Strange Men in Strange Cities (short story)

[image: Focusarg]

I've always been drawn to stories about couples taking trips together and getting naughty. It's an easy setup that we can all relate to: freed from the day-to-day routines that we both love and love to complain about, couples can explore versions of themselves that they normally wouldn't feel comfortable with. So we find Adam and Lizzie, playing a familiar game that's about to get spicy.

Strange Men in Strange Cities

A Variation on Watching Wife at Bar

The story is a familiar one to those with the kink—husband walks into a bar where his wife sits alone. Sometimes he approaches. Sometimes he sits back and watches the guys fawn. This story starts no differently.

Adam enters the narrow pub that’s attached to the downtown hotel, where Friday night patrons are packed in. The city is new, but the scene is the same. Travelers in groups cluster around tables, around the bar, all the conversation a loud cacophony that requires everyone to push in close.

He spots Lizzie sitting at the bar, her dark hair tied back in a single, sleek braid, her head tilted as she listens to a guy attempt to pick her up. He’s got no chance. He’s not Lizzie’s type. The tucked in golf shirt and khakis are all wrong.

It’s still a thrill to watch, though. Lizzie, his wife of fifteen solid years, flirting with a stranger. Sometimes it happens this way. Most of the time, they roleplay.

“Buy you a drink?” Adam asks once the golf shirt guy moves on.

Lizzie half turns to him, glancing at him sideways. A loose strand of dark bangs falls across her freckled cheek. “Sure, why not.”

“You look like the white wine type,” he says, “but tonight, you’re in need of some tequila.”

“Is that so?”

She always gets a little haughty when playing the straying wife, and Adam loves it. “You’re traveling alone, away from your family…” He nods at her ring. “And you’re here in this bar because you’d rather not be thinking about them. Tequila always helps with that.”

Lizzie turns more fully to Adam, her amused smile so familiar to him. It cuts against the illusion that she’s a stranger, but Adam doesn’t mind. She’s captivating that way. “Then a margarita it is.” 

This is the fourth time that they’ve played this game. It was actually Lizzie who started it, coming up to him as he was waiting for her at a bar and telling him that he looked like he needed a drink. It made him think about her single days, wonder if she was that forward. He saw her, ever-so-briefly, as the woman he first laid eyes on so many years ago, only mature now, a woman. He saw the creases around her eyes and the sharpness of her features that came with her forties. He saw how other men must see her now, and it turned him on. They kept up the charade that day, and the “one-night-stand” sex was phenomenal.

“I’m Neil,” Adam says.

“Annabelle.”

Introductions with their fake names always make them smile. The second time they did it, it ended the game entirely.

“Pretty name. It suits you,” Adam says. He waves the bartender over and puts in their orders—two margaritas, salt and rocks, premium tequila.

“You remind me of my husband,” Lizzie says. 

“That’s a good thing.”

Lizzie ignores the fourth-wall-shattering joke and says, “Even though you can’t taste the tequila with the mixer, he still pays extra for the top shelf.”

Adam checks her out. She looks great in her black, sleeveless dress. She wore it for her work meetings, but had paired it with a drapey sweater when she left that morning. Now the sweater is gone, and her lean, pale arms make her look more about sex than business.

“Well, he’s got fine taste.”

Lizzie laughs. “I don’t know about that. He married a woman who’s thinking about being unfaithful.”

“Just thinking? You look like a woman who’s done more than just flirt.”

She tips her head to one side and lifts her chin. “Do I now?”

“Mm hm. You’re not from this city, and even if you were, you wouldn’t be hanging out in a hotel bar. I imagine you travel a lot for work.” He doesn’t have to imagine, of course. He knows. “Don’t tell me you’ve never been tempted.”

“I won't.” I bats her lashes. “I can’t.”

It’s all a roleplay, but this idea of her straying lands like fire in his gut. This is what turns him on most. It’s not just refreshing to see his wife the way most men did, but it’s sexy as hell to think of her actually flirting with other men, of letting herself be Annabelle, who would go up to her room with a man like “Neil.”

The margaritas arrive. Adam holds up his. “A toast to Annabelle.”

“A toast to Neil.”

They smile. Their personas slip, just for a moment. Lizzie giggles. Adam sees the girl he fell for years ago.

“Or maybe to someone else,” she adds after the toast. “Don’t want you to get cocky.”

“You don’t like cocky men?”

“It’s a quality that could be attractive. But much like other things, it depends on how well the guy uses it.”

“I like a woman who knows what she wants.”

“Yeah? That’s different than my husband.”

It pricks at Adam. “Your husband doesn’t like that?”

“He knows what he wants, but isn’t always attentive to what I do.”

The conversation veers. The roleplay starts to deteriorate. Adam licks his lips. “What does he want?”

“Eh, what all men want. He wants me to be sluttier, dirtier, more adventurous. He wants me to be his pornstar.”

His gut tightens. “No, that’s not… I’m sure he doesn’t want—”

“Every Christmas, without fail, he buys me a g-string as a stocking stuffer.”

That is true, he does that. But it’s more of a joke now. He tries on his Neil persona again. “I don’t hate that idea.”

“He’s always asking me to shave my bush, even after I tell him how itchy it gets when it grows back.”

“Then just don’t let it grow back.”

Lizzie snickers. “Now you sound like him.”

“Weird.” They both laugh at that.

She leans closer, ready to share a secret. “He wants me to go out and flirt with men when I’m on the road.”

“And you don’t want that, too?” His confidence is gone. Did Lizzie really resent him this much? “Seems like you’re having fun.”

“Oh, no. You’re missing my point. Whenever I ask if that’s all he wants—the flirting—he tells me yes. He likes hearing stories. He likes hearing how turned on I get.”

“You really do get turned on?”

“Of course. I’m a red-blooded woman, and some of these guys are hot.”

Adam is hard. He’s short of breath. “But?”

“But I have to stop there. I’m not allowed to want more.”

“More?”

“These men, they don’t just flirt. They’re traveling, too. We’re alone in cities. We both have hotel rooms, just waiting there…” She runs a hand up Adam’s leg. “The ones who know what they’re doing with their… cockiness? They never fail to invite me up.”

He shivers.

“But my husband? He just wants me to flirt.”

Adam’s heart beats like a hammer against the inside of his chest. The tequila loosens his tongue and gives him the courage to say, “Maybe he wants you to do more, but is afraid to say it.”

Lizzie stares at him like he just delivered a riddle, like she’s trying to figure out if this was part of the game, or the truth. For his part, Adam’s not entirely sure himself, and rather than answer her follow-up questions, he excuses himself.

“I’ll be right back. Nature calls.”

Adam hasn’t had much to drink—one margarita shouldn’t make him feel this unbalanced—but he feels disoriented as he searches the bathroom. He glances back at Lizzie, sitting alone once again at the bar. 

She’s so poised, her back upright, legs crossed, one hand on the stem of her nearly empty margarita glass. She waves with her fingers. He smiles and turns back to his search.

Was she really tempted? No, not his faithful wife. Not the woman who folded the kids’ laundry while listening to NPR, who complained when her book clubs—of which she is a member of two—talks less about the book and more about gossip. That woman, virtuous and always the adult in the room, isn’t really tempted to have flings with strange men in strange cities. Is she?

It troubles him that he doesn’t know anymore. He also surges with excitement, so hard that he needs to adjust himself.

He has to ask about the restrooms, only to be directed out into the hotel lobby. It’s quieter out there, away from the raucous scene of pickups and post-meeting happiness. The lobby of this hotel is classy, old-school. People whisper, like they’re in a library. Soft jazz fills the space. Adam’s thoughts, though, continue to scream between his ears.

Is he really that self-centered? Does he really not take Lizzie into account? He doesn’t really want to turn her into a pornstar. She’s already so sexy, with her slender, yoga-fit body, with her dark hair and her creamy, freckled skin. Coupled with her delicate features, large eyes, and bow-like lips, she’s practically a Disney princess.

In the past, he has mentioned how practical her underwear selection usually is, though, and he had teased her about shaving off her landing strip. And then there is the game that they’re playing now. That was actually her idea first, but he was the one who kept pushing to play it again—for her to sit alone, for him to swoop in and be the stranger. It was just some fun to be had when they were away from their life, their kids, their normalcy.

But maybe she likes it for more than just a playful, marital game, Adam realizes as he tries to aim his erection into the urinal. She’s not just playing along, which makes him happy and nervous and excited and nervous and terrified.  She is more than the mother to his kids, or the high paid consultant, or the sweet woman he proposed to so long ago. She is a slender, dark-haired elfin beauty who enjoys sitting in bars and having men hit on her, and most of her trips she goes alone.

The one thrilling revelation is just how much more there was to discover about his wife and their marriage.

***

When he finally gets back to the bar, another man has taken his spot beside Lizzie. Unlike many of the guys here, he’s not in some form of business casual. He wears a tight, black t-shirt that stretches over broad shoulders and barely contains his muscular arms, one of which is sleeved in ink. Like his body, his face looks like it's carved from granite, his jaw square, his high forehead ending in a receding hairline that somehow works for him. 

This man is everything that Adam is not. Even from across the room, he can tell. This guy is the real version of Adam’s Neil persona—confident, handsome, and most importantly, a complete stranger. 

Unlike the last guy in the golf shirt, Lizzie seems into this dude. She’s leaning in as he talks, eyes wide as he recounts something that culminates in her covering her mouth and laughing. In that moment, Adam knows that she’s not thinking about him. She’s riveted by this stranger, and Adam feels jealousy and desire shift through him.

Adam needs to make a choice. Does he move in and tell this guy to get lost, that he was there first? Or does he watch her flirt until she dismisses him? They’ve done both, but in light of his new revelation, he opts for the latter.

A couple of spots open up on the opposite side of the guy, and Adam moves in to take it. Before he can reach, though, a second man joins the one flirting with Lizzie, carrying two drinks. Adam takes the lone spot, just in time to hear this new guy say, “There you are, Manny. Drinks finally arrived.”

“Thanks, man,” Manny says, only half turning away from Lizzie and whatever story he is recounting. Realizing a moment later that he’s being rude, he adds, “This is Liz. Liz, this is my buddy, McCartney.”

Lizzie sees Adam just beyond the two guys, her eyes flickering for only a moment before nodding at McCartney. “So there really is a visiting friend,” she says. “And now you're just ignoring him?”

Manny doesn’t acknowledge the little jab. “Liz and I… knew each other. Back in the day.”

Lizzie once again glances beyond the two men, right at Adam. He knows how to interpret what ‘knew each other’ means, and his eyes widen. Sucking in a fortifying breath, he gives her a nod before turning to find the bartender to get a drink of his own.

“That Liz?” Adam hears McCartney greet. “Nice to meet you.” 

It’s so hard not to look, not to stare. Harder still not to wonder what stories accompany that Liz. His heart threatens to beat itself out of his chest. He pulls his phone from his pocket and opens up his news app. Then, because he can’t help himself, he sends a text to his wife.

I want what you want. Whatever it is.

He chances a glance at her, but she’s already caught up in her conversation with Manny, who is once again fully engaged with her.

Manny’s traveling friend, McCartney, surprises Adam by asking, “You want this beer? My buddy, I guess, already got a new one.”

“It’s not roofied, is it?”

McCartney chuckles. “Nah, I’d never do that, even if you were my type.”

“Then thank you, friend. I’m Neil.” Might as well keep up the fake name.

“McCartney,” he says. “Yes, it’s a first name. My parents were big Beatles fans.”

Adam nods. Opposite McCartney, Lizzie laughs at something Manny says. She’s not doing it deliberately, but it feels like fire along the back of his neck. He shifts in the stool and tries to block it out. It somehow makes it worse that it’s loud enough in the bar that he can’t hear what they’re actually talking about.

Adam forces himself to make small talk, just to distract himself. “So you’re here for work?”

“Yeah. In town for a couple of nights. You?”

“Same.” His eyes are drawn back to Lizzie as she tilts her head to one side and touches her neck. She’s blushing. McCartney catches him looking, so Adam adds, “Wish I had some company like that, though, you know?”

McCartney chuckles, leaning in and lowering his voice. “I’m married, but yeah, I get it. It’s why I can’t really be mad at my buddy for ditching me. If she’s the same Liz that I think she is, I’ve heard stories…”

Something rumbles deep inside of Adam, like a depth charge silently exploding. “Yeah?”

Again, he glances at Lizzie, catching her just as she checks her phone. She must have seen his text because she looks past the two men at him, then quickly looks towards the bar, playing it off. She looks… electrified.

Face on fire, Adam takes a gulp of beer. McCartney doesn’t seem to notice the weird exchange. He leans further on the bar, just in case anyone else could overhear in this loud bar. “Manny’s not the settling down kind of guy, but has mentioned her as the one that got away.”

Adam licks his lips, which are suddenly very chapped. “What, uh, stories have you heard?”

“Eh, I’m making it sound crazier than it probably is. I just get the feeling that she became the chick that he compared all the others to, you know? She was a good time. Kept up with his adventurous spirit. Loved to fuck. Was one of those rare women who loved giving blowjobs.”

McCartney might as well have punched him right in the solar plexus. It’s like the wind was torn from his body. It is true, Lizzie gave really great head, but Adam wouldn’t have said that she loved giving them, and it had been some time since she did it.

His phone rumbles at the same time, and he knows that it’s from Lizzie. He can almost feel her attention on him, whether she’s looking at him or not. She wants him to check, so he doesn’t.

McCartney doesn’t help calm his nerves as he says, “I bet she’s going to be giving one out tonight.”

“I think she’s married,” Adam blurts. Then, covering, adds, “I think I saw a ring.”

“I’ve never known Manny to be put off by a thing like that.” Adam holds his breath, waiting for the part where McCartney tells him that Liz wasn’t so great with fidelity either. He already feels sick to his stomach as he considers the implications. But that’s not where McCartney takes it. “Pretty sure he prefers them attached. Means they won’t get attached to him.”

“Charming guy.”

“Definitely not.”

Adam couldn’t ignore his buzzing phone any longer. He pulls it out, turning it away so that McCartney can’t see what his wife has written.

[Lizzie]: And if I want to take this guy up to the room?

He has to re-read his previous text to anchor him. I want what you want. Whatever it is. His breath catches. He glances at Lizzie, who seems to sense him. Their eyes meet. He knows that look—serious, excited, ready to jump into something crazy and new.

He just nods and puts his phone away. “I think you may be right,” he tells McCartney, loud enough that maye, just maybe, his voice carries to Lizze. “I think you might not be hanging out with your friend much longer.”

Manny shifts as he hears Adam, glancing partially over his shoulder before rolling his shoulders back and finding his composure again. He leans in close to Lizzie and whispers something that makes her smile. She bites her lip. She finds Adam again. She’s going to do it. Holy shit, she’s actually going to do it!

Adam watches, stunned, as his wife turns to this other man, this guy from her past, without pulling back. She’s well in his personal space, their faces inches apart, their eyes locked. Adam watches as his beautiful bride closes that short gap, pressing her lips to Manny’s. 

Everything in Adam catches, like his insides are one giant snag for his soul. The kiss doesn’t remain so sweet, although nothing about this moment feels sweet to Adam. The kiss deepens, a tongue slides into a mouth, a hand rests behind a neck, and Adam sinks deep into a pit beneath his feet.

But damn does it feel exhilarating.

McCartney, looking over his shoulder at whatever has Adam so enthralled, chuckles. “I suppose you’re right.”

The former lovers break the kiss. Lizzie whispers something to Adam, who nods. She slides off of the stool and saunters out of the bar. All three men watch her float by, the picture of sexy elegance in her slender hips and that dark, jaunty braid.

“You’re going to stand me up,” McCartney says. He’s smiling in a way that tells Adam that this isn’t the first time this has happened.

“I mean, not really.” Manny is all smiles, looking exactly like a man who’s about to get laid. “We did meet. Had a beer.” He squints. “Weren’t you saying you should probably not stay out late?”

McCartney takes it in stride. “So that’s Liz? As in Liz Liz?”

“That’s her.”

“Now I see why it didn’t work out.”

Manny seems still half focused on the door that Lizzie walked out of. “Oh yeah?” he says.

“She’s too classy for you. No offense, but I was expecting someone with… more in the tits department and less between the ears.”

Adam pulls out his phone and pretends to browse the news as the two men chatter away.

Manny doesn’t seem offended. “None of that really matters as long as she knows how to use that mouth, am I right?” He chuckles. “But seriously, that’s what made Liz so special. She’s like that…” He waves in the direction that she left in. “But was always down for a good time. She was fun, funny, smart, and didn’t say no to very many things.”

It all sounds like his Lizzie until that last statement—that statement is the one Adam’s brain stumbles on. His ears burn. He stares harder at the headlines on his phone without reading any of them.

“And it doesn’t sound like she’s changed much,” Manny goes on. He’s settling up his tab, Adam realizes. He’s moving on to the next stage of the night. “She’s married, but apparently she gets a hall pass when she travels. You believe that shit?”

“No,” McCartney says.

“Yeah, man.” Manny looks serious.

A hall pass. Is that what Adam gave her? He doesn’t hate the idea. 

A text slides into view. From Liz.

This happening?

Manny slaps the bar. Adam jumps, as if the man’s palm struck him. “It’s good to see you, Mac. I’ll catch you around, next time you’re in town.”

“Have fun.”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure that I will.”

The world crashes all around Adam as he sits on the stool. Manny walks behind him, and it’s like the man leaves a wake of heat as he passes. Adam feels it like an open furnace. His face grows even warmer.

Somehow, Adam’s thumbs work where his brain does not. He punches out a reply—something fueled by alcohol and lust and recklessness—and hits send before the rest of him can catch up.

[Adam]: It’s happening. He’s on his way.

He re-reads the text like someone else sent it, like he’s the third party in a group chat. Like it’s not his wife who applies a heart emoji to those words.

“Wife?” It’s McCartney again, although Adam’s pretty sure he doesn’t see the actual text messages. God, he hopes not. Adam darkens his phone and slides it back into his pocket.

“Yeah, just checking in.”

McCartney nods. “Don’t mind me. I’m probably going to head on up to my room now that my buddy’s gone.”

“So it’s a reunion after all,” Adam says. He also realizes that he’s about to be alone, in a city, and totally unable to return to his room for some indeterminate amount of time. “I owe you a drink. What’ll you have?”

McCartney looks tempted, but ultimately declines. “I’ve already had too much, and besides, it’s a work night.” He stands and stretches. “Have a good one.”

With that, Adam is alone. His insecurities loom around him like the walls of some nightmarish prison, the dark sky completely out of reach. The din of the bar around him booms and echoes, and in that moment, he wonders if he’s going to have a full on panic attack.

He checks his phone again. A text waits for him that he didn’t realize had come.

[Lizzie]: I love you, baby. I owe you one.

He’s toasted enough that a jokey response feels appropriate.

[Adam]: Nah. This is for all the g-string gifts and shaving requests.

[Lizzie]: LOL. Silly man.

Adam sees her in his mind’s eye the way he’s always seen her—sweet and girlish, hand covering her mouth, eyes crinkled as she laughs. That’s who captured his heart. That’s who she will always be to him first.

And then her next text arrives. He’s here. And then, those high walls are back up around Adam and he’s falling into himself.

***

Adam completely loses track of time. He switches to drinking club soda, because he knows how this story ends. In the years that follow, when he and Lizzie are white-haired and hobbling around, he wants to remember every single detail—he wants to remember the murmur of conversation all around him, saying everything, meaning nothing; the smell of cologne and liquor and endless possibility; and just how focused everyone around him was, locked in on one another, lost in their own worlds and their own dramas.

Most of all, though, Adam wants to remember how turned on he was. He wants to remember how he trembled with excitement and anxiety as he waited to hear back from his wife, who’s fucking another man.

He still doubts that any of that is actually happening. She’s probably just messing with him, waiting upstairs, alone in their room, letting him squirm. This is payback for trying to make her someone that she’s not.

[Lizzie]: Come on up to the room.

The text feels like it could have arrived days later, but when Adam does the calculation, it’s only been an hour. He snaps back into his body, and realizes that he feels mildly disappointed. She’s been pulling his chain the whole time.

Still, that kind of game is exciting, too. It’s more devious than he thought she was capable of. He rides the elevator up to the room, chewing on this revelation. When they played this game in the past, Adam just figured that she was humoring him, doing the bare minimum. Really pretending to take a man back to her room is next level. He strolls down the long hallway with a rising erection, ready to jump his wife. 

His keycard chirps as he unlocks the door. Adam takes a deep and pushes in.

Their room isn’t large, but it’s well appointed. A pocket door leads to the bathroom. Opposite is a small coat closet. Beyond, the room opens up—television on the right, king-sized bed on the left. Adam walks in, expecting to find his wife smiling mischievously at the foot of the bed, her hands behind her back, smug at the trick she played.

That’s not what he finds at all. 

“Oh! Yes!” Lizzy’s moan lights up Adam’s ears and drives a spike into his chest. “Oh, fu… fu… fuck me!”

They’re on the bed, and the first thing that Adam sees isn’t his wife, but another man’s bare and thrusting ass. He’s behind her, fucking her doggy-style, and even still Adam thinks that this has to be some kind of trick. Like his wife is there, but clothed, and faking it. 

A few more steps dispels that… hope? Fear? He isn’t sure how he feels. Betrayal, yes, because holy shit, this man definitely has his cock in his wife’s pussy. Overriding that betrayal, though, is something that feels closer to walking in on a surprise birthday party. He’s stunned at first, shocked, then giddy that things are only just beginning to get good.

It’s a familiar story—all of this—only not one that Adam ever imagined that he’d experience. Their life is loving, yet practical. Lizzie has always been beautiful, but Adam never saw her as one who’d do this. Yet here she is, naked, on her hands and knees, as a former lover pulls her hair and pounds into her from behind. 

Both of them are naked, their bodies dappled with sweat, his bronzed and muscular body in stark contrast to her lean, pale one. Somehow, it’s both Lizzie on that bed and not her at all. How could it be her?! Manny fucks her in a way that Adam wouldn’t dream, more physically, much rougher, and yet she’s so into it. 

It all feels like a dream, and at any moment, he’ll wake up and find himself passed out at the bar. Like McCartney had slipped something into his beer, and damn does McCarthy and the bar feel like a lifetime ago. He’s certain that none of this is real; and yet he’s determined to enjoy every moment of it.

“Of course this is your husband.”

So Manny expected a husband, just not him.

“Fuck, I miss how kinky you were.” He starts fucking her harder, tugging on her braid. She cries out, but it’s more pleasure than protest. “He just watch, or…?”

Lizzie glances at Adam for the first time, and smiles. “He just watches,” she says, glancing at a chair that had been swiveled to face the bed. “He likes watching me—come!”

With that, she shuts her eyes and lets the pleasure overwhelm her—let’s Manny overwhelm her. He doesn’t disappoint, rocking her world with his hard body and harder thrusts. She lifts her head back, nostrils flaring as she comes on this other man’s dick.

Adam stumbles into the chair, the world woozy, his face hot. This is happening. He hasn’t woken up. This is really real?!

Manny’s not done with Lizzy. Accepting that there’s another guy there, he steps into the role that he realizes he’s to fulfill—bull, lover, prop to this couple. He doesn’t seem to mind. He pulls out of her, flips her onto her back, and spreads her legs.

His dick, Adam sees with a gasp, is huge, shaved bare, and sheathed in a condom. What hits Adam harder than seeing that wet dick is how Lizzie reaches for it, how comfortable she is as she tugs him close and slots all that cock into her. 

Adam starts rubbing himself through his trousers. He can’t help it, and when Lizzie looks his way, she looks pleased. He is still there. He’s turned on. They’re doing this together, no matter how far apart they are physically.

Adam watches, enthralled and aroused. It’s happening, and shockingly, all the jealousy and anxiety he suffered on the way up here is gone. Even when he watches the two lovers kiss, listening to their wet smacks, seeing their mouths open to one another, it only stirs up lust for his gorgeous wife. As he watches Manny pump hard into her, stiffen, and begin to fill the condom, all Adam can think about is getting his wife alone at last so he can reclaim her. 

This story has as many endings as there are couples out there. For some, the husband is restrained and forced to watch the lovers all night, denied release. For others, the husband is invited in for a threesome, where both men take the wife to new and profound heights. Still in others, the husband is told to leave so that the past lovers can reconnect.

As Adam watches those two, he realizes that he’s there for any of it—whatever Lizzie wants, he wants, too. Right now, she clearly wants Manny’s big dick, she wants her husband to watch, and Adam is all about it. He opens his pants, fishing out his erection, and starts beating off.

This isn’t their first fuck. They don’t fumble. They aren’t in the exploratory stage. Manny knows how to fuck, and he knows how Lizzie wants to be fucked. It’s a wild thing for Adam to wrap his head around. 

Wilder still, though, is when he wraps a hand around her neck and starts to choke her as he fucks. Adam leans forward, ready to leap to her aid. She doesn’t resist. Her eyes are open, locked onto Manny’s as she begins to moan even louder.

“Ahh!” she cries, breathy and high. “Ah, fuck me!”

“Take it, take it!”

“Yes! Yes, fuck me, harder, hard-ER!”

He squeezes her neck tighter, choking off her cries, but she’s already there, screaming, coming once again, her face bright red when he finally releases her.

But he doesn’t stop. Manny keeps pounding, keeps driving his big dick into her. She’s not ready to let go, either, linking her ankles behind his back to drag him closer.

“God, I missed this,” he huffs.

Adam’s jealousy stirs, but only just. She doesn’t return the sentiment, though. Instead, she reaches up and drags his lips back to hers. He groans after a second, rolling his forehead along hers as he slams one last time into her and comes.

Adam nearly joins him. It’s only through some godly act of willpower that he pulls his hand off. He looks away, unable to take the intensity shared between the two of them—not out of envy, but out of sheer excitement. This is his wife at her most sexually raw. This is her stripped down to all her passions. He loves her so much for it. He loves her thirst for the pleasures of life.

Manny pulls out, his dick already soft. He’s out of breath, his own face bright red from exertion. In that moment, like someone stepping out of the shadows, he becomes just another man. He’s not a threat. He’s not even some Adonis. He’s just a guy, about Adam’s age, with a big cock and a history with his wife.

He grabs his clothes and heads into the bathroom. Lizzie, lounging on the bed, shifts and turns to Adam. She looks so relaxed, completely fucked out. Completely gorgeous. Her gaze shifts to his erection, held tenuously in his hand, before she looks back at Adam.

“Want to reclaim me?” She knows the answer. Adam is there in a flash, taking his place over her, where another man had just been. He knows she’s comparing him, and just how different he is—the way he enters her, the way he holds her, the size of his cock. It gives him something to prove. It spurs him on to blow her mind.

But in his way. He’s not going to do what Manny did to her. He’s going to fuck her as the man she ultimately fell for, the man she ultimately married. He doesn’t choke her or fuck her like a hammer hitting a nail. He makes love. He reclaims. And her orgasm is so much stronger because of that.

“That was beautiful, you two,” Manny says. Adam is surprised that the other man is still there. He’s clothed, leaning against the wall, grinning. He puts a hand to his heart. “Makes it even harder to see what I could have had.”

Lizzie snuggles close to Adam, not letting him go. “This one’s special,” she says, kissing Adam’s shoulder.

He waves his hand, clearing away any invisible awkwardness between the trio. He places something on the edge of the bed. A business card. “Call me if you’re ever back in town.”

Like that, he’s gone, the door shutting behind him with a soft click. Lizzie reaches down the end of the bed and takes the card. It’s got his full name on it, an email address, a phone number. But no business.

“You think he’s a professional… player?” she jokes.

“Like a sex worker?” Adam laughs. Then something occurs to him. “You didn’t call him up and arrange this, did you?”

Lizzie instantly dispels that thought. “I was actually going to ask you the same thing.” She flicks the card. “I mean, he’s got the credentials to be that guy.”

“No, I didn’t even know he existed,” Adam says. “Not that I’d do something like that to you, even if I did.”

“I know.”

They hold each other quietly, studying the business card while thinking about all that transpired. “You going to call him?”

“First of all, no one calls anyone these days. And second…” She pauses, squeezing the card at the corners.

This story can have many endings…

Lizzie tears the card in half, then into quarters, then tosses the pieces onto the floor. “No, this isn’t about him. It’s about us.”

…and for Adam and Lizzie, the ending is one of discovery.

“One of my favorite subjects,” Adam says. “You’re full of surprises.”

Lizzie reaches down and finds him hard again. “You, too.”

For this story, the ending is just the beginning.

Author's Commentary

I originally wrote this to be included in an anthology that never happened. It was fun to write, and reminded me of one of my very first published hotwife stories, Rediscovering Danielle, which, for those new to me, then spawned a much longer story, Just Watch Me. That kind of journey frequently happens with stories that I write: small ideas grow into larger ones. I'm not sure that we'll see more of Lizzie and Adam, but who knows? It's possible.

As I was putting this Patreon together, though, and selecting what stories to seed it with, it struck me as an interesting how certain themes continue to resonate with me through the years. As I wrote in the commentary to Flirt, I love the premise of a couple getting away from it all for their own adventures. It's a good, comfortable setup, particularly easy to do with short stories, where you don't have a lot of space to set a scene.

Hope you enjoyed this exclusive story! For now, it'll remain only on Patreon.