Pictures at Ten

by Sean Geist

  Did I really have such a dark fantasy, that I wanted to see my wife cheat on me? I couldn't ignore the boner that seemed to confirm that suspicion, but the thought still sent a stabbing pain to my chest.

  I looked around, in case they'd moved to one of the tables. They hadn't. My body started to subtly shake as more naughty thoughts about what my wife might be doing with this stranger invaded my mind. I needed to sit down, but not here. A few people had already started to look at me funny, so I headed back to the room before they got the wrong idea about me, although I wasn't sure what the right idea really was.

  As I waited for the elevator, I slowly returned to my senses. Daphne was probably up in the room, having grown tired of waiting for me as she fended off all the guys trying to pick her up. It was the simplest explanation for her absence, even if it wasn't the first to pop into my head. It also turned out to be the correct one.

  I felt like an absolute fool when I found Daphne in our hotel room, sitting on the bed, dialing her phone.

  “What the hell happened to you?”

  That question could be answered in so many ways, even true answers might not tell the whole story.

  “Lining up a job interview.” I figured I'd keep it simple. Start big before revealing my anxieties. I just hoped she'd confess to getting hit on without any prodding from me.

  “What?”

  I explained about the call from Professor Hawkins and the interview I had scheduled for Friday and how confident I was that the job was mine to lose.

  “That's great news.” Daphne jumped off the bed and into my arms.

  “It's what we've been working for.”

  “Coming back home.”

  “Starting a family.”

  My wife pulled back, just a tad, and looked at me skeptically. “You think we're ready?”

  “Maybe. We don't have to start now. Let's find a home here. Settle in. See where we're at in a year or so.”

  We could have gone back to the restaurant and had dinner, but we decided to stay in and order room service, complete with a bottle of sparkling wine, and even though Daphne's birth control meant she wasn't likely to get pregnant, we decided to practice starting that family.

  ***

  Daphne scooped up a bit of frosting with her finger – the remainder of our dessert – and smeared a little on my right nipple before feeding the rest to me.

  “I had a little fun at the bar this evening.” Daphne licked the smudge of icing from my chest.

  “Did you?”

  “Yeah. I had a couple of college kids hitting on me.”

  “They give you a hard time? You should have called me.” I wasn't going to win any acting awards, but my reaction relayed just the right amount of interest and surprise.

  “No. No, they were harmless.” My thoughts exactly. “Told them I was married and they moved on to other prey.”

  Should I push? I mulled asking my wife about the older gentleman and divulge that I was watching her. Daphne took the decision out of my hands.

  “They were cute, but not really my type. Too much frat boy attitude in them.”

  “Not like me.”

  “Nope. Definitely not like you.” She leaned up and kissed me. She tasted sweet. “After you texted though, another guy approached me.”

  “One of the few perks of being so damn gorgeous.”

  Daphne started tickling me and we wrestled a bit.

  “Alan was nothing like those other guys.” My wife was now on top of me, straddling me, her moist lower lips leaving a trail of our fluids on my chest. “He was all man. Charming as hell. Knew when to be serious and when to joke.”

  She had moved up my body. Her pussy was now hovering over my face. I could see her labia, red and swollen, a few creamy drops of my cum still visible. I licked the entire length of her opening. I tasted the salty tangy remains of our love-making.

  “God that feels good, Rich.”

  I mumbled a thank you.

  “I could have sat and talked with him all night.”

  My deflated penis started to stir. I moved my mouth away from my wife's pussy and asked the obvious question. “Why did you come back?”

  “Because I could have stayed and talked with him all night.” Daphne's hazel eyes sparkled down at me, the tiny flecks of green and grey reflecting the warm lamp light. She was daring me to speak. Instead, I went back to eating her pussy.

  “You know I'm not really talking about talking, right?”

  “Uh-huh.” My affirmation may have been lost in her delicious flesh.

  “Alan was so handsome. I would have loved to get lost in his inviting brown eyes, run my fingers through his salt and pepper hair. Uhh!”

  Daphne arched her back and let out a deep sigh as a small orgasm rippled through her. This caused her mound to be pushed further into my face. I could hardly breath, but I was in paradise.

  She eventually came down and collapsed on the bed beside me.

  “So you're saying he's old.”

  “Experienced.” Her answer, more a sigh than a word.

  “And you wanted to... experience him.” I could feel my cock expand with this teasing exchange.

  Daphne leaned over until her nose touched mine. “In every way.” My wife moved her hands down my body and grasped my erection. “You're aroused by all this talk about Alan?”

  “We both are.” I reached over and thrust a couple of fingers into my wife's well-lubricated opening. She yelped.

  She then threw her legs over me again and mounted me. She started moving up and down on my cock and I met her thrust for thrust.

  Daphne threw her head back and became lost in her pleasure.

  I believe in karma, doing the right thing, and since my wife had been honest with me, I decided to be honest with her.

  “I'm glad you told me about Alan.”

  “So. Am. I.” Daphne continued to grind herself against me, rubbing her clit against the base of my cock. I wondered if she was thinking about him or me. At the moment, it didn't matter.

  I could feel her muscles begin to pulse, her nails dug into the skin on my chest and a low moan issued from her lips. “Fuck... Fuck... Fuck...” Her words were almost lost in the noise of the room's air conditioning unit.

  “I saw you. Down stairs. At the bar.” I gave a hard thrust for each declaration.

  “Wha—” Daphne's eyes opened wide. I kept up my assault, driving my cock deep with an urgency that felt primal. I wanted to drive all thought of Alan from her mind. I wanted her to know it was me, her husband, fucking her.

  “I saw the dudes. Alan. The flirting.”

  A few unintelligible words escaped her lips. I could feel my climax approaching.

  “You were. A very naughty. Naughty girl.” I couldn't hold out much longer.

  “And I. Loved it.” One final push, deep into her womb and I erupted. My cock pumping several blasts of semen as far up as I could. My orgasm sparked hers and I could feel her pussy convulsing, milking my cock for every last drop of cum.

  Daphne fell on me. Our mouths meeting. We kissed – a fierce kiss.

  “I love you. I love you.” Her words fought to escape her mouth between breaths.

  I hugged her tight, grabbing her ass and pulled her to me as she remained impaled on my, now softening, erection.

  “So, were you ever going to tell me you were in the bar?”

  “You know how much I love watching you.”

  “Yes. I do. Now answer the question.”

  “Truthfully, I don't know.”

  A darkness fell across Daphne's face. “What do you mean?”

  “If you hadn't told me about the flirting firsts, if you had lied...”

  My wife huffed and rolled off me, onto her back.

  “... I don't know what I'd have done.”

  “You think I'd hide that from you?”

  I really didn't think she would. We were always honest with each other. We both loved how the teasing spiced up our sex life. I was about to say a
s much, but my hesitation betrayed me.

  “You really think I'd keep that from you? Mess around with a guy behind your back.”

  Before I could answer, Daphne sat up and grabbed my face. “Trust me, Richard. I will never screw around behind your back.”

  She leaned over and kissed me. “I need to take a shower. I feel so. Dirty.”

  I thought about joining her, but she closed the bathroom door – a not so subtle hint that she wasn't inviting me in. So I sat in bed and wondered where we stood. I figured she was just annoyed at my lack of trust. She obviously liked being watched but only if she knew about it. And I liked watching, although I think I liked it more when she wasn't aware. I wanted to see how my wife reacted when she wasn't performing for my pleasure, but for her own.

  Chapter 5

  My confidence paid off and I got the job in Dallas. Neither of us were surprised. I'm good at what I do, and while three years of experience is on the low end of what they were looking for, my knowledge and ties to the local community more than made up for that short coming.

  The Metro-Plex Network payed for us to move, covering our costs in breaking our lease and putting down a deposit on a nice townhouse in Deep Ellum, one of the trendy neighborhoods near downtown.

  It was around a month after my impromptu interview that I found myself walking into a new newsroom for my first day on the job. I wasn't expected to actually start producing until the following week, so my first day consisted of staff introductions and filling out paperwork for the Human Resources department.

  I was at my desk, acclimating myself to the software I'd be using, when I heard an oddly familiar voice behind me.

  “So, you're the new kid?”

  I turned around and was greeted by the tall frame of Steve Speare towering over me. Granted I was sitting down at the time, but even after I stood up he was still a good inch or two taller than I was.

  “Mr. Speare, it's great to meet you.” I offered my hand and we shook. His grip was firm and I returned it in kind. I felt an odd tingle develop in my stomach. I remembered the first night I'd seen this man, his friendly blue eyes sparking on my television set all those years ago, and I remembered my wife's reaction to him and that tingle moved further south. I hoped he didn't notice the slight stirring in my groin and took it the wrong way, but I doubted he was the kind of man to notice that kind of thing.

  “Please, call me Steve, cause I'm going to call you Richard.”

  “Make it Rich and you've got a deal.”

  “Okay, Rich. Come on and lets get us some lunch. If you're going to be writing the words that come out of my mouth we need to get to know each other a little bit.”

  It was really odd, sitting down and eating salad with a man I knew my wife would love to fuck. I wanted to dislike him, but I couldn't, he was too damn friendly and it wasn't his fault he was handsome.

  “How was Des Moines?”

  “Like someone took Garland and plopped it right in the middle of a cornfield.”

  “I know the feeling. My first job was reporting for WSAV in Savannah. Great city, but I wouldn't want to spend more than a couple years living there.”

  “Most excitement I had was covering the election a couple years back.”

  “That was something.”

  We talked a little politics. Steve was a moderate conservative, liked keeping his taxes low, but wasn't too thrilled with the whole “family values,” agenda.

  “You married?” I hadn't seen a ring on his finger.

  “Nah. Hard to find the right woman, willing to move around as much as I have. Had a couple close calls, but when I got a chance to move further up the food chain, so to speak, both decided to stay where they were.”

  “Guess I'm lucky.”

  “Takes a special woman.”

  I don't know why, but I pulled up a picture of my wife on my phone. “This is Daphne. She's the definition of special.”

  I showed Steve her picture. “Holy fuck is she gorgeous, pardon my language.”

  “I say the same thing to myself every morning I wake up next to her.”

  “So would I.”

  I was starting to get a little uncomfortable talking about Daphne. I wished she was here, but glad she wasn't. I hadn't forgotten about her freebie list, and who was on it.

  “You seeing anyone?”

  “I've gone out on a few dates with Elizabeth.” Steve said the name like I should recognize it. From the blank expression on my face he realized his mistake. “She works at the station. In accounting.”

  “Small world. My wife's an accountant.” Daphne got rehired at her old job our first week back in town.

  Steve and I discovered a few things we had in common, before lunch was over. We both preferred baseball to football, liked reading Kurt Vonnegut and Norman Mailer, and we both went into journalism because of Edward R. Murrow, although my dream started after seeing the George Clooney movie and wanting to be Fred Friendly.

  That Friday I ran into Elizabeth from accounting and learned Steve and I had another thing in common. We both liked red-heads. And I knew I really needed to keep Daphne as far away from him as possible.

  ***

  And so, after more than three years, Daphne and I finally had a compatible work schedule and life became much less stressful. Sure there was the normal stress of putting together a news cast five days a week, but at least I could look forward to having a nice dinner with my wife after instead of coming home to find her in bed or heading off to her own job.

  Daphne's day ended an hour earlier than mine, so she usually whipped up something quick for us to eat or grabbed take-out on the way home. We made friends with a few of the other families living around us and sometimes we'd have dinner with them, chat and gossip, share a few drinks. Sometimes we'd go out. There was a quaint little pizza place we loved to go to, a few blocks away, that specialized in infused whiskey drinks and thin crust pizza. It was a great place to hang out.

  After dinner we'd snuggle up and watch television, or, if the weather was nice, we'd take a stroll around our quickly gentrifying neighborhood, admiring the murals and amazing graffiti on some of the buildings, or stop into a dive bar for a quick drink.

  But, no matter what we did after work, we always made it back in time to watch the Ten O'Clock News with Steve Speare. And nine times out of ten we had sex afterward. Sometimes a fast fuck, sometimes a little hard, occasionally a slow, tender, coupling. No matter the mode, it was always good, the best sex and most frequent sex we'd had since our wedding. We were happy with our new lifestyle and I was knocked off balance when, one Saturday in June, a year after we moved back to Dallas, my wife popped the question over breakfast.

  “You think I should go off the pill?”

  “Wha—” I didn't have an answer. I was just getting used to having my wife back, did I really want to share her attention with children? My first reaction was to be snarky. “You talk to your mother recently?”

  Daphne threw a biscuit at me, but I was ready for it and easily one-handed it.

  “No,” she said with a smile. “I just think it's time we thought about having kids.”

  “You think we're ready?” I thought it was a good question. Daphne's answer was puzzling.

  “No one's ever really ready for kids.” She had a point. “We'll lose sleep, have to keep a closer track on our budget, and there's day care. Diapers.”

  “You arguing for or against?”

  “Neither. I just think if we're going to do this – have a family – we should just go ahead and take the plunge.

  “Probably right. We should have the kids while were still young and can keep up with them.”

  “Look at you Rich. Being all pragmatic.”

  “Am I wrong?”

  “No.”

  Daphne quit her birth control that day and we spend the rest of the weekend in bed, me trying my best to get my wife pregnant. Of course it wasn't going to happen right away, but it was fun trying.

  We had sex e
very night that week and several times the following weekend, but without luck; Daphne got her period six days later. We took a two week break. No sex. No masturbation, at least for me. Daphne enjoyed her orgasms too much to quit, I was trying to refill my tanks.

  It was hard – my cock and keeping to my abstinence pledge. Every time I watched my wife get out of the shower, drops of water sliding along the slope of her perfect breasts, her amber tresses plastered against her head, that beautiful tuft of fuzz between her legs, I wanted to touch myself, but if I so much as reached for my cock, Daphne would shake her head and tsk her displeasure. I'd pout and cross my arms, my erection bouncing around painfully ahead of me. My wife would smile and run her fingers across her slick labia and I'd have to leave the bathroom before I blew a blood vessel.

  At the end of the two weeks, I was so ready to fuck.

  It was a Friday night, of course we had breaking news – a fatal car crash on the LBJ freeway during rush hour – and I had to stay late to help the six o'clock producer re-write her show. I didn't get home until after seven.

  Walking was difficult as my cock was straining against my slacks. It knew the reprieve was close.

  Daphne was sitting in the living room reading the newest Lee Child thriller.

  “I need you.” I hoped my voice sounded strong and forceful, not whiny.'

  “Good to know. Let me finish this—” I pulled Daphne out of her chair.

  “Don't you want to eat something first?”

  “No.” I pulled her toward the bedroom.

  “You know, you've gone longer without sex. Your acting like I'd cut you off for a year.”

  “That was different.” I began to take off my clothes.

  “How so?” Even though she was grilling me about my sudden need, my wife also disrobed with the same haste.

  Most of my blood had left my brain and rational thought wasn't easy at the moment.

  “Before, back in Iowa, lapses in sexual activity were out of lack of opportunity, not active denial.” That's what I thought I said. It really came out like, “crazy. need. fuck. please.” I think I stretched that last word out a little too long and Daphne started worrying.