indicated the chair Jessica had just vacated.

  She sat, perched primly on the edge, her knees jiggling again. “I know it’s not my business, but if you don’t know about it, I just couldn’t stand by,” she prattled on.

  He held up the panties. “And these?”

  She rolled her lips between her teeth and chewed on them a moment. “She left them behind, and I put them there as evidence.”

  Jesus. How could Ruby be so stupid as to flaunt their unconventional sex life?

  How could she fuck Bradley Palmer? Her bad taste was the worst crime of all.

  “I realize it must have been a shock,” he said, obviously understating. “I’m sorry you were caught in the middle. But Ruby is right, I do know.” He wasn’t defending; he simply refused to lie about it.

  Except that Ruby wasn’t supposed to pull this kind of crap at work. She wasn’t supposed to do it at home either. He didn’t want one or both of his sons walking in. Sure, they were in high school—he had them two weekends every month—but they didn’t need to know anything he and Ruby did.

  All Ruby had needed to do was show a little discretion.

  “Oh,” Jessica said. Emotions flitted across her face. Confusion, consternation, then condemnation.

  He didn’t know why he let that look bother him. He’d always known how other people would react to his kinky desires. He was divorced because of it. In heated moments, he and his ex had occasionally fantasized about her being with other men, but when he finally said he’d like to do it for real, she’d frozen him out.

  With that very look Jessica wore now.

  Goddamn Ruby for doing this.

  Jessica stood, hugging her folder to her chest. “I don’t understand,” she said, bewildered like a child faced with her first dead goldfish. “Don’t you feel cheated?”

  He couldn’t say that love had never entered into it with Ruby; that was between Ruby and him. “I’m not wired like most men.” Yet he knew it would explain nothing. Jessica couldn’t understand. His ex-wife had never understood his needs. In the end, she left because of them.

  Jessica seemed to gulp down air. “How can you let her do that to you?”

  He rose to look down on her. Her gaze was stricken. He realized she’d allowed this to torment her for two days. On his behalf. “She didn’t do it to me. She didn’t hurt me. It’s the way I like it.”

  She dropped the folder to her side and stared at him as if he weren’t the man she’d worked for—and hopefully admired—for the past three years. He actually felt diminished.

  Jessica finally looked away. “She said it turns you on.”

  “It does,” he admitted. He owed her the truth after what Ruby had put her through.

  “She said”—she licked her lips—“that you love to have sex with her afterwards.”

  Her mouth glistened. Her eyes were a deep blue, the pupils wide. A blush colored her cheeks. She was breathing faster, a pulse fluttering at her throat. And beneath the blouse, her nipples were hard peaks.

  Looking at her, he was inexplicably hard. It wasn’t about Ruby; it was suddenly about Jessica, the intimate conversation, his earlier thoughts about her appeal. “I do.”

  “Did you have sex with her when she came home on Wednesday?” she asked softly.

  The conversation was heated, the office walls closer, the desk between them barely any separation at all. He watched the rise and fall of her breasts. Like a wild dog, he scented her, too, the faint aroma of arousal and emotion.

  “Was it good?” She spoke with barely a sound, but he read the words on her lips.

  He could feel the sex from that night, and heat suddenly burned all the way to his gut. “Yes, it was.”

  But for a moment, the woman’s face he saw in his mind, the feel of smooth female flesh beneath his fingers, the warmth engulfing him, was no longer Ruby. It was Jessica.

  Chapter Four

  “It won’t happen again. Not here.”

  Clay’s voice seemed to come from very far away, but it was the images in her mind that consumed Jessica. Clay with Ruby, reliving the things she’d just done with Bradley. Clay, naked, gorgeous, powerful.

  “Ruby won’t embarrass you this way again.”

  Embarrass her? It was what Ruby had done to him that Jessica hated. He said he knew all about it, but there’d been something in his face—his muscles tightening, lips flat-lined—that testified Ruby had done some things he hadn’t
known about. Like where and with whom. That same look was in his eye now as he apologized.

  When you had to apologize for someone else, they’d obviously done something wrong.

  “Thank you,” she said. It felt like such an inane response. She didn’t care if Ruby did it again; she only cared how Clay felt about it, whether it hurt him. She would never doing anything like that to him.

  Yet, God help her, the thought of sex, and him, and Wednesday night. The kinkiness of it made her wet, her nipples hard, her skin flushed, and she wanted to know so much more. Like why he enjoyed letting Ruby make a fool of him. He didn’t seem the type. Yet after the reading she’d done on the Internet, there appeared to be men who didn’t think of it like that. Maybe they didn’t feel jealousy. Maybe they didn’t love in the same way. Maybe Clay didn’t really love Ruby.

  All the questions burning to be asked drove her to the door. Before they spilled out. “I’ll get the answers on these questions.” Thank God she’d written them down because she didn’t remember a thing that had occurred before she blurted out what she’d seen.

  “Jessica.”

  Please don’t say anything else. She didn’t want to know any more.

  “Why were you here so late on Wednesday?”

  It wasn’t what she’d been expecting at all. “The review for the board meeting. I had some things to finish up.”

  “I don’t expect you to work until ten o’clock at night,” he said.

  But she would, for him, if he needed something. She realized how pathetic she sounded, even in her own mind. “It’s only once a quarter.” Actually, she did it every month, staying late or coming in on a Saturday to work uninterrupted.

  “I appreciate the dedication.”

  But was she too dedicated? Maybe he thought she didn’t have a life outside of West Coast. Maybe he thought she paid too much attention to what Ruby did.

  “Everything’s all right now, Jessica. Don’t worry about it.”

  He’d returned to Ruby. Everything wasn’t all right. She’d fantasized about him before, but she’d had it in perspective. He was only a sex fantasy. Now, she imagined herself as his rescuer, saving him from his horrible girlfriend.

  She imagined taking Ruby’s place.

  * * * * *

  Clay allowed his anger to simmer until he got home. The scent of Chinese food wafted out of the kitchen. Picking up take-out was the extent of Ruby’s cooking skills. He didn’t mind.

  “Hey, baby, I’m in here,” she called. Ruby had a smoky voice, always on the edge of seduction. She liked to conquer men, and he’d enjoyed it when she came home to him after a little conquering. At forty, she was in her prime, her muscles firm beneath a short skirt that hugged her bottom. The stylish suit jacket plunged low. Most women would have worn a blouse under it, but not Ruby. She dared men to look down the front. He’d always liked that sense of daring about her, the air of sexuality that brought men to their knees.

  He stood in the kitchen doorway, watching from the other side of the center island as she unpacked the bag on the granite counter, pulled down a couple of plates from the new cabinets he’d had installed, and opened the cartons. More mouthwatering aromas filled the air.

  He couldn’t pinpoint why this time was different? True, she’d broken one of his steadfast rules, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think it was the first time. She enjoyed surprising him. And he’d enjoyed the surprises.

  Was it Jessica?

  How can you let her do that to you?

  The truth was that Ruby had fucked another man on his desk, leaving her mark on it in an almost blatant raising of the middle finger. Not to mention the man she’d chosen—though the word man didn’t describe Bradley. Clay didn’t complain about his subordinates, but Ruby knew enough to understand that Bradley was less than adequate. If Greg Stevens hadn’t gone to bat for the kid—Clay believed a manager had the right to make the decisions about his own employees—he would have been long gone.

  There was a statement in Ruby’s choice of place and partner. It wasn’t in the same league as telling him she was seeing a girlfriend only to arrive home covered in come. Or perhaps it was a greater degree of the same problem. When he let her get away with one thing, she’d then needed to up the ante.

  “What?” She was looking at him. He realized he’d been staring at her, not really seeing her. Or seeing her too clearly.

  Reaching in his pocket, he pulled out her thong and dropped it on the kitchen’s center island.

  Ruby smiled, her lipstick still fresh and glistening. “You found my surprise. I was wondering when you would.” She didn’t miss a single beat.

  “When’d you leave them for me?”

  She winked. “The other morning.” Then she dished out mu shu pork onto the thin pancakes.

  “You’re lucky I found them in the filing cabinet, instead of Angie.” He didn’t have a secretary, but one of the accounts payable girls did his filing for him.

  Ruby licked the spoon she’d used, then laughed. “She only does that for you once a month. I figured you’d find them first.”

  Except they hadn’t been in his filing cabinet. If Jessica hadn’t told him what she’d done, though, he’d have assumed Ruby left them to titillate him during the day.

  “Don’t lie to me, Ruby.”

  She stopped, a spoon of lemon chicken halfway between the carton and a plate. A large drop of yellow sauce plopped onto the counter. “I don’t lie, baby. I just stretch the truth.” The reply was typical Ruby.

  “Why don’t you unstretch it and tell me what you really did Wednesday night.”

  She pursed her lips. It wasn’t a good look for Ruby, adding five years to her face. “I’m sure she already told you everything.”

  “I want to hear it from you.”

  “The Chinese is getting cold,” she complained, buying time.

  “We can eat while you tell me.”

  She shrugged, finished dishing out the food, then carried the two plates to the table in the nook overlooking the darkened garden. Clay carried the cartons and set them in the center between them.

  “I just wanted to see if it got you all worked up in the morning when you went to work.” More likely, she’d wanted to see if he’d detect her scent all over the desk. “I thought it would be exceptionally hot.”

  “We have a rule.”

  She tsked. “It was late. No one was there.”

  “Jessica Murphy was there.”

  She pressed her lips together. “How was I supposed to know she’d be sneaking around at ten o’clock? There weren’t any lights on.”

  “Ruby, that’s exactly why we don’t do anything at work. Because you never know when someone’s going to walk in.”

  She smiled slyly. “Oh, I remember how badly you wanted to do a few things at work, sweetheart.”

  When they were first dating—if fucking their brains out could be called dating—he’d talked about wanting to fuck her on his desk. But he’d never broken that rule, as hot as it might have been. He wondered if she’d had Bradley Palmer do the same things they’d described to each other back then. Her carelessness and lack of regard pissed him off. Odd as it sounded, when she fucked other men, it was for the two of them. While she was out, he imagined what she was doing. And she was supposed to be thinking about him, about how he’d be on her the minute she was inside, wanting to hear everything while he fucked her. When she lied, the sex became about her, not them. If she didn’t know that already, he couldn’t explain.

  So he attacked on a level she could understand. “He’s a risk, Ruby. He can spread gossip.” Bradley would brag.

  “Oh, honey, no one’s going to believe him.”

  Actually, they would. Ruby didn’t have the purist of reputations. After all, she’d worked at West Coast for almost a year before they began their affair, and she’d gotten around. “You don’t fuck other men at work, Ruby. No ifs, ands, or buts.”

  “Spoilsport,” she muttered.

  He h
ad to hand it to her. It didn’t bother her that she’d been caught. But wasn’t that why he’d made things more permanent with her, bringing her home? Because she was wild. Because she did all the things he’d dreamed of having a woman do for him. Because she’d fuck anyone, anywhere, anytime, and rush home to tell him about it. He’d gotten everything he’d wanted.

  Be careful what you ask for.

  The problem was he couldn’t control her. Because of that, he’d laid down only three rules. No sex with anyone from or at work, never bring the guy home, and tell your boyfriend every dirty detail about what you did.

  She’d broken the first and the last rule. How long before she broke the second? Maybe she’d already had another man in their bed.

  “Dump him.”

  She moued. “It was silly, Clay. I’m sorry. He came on to me, and you and I had already planned my date, and I was so horny, I just did it without thinking it through.” Then she fluttered her eyelashes at him. “How can I make it up to you?”

  He didn’t believe her. This wasn’t the first time. And he doubted who came on to whom.

  “I don’t know, Ruby.” He didn’t play games—not head games at any rate—but the truth was more complicated. Something had shifted in him when Jessica asked how he could let Ruby humiliate him.

  She raised her brow, a sexy little come-on that usually got him going. “How about one of my special blow jobs?” Then she winked. “Out in the backyard so the neighbor kid can watch.”

  She loved exhibitionism. The so-called neighbor kid was actually twenty-five years old and worked in a pizza parlor because, as a college history major, he couldn’t find a job.

  She was the same woman she’d been on Wednesday. And on Tuesday. And yet something had changed. “No, Ruby.”

  “But honey.” For the first time, worry crept into her voice. But Ruby was never down and out. She smiled, then rose sinuously from her chair, sauntered to the side of his chair, her hips swaying with each step, and put her hands behind her back. “I know what we can do,” she said, her red lips curved in a sly smile. “How about a little role reversal?”