Learning Lessons: A Losing His Wife Novel

by KT Morrison

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Save-Mart has an External do its investigations.”

  “Yeah, but I am with Save-Mart.”

  Mark squeezed and rubbed his nose, looked around, thinking. Pete saw Andy with Pete Junior, his older brother helping him at a game called Dog Pounder. The two of them trying to launch colourful balls into a big cartoon bulldog’s open mouth. It kept repeating, Boy, am I hungry. They were laughing their heads off. Two very resilient young boys.

  “Pete, I’m a take a guess on something if that’s all right with you.”

  Pete nodded to him.

  Mark steepled his fingers in front of him, said, “Tyler friends with your wife?”

  “Yeah,” he said, rubbed his palms over his forehead. “You a detective?”

  Mark laughed. “No. I’m the Night Watch Commander for this peaceful town. I take care of it while it sleeps.”

  “Oh.”

  “She run off with him?”

  Pete shifted around in the blown plastic bench. “She did.”

  “Allison said she thought that’s why you came by.”

  “Really?”

  “Said your eyes looked like mine. Back when my wife took off with him.”

  “She did?”

  He nodded.

  “That’s a bit melodra—”

  “I see it too. And she was right, wasn’t she?”

  “What happened?”

  He leaned back, didn’t look like he wanted to talk about this. He kept it simple. “My second wife. Quite a bit younger than me. When she was in her twenties she...liked to have a good time...she was sober a long time when I met her. Every once in a while though she liked to top her resolve up with an AA meeting. She met him at one...”

  “Tyler’s an alcoholic?”

  “Don’t think so. He might like to think he’s one. Gives him some excuses maybe when he’s feeling low. Maybe he could be one down the road. But he’s not like the other people that AA helps. My wife used to say that about him. Before she fell for him and she wasn’t afraid to mention him. Said he wasn’t a drunk, but there was something about him...”

  “Needed saving?”

  “Something like that.”

  The waitress came by holding a tray with four enormous Cokes on it, full of ice and lemon wedges, straws stuck in the tops. Those boys were going to need two pee stops on the way home. She told them their pizzas were coming, then she got swallowed up by a birthday party on its way to a table with a hostess.

  “Did she leave you?”

  “I got rid of her when I found out. I...I loved her. She was my second wife, we were only together seven years—”

  “That’s a long time...”

  Mark shrugged.

  “Tyler made it sound like he had to get out of town...”

  Mark shuffled his bulk to the edge of the bench, leaned forward, said, “When I first found out, I admit, I lost it. It wasn’t good.” He looked over to see the boys were still wrapped up in their game. “I was going to kill him. Lord, I told him I would. I meant it. If I found him back then I’m certain I would have shot him dead. He took off.”

  Pete looked down into his Coke. “You would have saved me...”

  Mark laughed, closed his eyes. “Yeah, I woulda done you a favour.”

  “You didn’t try and hunt him down?”

  “I did. I was obsessed for a long time. Didn’t find him. Found out a lot about him. There was a lot of things he was running from.”

  Pete looked up at him, concerned suddenly. “Mark, is he dangerous? Should I be worried for my wife?”

  She was hot stuff in Ohio. Here she felt a little faded, a little less vibrant. She didn’t seem as vital against these young little girls who’d never had children, never fed a little baby or two from their breast. They were tanned and young and smiling. They had tight young bodies, the skin under their chin never ever bunched up in a weird way if they had to look down at something under their glasses. Their youthful beauty was effortless. They were kids.

  There were three of them around her Tyler. It was one pretty girl first, then her friend showed up. Jess watched one of them look back to her table, make a wide-eyed, He’s so hot! face, then a third hopped her kid-like body over. They were so obvious. Putting out that girl energy—sipping drinks through pouted lips, batting eyelashes, and swinging their hips while they talked. Oh, they were good. Tyler was into it. He liked the attention. He looked fantastic in a pair of faded army shorts, flips flops, and a charcoal t-shirt that clung to his ridiculously big chest and shoulders then got a little loose around his narrow middle. His hair was piled up over his forehead, above a pair of black Wayfarers. She liked watching him, but not like this. This hurt.

  They’d walked far up the beach from their motel, heading north before lunch. Didn’t see anything they liked, then crossed over the hot Gulf Boulevard once they were in Clearwater to see if there was anything on the main drag. Found this big loud sports bar, packed, patio full of lively young people here to watch a basketball game. Tyler didn’t care about basketball, but he liked the energy here; this was his kind of crowd.

  They sat outside but in the shade of a pergola. A black fan anchored to one of the beams was pointed right at her face which was great because the hot walk up the beach in her bare feet had left her pretty tired. They split some nachos and a pitcher of beer, now she felt bloated again. Great with these slim girls virtually rubbing themselves up against him like cats right in front of her.

  She had thought she and Tyler made such a good couple. Looked so good together until she saw him standing next to girls his own age. They would look like an even better couple. Any one of those girls.

  He broke away from them, came back to the table and she watched carefully to make sure no numbers were passed back and forth. He sat back at their tall brushed aluminum table for two, putting his feet up on the rung of the stool.

  “Making friends?” she asked him, putting on a smile.

  “Oh, please,” he laughed, put his arms on the table and leaned into her, slipping on some charm. “Know how many dudes been clocking you since we got here?” He put his lips out and she kissed him, put one hand on his forearm.

  “That’s nice,” she smiled, “what if one of them came up, leaned over me here, talking real close?”

  “Oh, I’d knock him the fuck out.”

  She sighed, scratched and squeezed the skin of his forearm. “Mm, that’s kind of sexy.”

  “You’re mine,” he told her.

  “Kiss me again, then. Kiss me for real.”

  He did. He leaned over the table and closed his eyes and she met him with her lips, kissed him softly, bit his lips gently, sucked on them. Not too much. Not enough to get them kicked out of there. Enough for those three girls to get the picture if they were looking. God, she hoped they were looking.

  The waiter came back with her card and said it had been declined.

  “Ah, shoot,” she said, fished through her wallet, gave him a different card. “Sorry, use this one.”

  “I wanna go to that club tonight, Boom-Chicka, I think it’s right around the corner from here.”

  “Okay. I want to sit on the beach until it’s dark first. Want to take a cab home? I’m pooped.”

  “Nah, let’s take the beach again. I’ll carry you.”

  The waiter came back with her receipt and she thanked him, left some cash on the table for a tip.

  “Let’s go,” she said. They headed off the patio and around the side of the bar, down a brick path between two gardens filled with palm trees and shrubs.

  Tyler stopped on the path, bent down a bit, showed her his back. “Hop on,” he said.

  “Tyler!” she laughed, but her legs were already working their way over his hips, her arms going around that strong, thick neck. He stood up with her on his back like she didn’t weigh a thing. She yelped, reached behind her to pull down her coverup. She’d come here in a bikini and flip flops and sunglasses, just a light, breezy, lon
g, striped top hiding all her bare bits. One of her flip-flops fell off onto the walkway and Tyler squat down and picked it up like she wasn’t even on his back.

  She held her bare little foot out for him with her hot pink painted toenails. He slipped it onto her foot, sliding it between her toes like she was Cinderella.

  She put both her warm hands over his face, slid them along until they covered his eyes. “Trust me?” she said.

  “No,” he laughed.

  “Come on, be my robot,” she whispered into his ear.

  “Where am I going?”

  “Left. Ten feet.”

  He stumbled into the red mulch that made up the floor of the garden. She laughed, said, “Not so left. Less left. Like...” She squinted, thinking, said, “ten-forty-five.”

  “What?” he blurted out, laughing and stumbling, her hands stopping him from seeing where he was going.

  “Ten-forty-five, like on a clock. Isn’t that military? Don’t guys talk like that?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, his hands were out in front of him, feeling around, making sure he didn’t walk into something.

  “Keep going,” she whispered in his ear, making it sound a little sexy.

  “Am I going to fall down a ditch or anything, Jess?”

  She let her hands off him. They were in the middle of the garden. In a clearing of red mulch only about three feet square, at the foot of a tall, fat palm that soared above them. They were surrounded by tall shrubs but you could still sort of see the walkway from where they’d come. Beyond, there was a side road coming off the main drag, above them a sign for a Burger King drive-thru. She slid off him.

  “We found an oasis,” she said, stood up on her tip-toes to kiss him. His hands went around her waist. He moved her until her back pressed against the trunk of the palm tree. He pinned her there with a passionate kiss.

  “Mm, Tyler,” she said between moments when her mouth sucked on his young lips. Her hands roamed his body until her palm found its way between his legs and started to knead his generous package through his army shorts.

  “Don’t get me started,” he said, “it’s a long way back to the hotel.”

  “What if I suck it right here?” she said into his mouth.

  “You’re my bad girl, but you aren’t that bad.”

  “You don’t think I’m bad enough?”

  “You’ve still got a lot of good in you.”

  Her hands worked his zipper, pinching the pull, holding the fabric tight with the fingers of her other hand. She pulled it down. She kissed and sucked his lower lip while she worked a hand into his fly and then under the waistband of his briefs. “Then you be the bad one. I’ll be good. Show me how bad you can be.”

  He held the back of her neck firmly, kissed her deeply. She found his cock, pulled it out into the daylight. Her smile broke his kissing away.

  “You’re pretty hard already.”

  “Turn around,” he said to her.

  She did it. She let his thing go and she turned, put her palms up on the trunk of the tree and looked over her shoulder at him. “What are you going to do?” Her hands were already moving up the hem of the cover-up, letting him see her rump.

  “Good, now pull those bottoms to the side.”

  “Why?” she asked him, but her fingers already slipped under the fabric of her bikini bottoms. She clawed them to the side, let her dirtiest bits be exposed to him.

  “What do you think I’m going to do?” he whispered into her ear, pressed his chest against her back.

  “I think you’re going to fuck me.”

  “I am going to fuck you. Right here where anybody could see us.”

  “Do it,” she urged him.

  “Pull those cheeks apart for me.”

  “Oh, Tyler. Don’t we need lube for that?”

  He held his palm out for her, right under her chin. “Spit in my hand.”

  She did it, she pursed her lips and she spewed as much spit into his waiting palm as she could muster. His chest pressed into her harder, pinned her to the tree. His hand went back behind her and she could hear the wet sound of him stroking himself with her own spit.

  “Do it,” she said again.

  His big, swollen glans pressed between her cheeks. It slid up and down her crack, trying to find a weakness, trying to find her little hole so it could bury itself deep inside her body. “Careful,” she reminded him.

  He moaned behind her as he found it, his plump head plunging, pushing apart her tight dark ring not meant for sex.

  “Ah,” she gasped out, and he shushed her.

  She pulled her lips in between her teeth as his huge size slowly, agonizingly sunk inside her. It felt so bad. His hand slipped to her front from her thigh. Slipped in between her legs and rubbed her, big fingers roughing her delicate feminine folds.

  “Ow,” she whispered.

  “I want it to hurt you.”

  “You’re so big Tyler,” she whimpered.

  He slid himself in and out of her. He talked tough, he threatened to hurt her but he was gentle. God, he felt good inside her. He was the sexiest man alive.

  “Fuck me,” she urged.

  It made him laugh. “Just when I said you weren’t bad enough, you show me you’re the baddest bitch ever.”

  “I’m bad, aren’t I?”

  “Baby, you make me so fucking crazy,” he said. His thing went deeper, and she cried out again. “You gonna come for me? You gonna come with me in your ass?”

  She nodded, her eyes closed.

  “Do it. Think about it, what we’re doing,” his hands worked between her legs and she followed along, thought about how bad they both were. How hot they were, how sexy. What it would look like if you were a stranger and stumbled on two attractive people engaged in such a horrid but lascivious practice.

  “Ah-oh, keep going,” she creaked.

  “You going to come for me? I know you are—you’re already dripping. You’re the sexiest woman I ever met...”

  She thrust her own bottom on him, put her little hand over his big hand. Guided his fingers so they’d do the right thing. She pushed him into the proper places, the ones she would touch for herself late at night, the ones that she knew best. She showed them to him, showed him her dirty secrets down there. His big strong hand was eager to learn.

  “That’s it, that’s it,” she gasped up into the palm tree. “It’s coming.”

  “Come for me, Jess, baby.”

  His hand worked faster, it knew the deal now, and her hand just rested on his wrist, along for the ride. He definitely had the hang of it. She was going to come. As long as nobody walked in and ruined it, she was going to come.

  “Aungh,” she blurted and her legs buckled. Her torso collapsed against the tree and the bark scraped at her soft face.

  She covered her mouth with her hand, rode out a quick but healthy and satisfying orgasm that eventually stretched a smile on her face that one hand couldn’t cover.

  “Oh, stop, stop, stop,” she urged him. She held his hips at bay, stopped him from thrusting that big thing inside her anus.

  He leaned against her, his body felt so good against hers. When her eyes opened she could see heads moving around over the shrub tops. Unaware of the things she and Tyler were doing, but still shockingly close. She felt self-conscious, tried to recall how loud she’d been when she came.

  “Take it out,” she said, trying to turn to face him. He did, his thing falling out from inside her and she felt it tap against the back of her thigh. She turned right around now, put both her palms up on his cheeks and she kissed him. His hands felt like they were pressing her down. She went with them, went and kissed her way down his neck, down to the ‘v’ of his T-shirt. Now what? Could she go lower?

  “Jess, baby, I wanna spend my whole life with you,” he said up into the tree, both his hands on the trunk now supporting his weight against it. She slid lower.

  His cock was there. She didn’t like this. It had just come from a very bad place
. She had a lusty tingle in her belly but was it enough to try and work this thing into her mouth? The point from which she ate and talked. Ew. She couldn’t help but be repulsed by the idea of putting this big thing in her mouth when it had just been up inside her bottom. She gripped it in her hand. Just grabbing it made her stomach roil, turn over like she wanted to heave. She held her breath and moved her lips closer to his dirty cock head. Her hesitation was his anticipation and she could sense his urgency. He’d become stone in her grip. He was trembling, waiting to feel her lips on his big, sensitive tool.

  “Please, Jess, please, baby, put it in your mouth, you bad girl...”

  She looked at it, its one eye staring at her stupidly. It didn’t look dirty. It wasn’t dirtily smeared from her insides or anything. She was clean after all. God, any one of those little sluts chatting him up at the patio would probably do this without a second thought. Girls these days. Only old moms worried about germs. She put her lips over his swollen head, plunged herself over it let it sink in her mouth. He was desperate to have it stroked and his hips sunk him deeper into her. She gagged. Retched up on his hard cock. Her eyes watered. She hated this. Hated it but she was here to impress. She was dedicated. She shut her eyes hard, felt tears stream down her cheeks as he gently fucked her open mouth. Fuck it, Tyler. Get off in my little mouth. Come in my mouth.

  When she finally breathed she smelled it. Her own dirty smell. Vinegar, poop, and perfume. Like her panties after a long hot day. His cock was dirty from her. She retched again. Retched but contained it, didn’t let that beautiful cock of his get away from her. She pushed all those thoughts away, just enjoyed the hard, hot, fleshy feel of him in her mouth, let his thick thing plunge in and out of her. She gripped him at the very base with one hand, where he emerged from his fly, hoping that was far back enough that it hadn’t been inside her.

  “Rr, Jess,” he growled and she stopped.

  “What?”

  “Get up here, baby.”

  She raised up to him, her back scratching along the rough surface of the palm behind her. His hands gripped her shoulders and he pulled her to his waiting mouth. He bit her lips and sucked on her tongue. His hand gripped his cock and she felt it searching for her heat. Her hand went down, pulled the bottoms aside and she held her breath while he slowly eased himself inside her. She was so wet she took him all in one slow stroke.