The Other Man (The Other Man Series Book 1) (18 page)

I shook my head, no.

“I’m not nervous, I’m petrified. It seems so, so…”

“Huge? New? Painful? It seems so what?”

“All of them. More though. There’s no going back from that. I want you, I want to be with you, but what if this goes wrong, Zach? I’d be broken. For some reason, the thought of letting
that
happen and then ever losing you, just feels like something I couldn’t recover from.”

“That’s...deep,” he noted, and I nodded. “You’ll get past that fear. I have you now and this doesn’t have any choice but to work because we’re going to make it. There’s no giving you up now. Anyway, I’m not saying tomorrow, or even next week, but soon, I’m going to get you ready for me. I know how it feels and it’s indescribable. I want to be the one to give that to you. I want to be the one who stretches you with his fingers, the one who licks your ass until you’re begging for it. I want to be the one who opens that tight little hole wide enough to take me, who feels the inside of you pulsing and choking my cock. I want that. I crave it and you’re going to give it to me.”

My dick stretched, his words sending the blood from my brain rushing south. He smirked.

“You want it, you’ll get it. Soon. But right now, we need to go clean up. We’re going to go crusty if we don’t clean this shit off soon!” He joked. “Shower with me?”

I shook my head, hoping he’d understand that I needed a few minutes by myself to take in everything he’d said and my reaction, “Do you mind if I take my own?”

“Of course not. You take the main bathroom, I’ll take the ensuite,” he kissed me briefly. “I’ll grab you a towel and meet you in bed.”

He heaved himself up, and grinned down at me, “And Blake? Don’t over think things ok?”

Easy for him to say.

“No,” I spat. “I’m not going to keep going over this. Tell me one thing, Carlie. When it’s written all over you that you don’t really care either way, why are you fighting me on this? Just sign the papers and we can both move on with our lives.”

It was not going well.

I woke up that morning, and headed into work dreading the visit with Carlie...and I was right to.

First, I walked through the door, she was wearing tiny little French knickers and a vest top - no bra - and she tried to kiss me. Second, she slapped me. Third, she cried. And finally, she’d taken to begging. I was
this close
to losing it altogether.

“There’s nothing else to talk about,” I sighed. “Either sign the papers, or we’ll fight it out in court but the result is the same. I’m not coming back.”

She fell to her knees in front of me, placing her hands on either thigh. I tensed.

I was sitting on the sofa with my legs spread and she had been pacing the room. Her being that close to me, having her hands so high on my thighs, it didn’t feel right. The urge to escape roared through me. I tried to push her hands away and slide out from underneath her. She felt my movement and scrambled forward, straddled my lap and threw her arms around my neck.

My body turned to stone.

Sobbing, she pleaded with me.

“You can’t do this to me, Blake. We love each other. We always have.”

“You need to get off me. This isn’t going to work,” I picked her up by the hips, stood and put her back down on the sofa. “If you have nothing more to say, I’m going to get some more of my stuff and leave.”

“You can’t leave!” She cried. “Not yet anyway.”

Her words made me pause in suspicion, “What’s going on?”

Biting her nail nervously, she looked towards the front door and back to me, not answering. I had a really, really bad feeling. The doorbell rang.

“Just remember, I was trying to do something good. I didn’t think you’d be like this. I just thought we could sort things out and now this isn’t going to happen and I just thought...I thought...well that night was really good and you didn’t mind the second time and we needed something good and...and…”

“Answer the fucking door, Carlie,” I growled as the doorbell sounded again.

I didn’t need to see who walked in. I could sense him. His voice, his scent. I couldn’t avoid what was about to happen, so I stood with my feet apart, shoulders straight, arms crossed, and my chin held high. I didn’t know how this was going to play out.

Zach walked in, followed by Carlie and he stood opposite me, mirroring my stance.

“What’s going on?” He asked, directing his question at Carlie.

“Um,” she stopped and bit her lip. “Well, you see, before, you said you were always willing to, you know, like…”

He sighed, she cringed, I growled.

Playing the part, I threw my hand out in their direction and laughed without humour.

“Are you fucking kidding me with this shit?
I’m
divorcing you
, I actually filed the papers and you thought...what? What were you thinking, Carlie, because this shit makes
no
sense.”

Her voice cracking, she leaned forward and screamed,
“You liked it! You fucked me harder the first night that he was here than you
ever
have before and I fucking loved it!”
she sucked in a breath and spoke lower. “You were different, both nights we had together. You wanted me more because he wanted me too. You’ll see, Zach’s cool, he’ll do it again. That possessive side of you wants to come out to play.”

She stepped forward and ran her hands up my chest to my shoulders, “Think about it, Blake. Remember how amazing it was, how hard we fucked. Remember how much it turned you on when you watched him lick my pussy and when his cock was inside me.”

I clamped my lips together to hold back the vomit threatening to erupt and gently pushed her away from me. I remembered, and it was amazing. It was hot. It was beautiful.

At the time.

Now all I saw was Zach’s face as Carlie sucked him, him throwing back his head in unadulterated pleasure. I saw his eyes on me. I saw him on his knees, sucking Carlie’s essence from my dick and milking me dry. I heard the sounds he made as he swallowed and the way his throat worked.

I saw it
all
.

But he was
mine
.

His pleasure was because of
me.

And I could have all of that without her there, which was exactly what I wanted.

Her desperate attempts at making me jealous had no effect. It was sly, part of me felt guilty because of the clouds of secrets in the room that she was completely unaware of. But what she’d done? It was completely unacceptable, crazy, and thoughtless. Completely Carlie.

“Jesus, you are actually insane,” I whispered in shock.

“Um,” Zach started. “I’m just going to go and let you two…”

“
No!
” Carlie shrieked. “You need to stay!”

“Carlie, honey, I never agreed to this. You said you needed to talk to me,” he widened his eyes at me and I knew that he’d been thinking that she knew about us. “I’m thinking now is not a good time so…”

Ignoring him, she turned back to me, “You were
jealous
, Blake. Do you know what that means? You still love me, and I’ll prove it.”

She spun around, stalked across the room to Zach, leaned up on her tiptoes and crashed her mouth to his. I grunted, holding in my laugh. Zach eyes shot wide and his lips fused together as she licked along the seam of his mouth. His shoulders snapped back and his hands turns to fists at his sides.

Carlie pulled back with a frown, she was whispering, but I could hear every word.

“It’s ok, Zach. You can kiss me. Trust me, it’ll all work out nicely.”

Eyes still wide as saucers, he shook his head back and forth. The poor guy looked terrified. I couldn’t help it, I snorted, tried to cover it with a cough and failed.

Laser beams shot from Carlie’s eyes.

“
This isn’t fucking funny! I just kissed another man and you’re supposed to be jealous!
”

The pitch of her voice slid through me and I shuddered. Enough was enough.

Quietly, but firmly, I asked her to look at me. She did.

“Would you look at yourself?” I started. “What happened to you? This isn’t you, Carlie. I get it, ok? Do you think that when I married you, I wanted things to turn out like this? That I ever imagined they would? Not in a million years. I loved you, Carlie. So fucking much. I was proud to have you on my arm. I loved it that all the guys thought I was so lucky whenever they saw you at work functions. I used to smile when you’d get in a state because your hair wouldn’t behave or because you couldn’t find your favourite pair of shoes. But we grew up, darling. Or at least, I grew up. Nothing changed. You’re still all about image. You care so much about what people think, what their opinion of you is. You’ve lost sight of who you are and I’ve lost the wife I loved. You know why we never had children, or why we never spoke about it? Because I was too wrapped up in my career, and you were too wrapped up in yourself.”

“That’s not true I…”

“It
is
true, Carlie. You’re so obsessed with being perfect, how would you feel if your flawless skin was scarred with stretch marks? I can tell you, you’d drive yourself to distraction. I’m letting you go, honey. We don’t work anymore because we’re not made for each other. I can’t pay you enough attention, and you can’t understand my attachment to my job. If we were meant to be together, Carlie, those things would just be that. Things. For us, they define us. You’re thirty-three, not some old spinster. You’ll find someone else, you’ll settle down again and be happy with who you are. Staying with me is making you crazy, and that’s not fair to you, or to me. You need to spend some time by yourself. Find the old Carlie. Bring her back. When you find her, don’t let her go because she was one of the best women I’ve ever met. As much as it hurts me, you’re not my other half and I’m not yours. You need to find the person who owns the other half of your soul.”

I fought to keep my eyes off the one person in the room who had taught me that. Carlie opened and closed her mouth a few times. Zach cleared his throat and pointed at the door, indicating that he was going to leave and I nodded.

Carlie’s shoulders twitched as if she’d just realised he was still there and she looked over her shoulder at him. He closed his eyes as if in pain when he noticed the tears openly streaming down her face and I watched him flinch. Yeah, it was
not
a nice feeling. The lump in my throat grew thicker with every passing second.

“You’re really leaving me?”

I slowly closed my eyes and let a single tear fall, “Yes, honey. We can’t do this anymore.”

“But...we love each other.”

“Not anymore,” I said gently. “You’re holding on to thin air, Carlie.”

She mouthed my words back me, testing them on her tongue. Her tears were flowing down her cheeks, little black streaks of mascara left behind in their path. She shook her head.

“You’re wrong, Blake. I do love you. I always have and I always will. You’re my husband. When I said my vows to you, I meant them. To love and cherish, to have and to hold, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health. I failed. Because I won’t have you until death do us part. I can’t look you in the face and tell you that I hope you find the other half of your soul, Blake. I can’t do that and I don’t think I ever will. You were mine to have, mine to keep. I don’t know where we went wrong,” she hiccupped in a breath. “I’m letting you go, too. Holding on is hurting me more than giving you up. I kissed another guy right in front of you and you laughed. Even if you still had the tiniest bit of love for me left, you never would have done that. I can’t fight this battle on my own, Blake, and you gave up on me a long time ago.”

I swallowed. Guilt, shame, heartache and pain flickered across my mind and made me jump forward. I grabbed her around the shoulders and squeezed her into me. Burying her face in my chest, she sobbed. I gave in and allowed the rest of my tears to fall.

Years ago, the old Carlie, the old Blake, they would have clung to each other in passion, in love and in laughter.

This wasn’t that.

We were clinging to each other in agony, in loss and in goodbye.

I loosened my arms, framed her tear-stained face in my palms and whispered, “There she is.”

She attempted a smile, but her face crumpled. I moved us to the sofa and sat, she curled up in my lap.

So I held her. I let her cry. I let her curse at me.

I held her long after I needed to.

Hours and hours.

Long into the night, until the first streaks of sunlight kissed the sky and she fell asleep. Then I shifted out from underneath her. I lay her down and covered her with a blanket before kissing her forehead. I lingered longer than I needed to, longer than I should have. Her eyes blinked open and she tilted her chin up. My eyes fell to her parted lips.

And I kissed her.

Her tongue swept out, dancing with mine. Her fingers drove into my hair and I moved closer. I kissed her with all the love, passion and desire that we had lost.

“I’ll always love you, Blake,” she whispered against my mouth when we paused for breath, “But you need to go now.”

I nodded, “Yeah, I have to go now.”

“Estás rompiendo mi corazón, Blake. Pensé que tu eras mio para siempre. Salir, hacer lo que tienes que hacer.Te esperare por siempre si tengo hacerlo. Usted puede creer que su alma pertenece a otra, pero está la otra mina,” she breathed, driving that blade deeper.

“I don’t understand you, honey.”

Her lips curled but her smile didn’t reach her eyes, “You never did.”

She turned her back to me and curled into the sofa, I took that as my cue to leave.

At the door, I heard her whisper, “Bye, Blake,” but I couldn’t turn to look at her when I replied, “Bye, Carlie.”

Someone, somewhere was listening to Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley’s
Remind Me
, and not realising just how easy it was to forget.