Текст книги "Shiver : 13 Sexy Tales of Humor and Horror"

Автор книги: Belle Aurora

Соавторы: Penny Reid,Ruth Clampett
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Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 39 страниц)

Part Two: The Tease

Arriving back in Vegas was a whirlwind of activity. Jay had to get back to doing his show five nights a week, which meant I had to return to work, too. Since I hadn’t won our bet yet, I was still confined to the usual (boring) man choices of the wardrobe world. My artistic freedom was going to come at a price, and that price would be fooling my husband into believing he couldn’t frighten me.

I spent our first afternoon home secretly Googling techniques for staying calm in times of crisis. If I knew anything about Jay, he was going to go all out, so I needed every advantage I could get.

In other news, we’d been invited to a Halloween party being thrown by Tina, the girl who worked as Jay’s assistant. Don’t get me wrong – he didn’t have those sexy magician’s assistants who wore sparkly outfits that showed lots of leg and/or cleavage, but he did have a PA. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t like her much, and I rarely disliked people.

This was probably due to the fact that she showed a lot of leg and/or cleavage anyway.

I could tell she fancied the pants off Jay and was secretly biding her time. It was ridiculous; I mean, we’d just gotten married, for Christ’s sake. And really, it was so unclassy to have designs on someone else’s man. It wasn’t as if there weren’t thousands of other eligible bachelors in the city for her to set her sights on. No, she wanted mine. I knew Jay was aware of her affections and a little discombobulated over what to do about it. He was trying to be a gentleman, but I thought maybe he was going to put in for a new assistant soon.

I was hoping that was what he’d do, because I was one step away from making a voodoo doll, and since I was a dab hand at crafts, it wasn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility that I would….

Anyway, I was holding my head high and not succumbing to the urge to trip Tina and her too-tight jeans over, and I had agreed to go to the party. It was fancy dress, which meant I needed to find a suitable outfit. I kind of felt like going down the comedic route by dressing as a beer bottle or a stop sign, but that wouldn’t do. All of the women would be going as sexy angels, witches, nurses, vampires…llamas. No? Okay, then.

The point was, I needed to come up with something that was fancy dress but also provocative. It was shallow, but I wanted to look better than Tina. I would have designed and made something myself, but I was too rushed off my feet. That meant I had to go to a costume shop and buy an outfit. Unable to decide, I ended up buying three and bringing them back to the hotel with me to try on. They were as follows:

1.) Black pleather cat suit with spider-web netting over the boobage. Indecently tight.

2.) Sexy cop outfit complete with handcuffs and a bare midriff.

3.) Another black cat suit, this one for an actual cat, with cute ears and stick-on whiskers. Again, indecently tight. I thought I might have to be sewn into it like Olivia Newton John in the “You’re the One That I Want” scene from Grease.

And you know what? I kind of hated all three. I just wanted to wear a nice dress, do something cool with my hair, and be done with it.

It had been three days since we made the bet, and I was dying to give in and call it off. In terms of our relationship, everything was still very new, and I had a hunger for Jay that simply wouldn’t abate. It was torture to watch him doing stage rehearsals, which could be very rigorous, and hence he would work up quite the sweat. Yesterday he pulled off his T-shirt, balled it up, and used it to dab his forehead. It almost felt like it was happening in slow motion, like a Diet Coke ad or something. I mean, how was I supposed to resist that? Tina almost spontaneously combusted with an eye orgasm.

I coughed loudly, and her gaze slid to me, momentarily widening in shock to be caught ogling. It was funny. I was having a hard time with all this jealous/possessive business. Before I met Jay, I was always the sort of girl to back off and let the sassy go-getter chicks have the guy. But with him I felt like doing bodily harm when other women so much as glanced at him, going all Vampire Bill and proclaiming Jason is mine!! It was a strange new feeling for me, and I wasn’t sure I liked it.

Back to the present, I was trying unsuccessfully to zip myself into Halloween costume number one, the spider-web cat suit. I stood in front of the mirror in the lounge area of our suite, twisting my body as I tried to pull the zipper all the way up, but the lady was not for turning. I had way too much hip, belly, and tit going on for a surprisingly unstretchy material. I should have gotten one made out of spandex or something.

Finally, with a lot of wriggling around, I managed to get the zip done up the entire way. I felt like my ribs were being crushed, but I was triumphant, pumping my fist up into the air in victory. Unfortunately, my fist pump exerted a little too much action, and I heard a rip. I froze, eyes widening, as I turned and looked at my backside through the mirror.

I thought these kinds of things only happened in cheesy physical comedies, but no, it seemed the arses of pants that were too tight could split in real life, too. It was at that wonderfully opportune moment that the door to the suite opened, and Jay walked in. I stood in front of the mirror, staring at him through the glass, caught with my pants down (or should I say, torn at the seam.) I had half a mind to run and hide in shame, but it was too late. He’d already seen the damage, as it were.

I could tell he was trying not to laugh when he plastered on a bland expression. “Hey, you want some dinner?”

Bless him, he knew I was embarrassed and had chosen not to capitalize on the moment.

“Yes,” I sighed. “And you can go ahead and get a few jokes in. You know you want to.”

His mouth twitched. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Watson.”

“I bought the wrong size, okay. And the shop was about to close, so I didn’t have time to stay and try it on.”

He went to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water, twisted off the cap, and took a long gulp before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “If it’s any consolation, your tits look great in it,” he said, smirking.

I gave him a tiny grin. “Ever the charmer.”

He winked at me, and I went about relieving myself of the awful cat suit. The material made some rather unsexy noises as I pulled on it, heaving heavily when I finally got it off. I sat on the floor in my bra and knickers, trying to catch my breath after such a vigorous ordeal. Jay walked out of the bedroom, where he’d somehow managed to procure an energy bar. He had it halfway to his mouth when he paused midstride, piercing me with his gaze.

“Oh, no, you don’t, you’re not allowed to give me bedroom eyes. That’s against the rules,” I said, quickly standing up and hurrying to throw on a T-shirt and some yoga pants.

He took a bite out of the bar then and began to chew. In my sex-deprived state, even seeing him chew was like pornography.

“I wasn’t giving you bedroom eyes, Matilda. They were more ‘I want to tear your panties off and bend you over the couch’ eyes, and I didn’t happen to see anything about those sorts of eyes in the rulebook.” He gave me a very smug grin.

“All carnal looks are prohibited,” I said. I had been heading for the couch, but I stopped, turned, and went to perch on a pouf instead.

“It’s been three days. I have no censorship control over my eyes at this point, so you’ll just have to deal with them. Now, what are you going to do about your Halloween costume? It saddens me to say it, but it looks like whatever you were supposed to be in the cat suit is out of the question. A damn shame, too.”

“I have some other options.” I waved away his concerns. “What about you? What are you going as?”

He smiled, flashing his teeth at me, but didn’t reply.

I didn’t bother pushing him, because if I knew anything about Jay by now, it was that he never told a secret he didn’t want to tell. We ate dinner, and then it was time for his show. He performed in the hotel’s venue downstairs, so we only had to take the elevator down to get there.

The next day he was working out a few kinks in his choreography. And when I say “choreography,” I don’t mean dancing. In a magic show, it’s all about placement on the stage and standing in exactly the right spot at exactly the right time.

I was mending a cape Jay used in the disappearing part of his act. It was probably one of the few “old school” tricks he performed. Anyway, the cape had gotten torn on one of its edges. I suggested simply buying a new one, but he was adamantly against it. Apparently, some old guy he knew back in Boston who mentored him in magic for a while had given it to him, so it had sentimental value. That was why I was taking extra care to make it good as new.

Practice was an everyday thing for Jay. His show was a thrill ride when you were watching it from the audience, but the little details that sometimes took days or even weeks to perfect were tedious. Saying that, I still loved hanging out while he practiced. I was sitting by my sewing machine in the small room devoted to wardrobe with the door open. It was at just the right angle to be able to watch him. He had a small notepad in his hand and a pencil tucked behind his ear as he paced. He’d take three steps, stop, scribble something down on the notepad, then take another three steps.

Tina came in then, carrying a brown paper bag and a tray of takeaway coffee cups. I drew my lips into a tight line when I saw how short her skirt was. In terms of looks, she was the exact opposite of me. Tall, lithe, blonde, and graceful. She could have been a ballerina in another life. And sadly, I noted how Jay never had to bend down to speak to her. If they were kissing, their bodies would be perfectly proportioned for their mouths to meet.

I didn’t know why my brain came up with these horrible thoughts; it seemed it got a sick pleasure out of torturing me. Or perhaps I got a sick pleasure out of torturing myself, since technically speaking, I was my brain.

Jay barely gave her a second glance as he thanked her for collecting lunch, and took the proffered sandwich and beverage. She placed a hand on her hip and said something, but I was too far away to hear. Still, I imagined it was something saucy and flirtatious. My fears were totally unwarranted; Jay would never cheat on me, but I still couldn’t help having them. I quickly looked away and focused on my task when Jay’s head turned in my direction.

I wasn’t a crazy, jealous fool. I was so cool I was oblivious to all of my husband’s admirers. Ha, yeah, right.

“Yo! Watson!” he called, hands clasped around his mouth. “Lunch is here. Come eat with me.”

I suppressed my smile when a tiny scowl flittered across Tina’s face. She hadn’t known I was there. Perhaps she’d been hoping Jay would invite her to have lunch with him. I set my work aside and made my way out. Jay was already sitting on the floor of the stage, his legs dangling off the edge as he dug into his sandwich. Tina glanced at me, then held out the remaining sandwich and my requested tea.

“I guess this is yours,” she said as I took them from her.

I swallowed and glanced away. “Um, yes, thank you, Tina.”

You see, this was my problem. I couldn’t help but be polite to people, even when they didn’t deserve it. Her first day on the job, Tina had shown up in loose jeans and a very respectable shirt/cardigan combo. However, after she saw who she was going to be working for, i.e. Jay, she began showing up in low-cut dresses, short skirts, and painted-on jeans. What? I was a designer. The sorts of clothes people chose to wear was something I noticed more than the average person. And Tina’s outfits were clearly chosen to catch the eye of any that-way-inclined gentleman in the vicinity.

Tina also giggled unnecessarily whenever Jay said anything even remotely funny and fingered the silver moon pendant that hung around her neck a lot. Having read one or two of Jay’s books, I knew a good deal about body language tells, and Tina’s fingering of her pendant was a move designed to draw my husband’s eyes to her chest. She wasn’t as well-endowed as I was, but still, breasts were breasts, and men liked to look.

I sat down beside Jay, and Tina walked off. Deciding this was as good a time as any to broach the subject that she was attracted to him, I dived right in.

“Your assistant fancies you, if you hadn’t noticed,” I said absently, and took a bite out of my sandwich, which was surprisingly good. I just hoped Tina hadn’t spit in it or anything.

Jay let out a long breath. “Yeah. Bit of a problem. She’s great at her job, though.”

My initial instinct was to say no more, but I wasn’t going to back down. I couldn’t allow myself to. “I don’t like it.”

Jay took a slug of his coffee and set it down. I could see he was smiling already before he turned to look at me. He seemed entirely too gratified by my jealousy.

“Well, you don’t have to look so pleased about it.”

“Hey, I have a right to be pleased. It only took you a goddamn month to actually come out and admit you had a problem with her. I was beginning to think you didn’t give a shit.”

My eyes widened and my mouth dropped open. I was indignant. “You were waiting for me to say something! Was this all a little game for you?”

He shrugged and took another bite of his sandwich, nonchalant. I hated that I still found his chewing sexy. “What? A man needs to know his woman will fight for him,” he teased me.

“I’m not sure I’d win that fight. Tina’s bigger than me.”

He nudged me with his shoulder and winked. “Oh, I beg to differ. You’re a scrappy little thing, Watson. You could take her.”

Despite everything, his reply made me laugh. “I can’t believe you were baiting me with this. That’s sneaky, Jay, very sneaky.”

“You love it,” he said, voice growly. “I’ll get rid of her if you want. It’s unnecessary, since she could walk right in here wearing nothing but a thong and a smile, and I’d still be looking at you, darlin’. But if it makes you feel more comfortable, you only have to say the word.”

I chuckled against my will at his use of the phrase “a thong and a smile,” and then considered his offer. For some reason, I didn’t enjoy being the one to make the decision about someone else’s livelihood. Even if she was making a play for my husband, it felt selfish and low to have her fired just to assuage my own jealous insecurities.

Letting out a long sigh, I finally replied, “No, don’t fire her. Just…maybe I should talk to her or something. Tell her she needs to back off, you know, woman to woman.”

Jay pulled me to him then and began to massage some of the tension out of my neck. “Standing up for your man. I like it,” he murmured, and I melted into his touch. “You look gorgeous today.”

I had to stifle a moan, because his hands felt so good on me. Jay had been pulling late nights after his shows all week, staying up to do research, so most of the time I was asleep before he came to bed. It was good in terms of us sticking to the rules of our bet, but at the same time, I was hungry for his touch. His hands. God, I loved his hands.

I sank into him, my back to his front, and his lips whispered over the shell of my ear. “I’ve missed you,” I whispered weakly. His lips at my ear made a shudder pleasantly trickle down my spine.

He didn’t say anything, but his hands went to my hips as he pulled me in closer so I could feel just how much he’d been missing me, too. His cock was like a steel pipe pressing into my back, and I desperately wanted to reach around and feel him, but there were people still milling about, so I couldn’t. I was confined to the secret thrill of knowing we both wanted each other, but there was nothing we could do about it for the moment.

“You have no idea the things I’m gonna do to you after I win this bet,” he threatened, and I squirmed, clenching my thighs together. I wanted him to do those things right now.

His hand moved to my stomach, then dipped down so it was tantalisingly close to my nether regions. Daringly, I asked, “What kind of things?”

Even though I wasn’t facing him, I could practically feel his satisfied grin. “I’ll grip your hair as I sink myself into you from behind, pulling just a little, because I know how much you like that,” he said, and his words were torture. I was instantly wet and aching.

“Mm-hmm,” I mumbled, biting my lip.

“Then I’ll make you come with my cock still inside you. I can’t wait to feel you pulse around me.” He paused and took a breath as one of the hotel workers walked by. To the ordinary bystander, nothing lewd was going on. Little did they know the things my husband was whispering in my ear.

“I’ll have a taste of you then, maybe make you come on my face this time.”

“Jay,” I pleaded, gripping onto his hand, which had started to move down between my legs. I managed to stop him just in time. “You need to quit talking now.”

His chest shook with quiet laughter. “You’re the one who asked.”

“Yes, well, I hadn’t expected that onslaught.”

He tutted. “My dear Watson, do you know me at all?”

Part Three: The Ruse

The next day was Halloween. Jay had an afternoon show to perform, and then he was off duty for the night. I’d caught the tail end of a conversation between him and Tina that morning, with Tina asking if he was still coming to her party. He’d replied that yes, he was, and that he’d be bringing his wife. I enjoyed the extra emphasis he put on the word.

Still, Tina hadn’t seemed too deterred, and there was even a bit of an extra swing in her step all day. I absently wondered what she had up her sleeve. I was making my way back to the hotel suite that evening, my mind full of Tina and her scheming. It had just gotten dark, and we were supposed to be leaving for the party in an hour. I planned on taking a quick shower and then throwing on my costume. I’d done a bit of improvising, deciding to use the cat ears and whiskers, but instead of wearing the indecently tight cat suit, I’d wear a pretty black lace dress.

Tonight I was going to get Tina alone and have a woman-to-woman chat. I was all inside my own head, psyching myself up for it, as I stepped into the suite and dropped my bag down onto an end table. A warm breeze brushed past me, and I saw that someone had left the balcony doors open. It must have been the housekeeping staff because I knew Jay had been downstairs all day.

I walked across the room, intending to close them, when something caught my eye. A necklace of mine was sitting on the ledge, and I didn’t remember leaving it out there. Stepping outside, I went to retrieve it, and the moment I picked it up, the balcony doors slammed closed behind me, making a loud clatter. Gripping the necklace, I whipped back around and went to open the doors, but they wouldn’t budge.

What the hell?

I pulled at them, but there was nothing for it. They’d been locked. I was almost certain that there was no automatic lock on them, either. Peering in through the glass, I saw that the suite was empty, exactly as it had been moments ago. Nothing was out of place, no sign that anyone had entered and locked me outside for whatever bizarre reason. My heart began to thrum as my mind raced. What if a thief had broken into the suite to steal our valuables and locked me out here so I wouldn’t get in the way?

The breeze blew my hair over my shoulder, and with it I was one hundred percent certain I felt a cold hand slide across my neck. I had definitely felt it. Turning around again, I found no one. I was all alone, and goose bumps began to break out on my skin. I started to get anxious, because I hadn’t imagined the hand. It had felt oh, so very real.

“Murder,” came a strange whisper in my ear. It echoed as though coming from an electronic speaker, but that couldn’t be right. There was nothing out here. All of a sudden, I remembered the bet. I couldn’t believe it had slipped my mind, but I’d been so busy with work and fretting over Tina.

The hand slid across my neck again, but this time I was fast, grabbing it before it could disappear again, as weird as that sounded. Nothing was too out of the realm of possibility when it came to Jason Fields.

When I did turn around, I startled for just a moment as he came toward me, backing me up into the glass door. The thing about Jay was that he was almost as good an actor as he was an illusionist. Even though you knew it was him, he could be so absorbed in his character he made you believe it, too, made you question if you actually knew the real him at all. I clutched at my heart. He was wearing zombie makeup, a torn white shirt complete with fake blood stains, and torn black trousers.

I almost didn’t recognize him.

“Raised eyebrows, eyes wide, heartbeat accelerating. Yep, I think I managed to frighten you, Matilda,” he declared triumphantly.

I scowled. “You gave me a fright, that’s all. You didn’t frighten me.”

“Now, now, you know you can’t lie to me. You were scared, admit it.”

“I was more confused than scared. I couldn’t figure out how the doors became locked.” Walking to them, I pulled on the handle. They still wouldn’t open. I turned back to him. “Okay, how the hell did you get out here? Were you hanging off the edge of the balcony or something?” If he had been, it wouldn’t be the first time, but that was a whole other story.

He simply gave me an enigmatic smile in response. He rarely revealed his trade secrets to people, even his own wife. I stared at him, brows furrowed. This had been a good trick and all, but I found it difficult to believe he had spent all his time planning something so small-scale. Jay liked to think big. His usual stunts were the Taj Mahal. This was a one-room cottage on the side of the road.

“So that was it? That was your attempt at scaring me?”

“Yep. And it worked,” he said, reaching past me for the door handle. Annoyingly, it opened quite easily when he tried. “I can’t wait to collect my winnings.”

“No way. If anybody’s going to be collecting winnings, it’ll be me. I wasn’t scared. You took me by surprise. It’s not the same thing as fear.”

Jay shrugged and walked into the suite. “Fine. Have it your way.”

I followed him, grinning. “Oh, I will. I’ll have a great time having it my way, and the first thing I’m going to make you wear is a red Dickie bow. Get ready for some style, Inspector Holmes.”

He winced and flopped down onto the couch. “A Dickie bow? Not happening. Okay, I still have until the end of the night to frighten you. The bet hasn’t been won yet.”

I gave him a confident look and folded my arms across my chest. “Fine. Bring it.”

“I love it when you sass me. You won’t be sassing me when I win, though. You’ll be bending over and begging for more.” He waggled his eyebrows.

Studying him as I went to gather my things for the shower, I got the distinct feeling that the little show out on the balcony was all a ruse and that he had something much bigger planned. It was so like him to lull me into a false sense of security and then bamboozle me with a grand finale. I decided a five-minute shower was all I had time for. Our bathroom here was huge, and there was even a bench inside the shower that you could sit down on if it so pleased you.

So I sat there, lathering up my hair with shampoo and trying to think of what my devious husband could be planning. I was fresh out of clues. I had just finished washing and was about to get out when the door to the shower opened, and in stepped Jay wearing nothing but a smile. Yeah, there wasn’t even a thong to speak of. I threw one hand across my chest and the other over my downstairs business.

“Get out! You’re breaking the rules,” I protested. I was annoyed now, because I was so close to winning our bet and he was throwing a spanner in the works. Plus, I had some sexy lingerie set aside to wear tonight, and whether he won our bet or not, I had been hoping to surprise him with it. It had been a week since we’d been intimate. I didn’t want him ruining my surprise with shower shenanigans.

“I have to wash off all this zombie makeup,” he explained teasingly. “Not everything is about sex, Matilda.”

“Aren’t you dressing up for the party?”

He shrugged.

I watched as the water hit him and his cock stood proudly to attention. “Not everything is about sex,” my arse. I think I might have drooled a little. That plus the sight of his wet abs was enough to tempt even a nun into handing over her celibacy.

I stood there, yep, still drooling, as he squirted some shower gel onto his hand and began rubbing it all over himself. I had no words. None. The smile never left his face as he brought his eyes to mine and ran a hand from his chest down his abs to his groin. He looked…lickable. And he was using dirty tactics.

“You’re playing dirty,” I whispered, my voice completely devoid of all strength.

His eyes went soft, sort of sexy hazy, as his hand went to his cock and fisted it. “On the contrary. I think you’ll find I’m playing clean.”

Eating me up with his gaze, he pumped himself up and down, and I had to get out of there before I attacked him. I swallowed, took a deep breath, and put one foot in front of the other. They were the hardest three steps I’d ever taken in my life. I didn’t know why I was so determined to keep from having sex with him; I guess in some messed-up way I wanted to prove to myself that I could resist him, even if I was on a knife’s edge.

I summoned all my reserves of calm. I knew he was jerking himself off in the shower and wished I could be there to witness it, if not to join in. Trying to keep busy, I blow-dried my hair and set about putting on my costume. I used some black face paint to draw on a cat’s nose and then stuck the whiskers on my cheeks. I was done.

To my delight, Jay wore a black suit with a white shirt and a black tie that I’d designed for him, and even though it wasn’t fancy dress, I didn’t mind. I took a strange pleasure out of seeing him in clothes I’d made. He whistled appreciatively when he saw me, and I smiled happily.

“That was a low move you pulled in the shower,” I said as I took his hand and he led me outside and into a waiting taxi.

“You loved it, and you make a very pretty cat, by the way,” he said, dipping his head down and capturing my mouth in a quick, tender kiss. His tongue briefly slid past the seam of my lips and dipped inside, but then it was gone. He could be such a tease sometimes.

Tina lived in an apartment in a stylish part of town. Her place was small, but maybe it just seemed that way because there were so many people. She pouted when she answered the door – yes, that’s right, pouted. Her hair was up in a twist, and she was wearing a pink Playboy bunny outfit. It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. This was obviously the thing she had up her sleeve. I was almost offended on Jay’s behalf that she thought a sexy bunny outfit would be enough to tempt him.

“Jay, you didn’t dress up,” she said, trying to look all cute and disappointed. She barely gave me a second glance, even though I had gone to the trouble of dressing up.

Jay wrapped his arm around my waist as he led me inside. “Oh, I beg to differ. I thought my Alfred Hitchcock vibe was obvious,” he said, winking.

“You could be anyone in that suit,” said Tina, still feigning disappointment, like he had to make it up to her or something.

God, this woman needed to get a clue.

A somewhat awkward silence ensued.

“Oh, well, make yourselves at home, and feel free to have some drinks and food,” she said, and then went to talk to a group of other people. I saw her briefly touch Jay’s hand before walking away, and he broke the contact immediately, giving me an apologetic look. I knew there was nothing going on between them, but it was getting on my last nerve how she kept trying to get his attention.

Jay led me over to a counter full of drinks and poured me a glass of white wine. He knew my tipple of choice by now. His was usually a whiskey or sometimes a beer.

“Well, this is going to be fun,” I said, heavy on the sarcasm. “She obviously wore that outfit for your benefit. Perhaps you should fire her.”

Jay gave me a pleased smile. “You sound bitter, Watson. It doesn’t suit you.”

“Oh, whatever. You’re just as bad. Remember the barman from our honeymoon? I swear, if looks could kill, the guy would have dropped dead on the spot the moment you set your eyes on him.”

He massaged my hip as he placed a wine glass in my hand. Just my mention of the barman brought on a frown, and I enjoyed it. “Let’s not talk about that,” he said, and then some people we knew from Jay’s show came over to make chitchat. About an hour passed, and despite Tina making fuck-me eyes at my husband all night, I was having a decent time. I’d had a couple glasses of wine in me when I saw her make her way toward the bathroom. With alcohol-fuelled courage, I decided this was my time to set her straight.

Just before she had the chance to close the door, I pushed it open with my hand and stepped in after her.

“What the hell?” she said, giving me a dirty look.

“We need to talk,” I stated firmly, and closed the door behind me.

“I was just about to take a piss…um, what was your name again?” she asked bitchily.

Oh, she knew exactly what my name was. I laughed as I imagined her cutting my head out of photographs of me and Jay, and then supergluing her own head onto my body.

“My name is Matilda,” I enunciated. “Matilda Fields, and I’d like to politely request that you stop making a play for my husband. It isn’t proper.”

She stared at me, eyes squinted in annoyance. Then she folded her arms and cocked her head. “Jay is my boss. I work for him, so I’m certainly not making a play. I think you might be imagining things.” She paused and let out a long sigh. “Some women, God, so insecure and jealous.”

My eyebrows practically shot right up to the ceiling. “If you weren’t interested in him, then you wouldn’t have just said that. But anyway, I don’t want to drag this out. I just wanted to tell you to back off. We just got married, and I’d like to enjoy being a newlywed for a while without having to deal with women like you.”