Flirt (short story)

[image: LanaStock]

I first published back in 2014, in an anthology of short stories called Wife Sharing Shorts, Vol. 1 (the implication being that there would be more volumes, which sadly never came to be). If you want to read more shorts immediately, go grab that collection. It holds up, even ten years later.

Completely unintentionally, but my much newer short, Strange Men in Strange Cities, which will be posted here at the same time, tackles a similar theme of a traveling wife and the naughty things she can get up to, only as you'll see, it's also quite different.

Enjoy, and welcome to my Patreon!

Flirt

“So Bear-Bear was sick and you gave him a shot, just like you got one from Dr. Sewell?”

“Yeah, because he was sick. And...and...and he didn’t cry, either.” Paige’s voice was earnest in only the way a child’s could be. “He was brave!”

“Just like you were brave. I’m so proud of you, Paige.”

Matt listened to the whole conversation from the living room, where the baby monitor cracked and popped. Paige would be three in a month. Probably time to put the monitor away, but for now, it was a safety net.

His wife, Leanne, continued. “So in the morning, we’re going to go to the museum and see all the dinosaurs.”

“All together?” Paige asked. The excitement translated through the monitor.

“All together. You, me, and Daddy. But you’re going to need your rest, okay, sweetheart?”

“Can you rock me, Mommy? Sing me just a couple songs?”

Matt could imagine his wife’s smile. She’d been gone for two weeks—one of the longer stretches of time away—and he knew how she ached for these moments. “Of course, Paige. I’d love to. How about, Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star?”

Matt wandered into the kitchen, out of range of the monitor, to clean up dinner. He’d made lasagna earlier in the day, so most of the mess had been taken care of before he’d gone to pick Leanne up at the airport, but there were still dishes to be rinsed and counters to be wiped down.

He poured himself a glass of red wine as he went about his chores, happy to have his wife back.

It had been almost a year since she’d taken her new job, but things were still intense for him. Between his job at the university and taking care of Paige, these frequent trips made life tough. Leanne made more than enough to support the two of them and their children, and they’d talked about him cutting back on his work schedule, but the talk wasn’t serious. He was on the cusp of getting his tenure and they both knew how important that was. 

He heard the shower cut on above and imagined Leanne standing under the sunflower showerhead, naked and wet. He felt himself stir. The lack of sex was hard, too. Not that they had this wild sex life—or even a very active one. But they did have one, and he missed that intimacy. 

Putting the last of the leftovers into the fridge, he thought about joining her. It had been years since they’d shared a shower, long before Paige was born, but he decided against it. She was still on London time—she was probably too tired for anything crazy like that.

Matt switched off the lights and headed up. It was just after nine, so practically two in the morning for her. The shower cut off just as he hit the upstairs landing.

Leanne emerged from the bathroom in a cloud of steam, lost in thought, eyes distant. Matt’s cock stirred again as he gave her a once over. Even after eight years of marriage—and even with the towel wrapped around her—her tight little body could get him going. The pale skin of her chest and shoulders glowed pink from the hot water. Her light brown hair looked as dark as his own like that—freshly brushed back and still wet.

“Oh, hello,” Leanne said.

“Feel better?”

“Much.” 

“Jet-lagged?”

“Yeah.” She floated over to own dresser—a much larger one than Matt’s—and rooted through her pajama drawer. Matt automatically looked at the tops of her thighs where the towel pulled up, catching a flash of her pussy before she retrieved her PJs.

She straightened up, oblivious to the view she’d just given him. She said, “It’s getting easier to adjust. Guess my body’s starting to get used to all these time zones.”

She glanced over her shoulder, catching him out of the corner of her eye before opening her towel and letting it fall to the floor. Matt blushed, even as he drank in her nudity. She may have been petite, but she had one of the best asses he’d ever laid eyes on—a perfect, inverted heart beneath the gentle flare of her hips.

Matt excused himself for the bathroom, wanting to give her privacy as she dressed. It was always like this when she got back from a trip—like during the early days of their relationship, when modesty mattered and even a glimpse of nudity was exciting. He glanced back just before walking into the still-balmy bathroom, catching the sight of his wife as she pulled on a pair of pink and white striped cotton panties.

He wondered if she had enough energy for sex, then felt mildly guilty for wondering it. These trips were hard on her, and here he was, thinking of himself and his pleasure.

Leanne swept into the bathroom with him, dressed in her pajama set: a cotton pant-and-buttoned-shirt affair Matt had gotten her from Victoria’s Secret a while ago. That's the level to which their relationship had evolved: when buying things for her at Victoria’s Secret these days, he went with the practical choices rather than the racier alternatives.

She found her rimless glasses on the sink, slipping them on and smiling at him in the mirror. Her glasses underscored the bookish girl he’d fallen in love with back in their doctorate program, although she rarely wore them these days. 

They brushed their teeth together. It was casual. Comfortable. They were the old married couple, and neither had yet celebrated their 35th birthday.

His mind had other ideas. He stole glimpses at Leanne as she brushed, his imagination immediately going dirty as he looked at her soft mouth and sensual lips. It had been forever since she’d given him a blowjob, but it was really easy to imagine it now. He flushed when she met his eyes in the mirror, immediately looking away. She smiled, spit, and rinsed behind that electric smile.

They climbed into bed together and shut off the lights. Leanne snuggled close, and when she went to kiss him goodnight, he took the kiss further. As she welcomed his tongue with her own, the awkwardness that he hadn’t even realized was there fell away. She was Leanne again, the woman who’d been by his side forever and a day.

Pulling back, he could just make out her features in the dark: her cute smile, the splash of freckles across the bridge of her nose, the neat arches of her eyebrows. She took a deep breath—the kind of breath people take just before delivering bad news. Matt’s heart constricted.

“What?” he asked, happy to have the darkness around him.

“I…” Her breathing quivered. Matt’s chest tightened. “There’s something I need to tell you...”

Matt’s mind jumped to terrible things—the worst things. From affairs to terminal diseases to…to…

“So this job…it has me traveling a lot, right? All the time, all over the world.”

“Sure…”

“Right.” She released another nervous breath.

“Just tell me, Leanne. What is it?” He hoped he sounded more relaxed than he felt.

“Okay. So when I travel, I kind of like to...um, flirt with guys.”

“Flirt? As in...?” As in fuck, he didn’t finish.

“Oh! Oh, no, not like that. I just flirt, that’s all.” She laughed nervously.

Matt stared at her like she’d grown a third eye. What was she saying? This was totally—totally—out of character. As a professor, Leanne was the one who’d summarily deny that any of her students had crushes on her “because that would be ridiculous.” She acknowledged that she was cute—pretty, even—but whenever Matt told her how sexy she was, she laughed it off as a husband’s duty to say those kinds of things. Now? Now Matt wondered if this was some kind of dream.

“Say something, Matt,” Leanne said.

“I…” He brushed his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know what to say, honestly.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll stop. It never meant anything. It was just...just Business World.”

“Business World?”

“It’s what I’ve heard people call it. So there’s all these consultants out there, traveling around the globe, and many of us in the same industry cross paths all the time. Like, a world between worlds.”

“Sounds very sci-fi.”

“No, it’s not like that.” Leanne’s voice steadied as she spoke. “My life is here, with you and Paige. That will never, ever change. Before I took this job, we had a life beyond this house, right? A professional life? Our acquaintances were different. Our friends were different. Even when the two of us were together, we behaved differently, right?”

“Professionally,” Matt said.

“Right! So it’s not all that different now. Only instead of the setting being around campus, it’s at conventions in strange cities, boardrooms of major multinationals—“

“Hotels where no one knows anyone else,” Matt interjected. He could practically feel Leanne’s blush radiate off her.

“That, too.”

He could have pressed. He thought about it, but then gave her an out anyway. “So...Business World?”

“It’s just a silly term that this guy Brad, from work, has.”

“Do I know Brad?” In the dark, Matt couldn’t tell whether Leanne looked away or not.

“I may have mentioned him before. He’s the guy who seems to have a girlfriend in every city we travel to?”

“Oh, the younger George Clooney? I thought you didn’t like him.”

“I don’t. But his Business World theory actually makes some kind of sense to me. It’s different than the university, or the office, or any of those normal, professional settings. Everyone’s a stranger, you know? Everything’s new, all the time. And…and it’s easy to be someone else.”

“So who are you in this world?” Matt’s throat felt dry.

“I’m…me.”

She wasn’t telling the whole truth. Matt knew it, but again couldn’t bring himself to call her on it. They were back to that moment earlier, when Matt couldn’t bring himself to watch his wife undress. They were strangers again, but for a whole other set of reasons.

Instead, he asked, “So how does it work? The flirting, I mean.”

Leanne blew out some air, slowly but not quite steadily. “I don’t know. I guess I just go down to the hotel bar and...flirt.”

He tried to picture it but couldn’t.

“Matt?”

“Yeah, sorry. I’m just trying to wrap my head around it.” This was a woman who, at one point early in her career, had been terrified to death of lecturing a large class. A woman who went to bars because her friends invited her along, not on her own. “It’s just so...different to think of you like that.”

She nodded.

“Did you…do you do that a lot?”

“Not a lot, no. The work days are long, so most nights I crash.”

“But not every night,” Matt said.

“No.”

A picture began to materialize: Leanne down at a bar, hair up, dressed in some sexy little number. What also materialized was something equally confusing; he was hard.

“What?” she asked. “You’re looking at me funny.”

“It’s just...” It was Matt’s turn to laugh nervously. “It’s pretty sexy.”

Leanne looked at him the way he’d been looking at her since her confession. Like: Who are you in my bed?

“Really?”

“Yeah.” As he said it, he became more sure of it. He just didn’t know how to follow the confession up, so he scooted up against her and kissed her.

Leanne seemed to relax into the kiss, the worry of her confession draining away. Matt pulled her against him, his hands drifting down to her ass.

“Oh,” she said, pulling back from the kiss. “You really do think it’s sexy...”

His erection pressed against her thigh.

“I do. I don’t really get it, but...yeah. It’s pretty exciting.”

Leanne kissed him hard, rekindling a passion from their early days. Matt remembered a time when kissing her like this was enough to give him an instant hard-on—just like now—throbbing and pulsing.

“So when did it start?” Matt asked. He held her close, their faces inches apart. He could make out the amber flecks in her green irises, even in the dark.

“Well, it kind of happened randomly. The first time was on that trip I took to Barcelona.”

“You mean in December?” December was nearly three months ago. "Why didn’t you tell me?”

Leanne bit her lip, her brow creasing. She wanted to look away. Matt could feel her struggle, but he didn’t release her. He kept staring into those gorgeous eyes that he loved so deeply.

“I was scared. I love you. I didn’t want to lose you—”

“But you kept doing it?”

This time, she did look away, bashful. “I’m sorry…”

Matt sighed, touching her face. “Don’t be sorry. I can’t explain it, but I’m not mad at you for doing it…I just wish you’d included me.”

She looked at him, surprise on her face. “It just happened. And then, I couldn’t stop.”

“So how did it happen?”

She released a quiet breath. “So there was a big conference there...trade agreements within the EU. Not my usual focus, but we had some clients interested in what was being said. I was alone, didn’t know anyone—until then, I’d pretty much always traveled with someone else from the firm.”

“Brad?” Jealousy rammed a spike into Matt’s gut.

“Sometimes him. Sometimes someone else. And Matt, seriously, don’t be jealous of Brad. It’s really not like that.”

Oddly, Matt felt a little disappointed. “Okay. So you were there alone.”

“Right. I was alone, didn’t know anyone. There was this cocktail reception to kick-off the conference. I attended out of obligation.”

“I think I remember you complaining about that.”

“Oh yeah. You know me, it’s just not my thing. If I wasn’t still mostly on East Coast time, I would have skipped it, but I was awake so I went anyway.”

“And that’s when you were hit on?”

Leanne squeezed her hand up between them and covered her eyes, her smile blossoming. Matt loved her embarrassed face. He wanted to kiss her, but instead waited out the response

“It was so crazy. Like, at first I thought someone was putting them up to it. Here I was, a 34-year-old mother getting hit on by some young—and very hot—guys.”

Matt’s body quaked at Leanne’s side. He’d never heard her call any one guy hot. Until now, that was a term reserved for the temperature, not pure physical attraction.

“You know you’re sexy, right? I’ve told you that over and over. You didn’t believe me?”

“You’re my husband. You have to say that.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”

“It’s just different when it’s coming from strangers, you know? Thrilling.”

“Validating.” Matt thought about a few of the college girls he’d had in class with obvious crushes on him—crushes he’d never told Leanne about, of course, even as innocent as they were.

“Yeah, I guess validating is the right word. Whatever it was, it made me feel so good about myself. So confident. I carried that confidence through the conference. It was like I was playing a role—the sexy American economist—and they all fell for it.”

“Wait, was that the same conference that landed you the British and French deals?”

Leanne grinned sheepishly. “It was. I don’t think the old Leanne could have pulled that off alone. The new me suddenly got herself a huge promotion.”

“And that was three months ago?”

She looked bashful about that. “Yeah. I should have told you sooner. I wanted to, but I was so scared. I kept telling myself it wasn't a big deal, you know? That everyone has secrets, and this was just part of...Business World, I guess.”

So why now? Matt asked, first to himself because he was scared shitless of the answer. Had something more happened? Had she met someone else? But in the end, he had to ask.

“So why tell me now?”

That fluttering nervousness that he’d seen when she first confessed was back, affecting his own anxiety levels.

“After that, I couldn’t help myself. For the longest time, I kept thinking that time in Spain was a fluke. Like, I’d go down to the bar and be ignored.”

She wasn’t dodging the question. Matt had witnessed this technique back in her teaching days. She'd get to the point in the end.

“It still surprises me, honestly. Maybe I keep doing it because I still don't believe it.”

He should have been upset. He should have been afraid. Those were rational reactions for a man in his position—hearing that his wife had been flirting with other men behind his back for the last three months. And while he was all of those things, he was also more turned on than he'd been in a long time.

“So you hit up a bar while you were in London?”

“Yeah," she said. She snuggled closer, feeling the effect this had on him. “Matt, you’re so hard.”

“Yeah,” he admitted, embarrassed. “So, when you went down there, did you dress up?”

“I didn’t wear my work clothes, if that’s what you mean.”

“Like what did you wear?” He swallowed before adding, “What did you wear this last time, in London.”

“You…” She hesitated. “You haven’t seen those dresses or shoes.”

Matt breathed in heavily. His pulse jittered against the inside of his chest. His throbbing cock pulsed against her. She even had a wardrobe that he didn't know about? “Show me.”

Leanne licked her lips. He knew her well enough to practically read her mind. She was trying to figure out a way to get out of this, to come up with an excuse for why she couldn’t just pull the dress out of her garment bag and show him.

He let her off the hook, despite wanting to see her in her party dress and shoes. “I'm sorry, never mind. So you were in London. You went down to the bar...”

“I have an idea.” She gave him a quick kiss. “Why don’t you go downstairs and pour us a couple glasses of wine. I’ll be right down.”

Matt’s erection strained against his boxers, and when he slid out from under the covers, it was visibly prominent in the moonlight. He looked back at Leanne, who watched him from the bed, her head propped up on her elbow. Matt felt exposed under that stare, suddenly modest as he stood there in nothing but his boxer-briefs.

She said, “You’re really good looking, Matt.”

She didn’t say it out of obligation, or out of reflex. She said it like someone who realized that she’d been taking something for granted.

“So are you. But you don’t need me to tell you that anymore.”

Leanne buried her face in the pillow, waving for him to go. She peeked out enough to say, “I’ll see you downstairs. Open the bottle of Firesteed that I saw you bought.”

Matt grabbed his robe and headed for the stairs.

The house was quiet. It was well past ten, but Matt felt electrified. Sleep was a distant thought, trying and failing to get noticed.

Leanne had been flirting with random guys for nearly three months? In bars? Alone? It just didn’t compute. They hadn’t been each other’s firsts, but neither of them had a ton of experience when they met in grad school.

Matt still remembered the first time he laid eyes on her. It was early fall, still warm enough to sit in the grass outside without a jacket. Leanne had been sitting on the quad with some mutual friends, looking cute in a pair of jeans and a grungy flannel shirt. He remembered thinking, She’s cool; I want to know more.

It wasn’t love at first sight, but it was something close.

In the kitchen, he switched on the pendant lights over the island counter, turning them down low. He removed a pair of Pinot Noir glasses, set them on the granite, and went to work on the bottle of wine.

That girl on the quad had captured his heart and not let go since. She was not only cute but smarter than anyone he’d dated before. Even now, her practical knowledge of international economic policies and the ripple effect they had on global markets was astounding. He may have taught university-level economics, but Leanne changed the ecology of the world. How’s that for sexy?

And yet, apparently there was so much more.

Her voice startled him from his revelry. “Hey.”

The woman standing at the edge of the light couldn’t have been Leanne—at least not the Leanne he knew. Nothing about her was recognizable. Not the way she wore her light brown hair clipped back. Not the kohl-lined eyes or dark burgundy lipstick. Certainly not the strapless white dress that covered less than her towel had, or the spindly white heels with their thin sparkly straps. Her red painted toenails glowed, even in the dim lights. She looked taller than the 5’2” woman he thought he knew.

“Um...I think you may be in the wrong house.”

Leanne smiled shyly at his joke. There was the woman he knew.

“Actually, I’m exactly where I want to be,” she said. She moved like silk in the breeze, gliding over to the island counter and leaning on it like she was at a bar.

The thin fabric of her white dress molded to Leanne’s perky breasts, and then hugged her rib cage, her narrow waist and her flat belly, eventually sliding over the bottom of her hourglass figure, along her narrow hips and perfectly rounded ass. Matt realized that he wasn’t breathing. He wondered if she wore a bra—something she usually did, but could get away without—then he saw the contours of her nipples pushing against the thin fabric.

Leanne’s lips curled up into a knowing smile when she caught him looking at her chest. She fingered the stem of one of the glasses. “This mine?”

“Hope I got the order right.”

It was Leanne’s turn to dance her eyes down her husband’s body. “I like this establishment. Cute bartenders wearing nothing but robes and underwear. I’ll have to come back.”

Matt laughed. “A pretty lady like you is always welcome.”

Leanne returned the laugh with a giggle. She raised her glass, clinking it with Matt’s as they shared a silent toast. The impromptu roleplay fell away. They were back in the kitchen of their suburban home, husband and wife again.

“That’s some dress, Lee.”

Leanne’s fingers twitched, like she was itching to pull the short hem down. She resisted. “Thanks. I got it in Paris a couple months ago.”

Matt steadied his breathing. It was hard enough to believe that she was wearing it here, in the privacy of their home. To think that she’d worn it in public, without him, was both disturbing and profoundly erotic.

“So you’ve worn it a few times?”

“A few, yeah.”

“You look amazing in it.”

“Thanks.” This time, she did pull at the short hem. “Baby, the way you’re looking at me...” She averted her eyes, then glanced back through her lashes.

“I’m sorry. I just...I’m still trying to wrap my head around this. You sound like my wife, and you even look like her—sort of, anyway—but…” He was at a loss for words.

“I know. The first time I put this dress on, I almost stayed in my room. It took me half an hour—and a couple of miniature bottles of vodka from the room’s fridge—before I went down there.”

“It’s sexy, but not, you know, slutty.”

“That’s what I was going for. I didn’t want to look like a hooker.”

Matt circled around the bar, holding his robe over his hard cock. “Maybe a high-class call girl, but not a hooker.”

“Ha ha. Thanks, Matt.”

He reached out, touching the bare skin of her shoulder. She tilted her head as his fingers slipped up the nape of her neck.

“I don’t mean that in a bad way. You wear it well. I mean, you wear it with confidence.”

Leanne looked over at him slyly. “I feel confident. The way you’re looking at me—the way all those other guys looked at me when I sat down at the bar... I’ve never had that kind of attention. It made me feel hot and desired...and I liked that feeling.”

“You’re crazy. You’ve always been sexy, and I’ve always desired you,” Matt said. It was knee-jerk.

Leanne fixed him with a matter-of-fact expression. “Well, I haven’t really felt that way since I was younger. In my twenties. I’d forgotten what it was like to walk into a room and really feel...sexy.” She laughed. “Ha....I’m talking like that ever happened!”

“It did for me.”

“You saw an alternative girl in ratty jeans and a flannel shirt.” Leanne giggled. “Is that how you’d describe me right now?”

Matt took in the dress, the make-up, the heels. “No, I see what you mean.”

She hopped up onto the counter and crossed her legs. Matt couldn’t resist looking—he’d always loved her dancer’s legs, toned and long.

He pressed on. “So how did it work? The flirting.”

Leanne smiled, glancing into the murky red. The vino seemed to trap the soft light of the pendant lamps and glow.

“You remember how to flirt, right? Two people getting to know one another, talking about nothing, but with the sub-context of sex behind everything.”

“I mean, like, do you just go sit and guys come up to you?”

“Pretty much, yeah. Most of the time, the guys are pretty ridiculous. Bad one-liners. Cockiness that’s so not deserved.”

“But it’s not all like that,” Matt said. “I mean, otherwise you wouldn’t do it at all.”

“Honestly, the kind of guy isn’t the point. They’re all thrilling. I’ve never been that girl, you know?”

“The one all the guys are tripping over.”

Leanne giggled. “Sounds bad when you put it like that.”

“But that’s what you mean, isn’t it?” Matt’s heart raced as he pushed her through this confession. He looked back at her tiny dress. “I’ll be honest, you pull off that girl really well.”

Leanne looked bashful, an adorable contradiction to her outfit. “You’re looking at me that way again...”

“Isn’t that what you hope for?” Matt said, his heart beat jumping. “When you put that dress on?”

Breathlessly: “Yes.”

“So when you last wore this dress, did you meet anyone interesting?” Matt asked. He couldn’t keep to himself any longer. He set his glass of wine down and stepped up against her, resting his hand on her knee.

“Yes.”

He ran his hand up to the hem of her dress. “Tell me about him.”

In just boxer-briefs and an open robe, his erection was huge.

“Okay. Well, it was a Friday night, so the bar was pretty full. I went down basically in this exact outfit—“

“Basically?”

“Yeah. I haven’t had a chance to wash my clothes yet, so the panties are different, but basically the same.”

“Let’s take them off. I want authenticity here.”

Leanne giggled. She went beneath her dress, lifted her butt up, and wiggled out of a little peach thong. He could smell her arousal, and see it in the dampness of the cloth.

“How’s that?” she asked.

“Better.” He moved in closer, pushing his hand up under the dress before she crossed her legs again. His fingertips touched the soft curls of her pussy just as his lips met hers. She gasped against his mouth as he pushed a finger inside her.

Breaking the kiss before it could coalesce, he pulled his hand back to her knee and said, “So it was Friday night. You were dressed like this. Mostly.”

Leanne smiled. “Mostly. It usually takes a few minutes for guys to approach. They’re feeling me out, you know? Am I there with someone else? Am I just waiting before going into the restaurant. I usually buy my first drink.”

“Which is?”

Leanne grinned. “Dirty martini. To get into the mood.”

Matt’s cock flexed.

“I’ve never had to buy a second drink, though. Wine after the martini. Don’t want to get drunk, you know? Might get into trouble.”

Matt realized she said that to tease him. It certainly worked.

“That particular night, I didn’t meet anyone interesting until I was halfway through my second glass of wine. I never go more than two or three glasses, so I figured that the night would be a bust. Then this guy joined me. Spanish guy, with all that came with it—the cockiness, the dark good looks, the thick, wavy hair.”

“I thought you didn’t go for cocky.”

Leanne smiled shyly. “I don’t go for cocky if the guy can’t pull it off. This guy could.”

As the scene played itself out in Matt’s mind, his emotions went haywire. Skepticism was at the forefront—she had to be making all this up, right? His jealousy was so visceral he could have been sick had he not been drunk with excitement. And beyond that—wonder, appreciation, and love for this woman who still managed to surprise him, even after all these years.

“So you two flirted?”

“Oh yeah.” She hadn’t crossed her legs, but squeezed them shut, rubbing her thighs together. “Having a guy like that hit on me does good things to my ego. I even had a third glass of wine, just to keep talking to him.”

“Baby, that’s so hot.” Matt barely realized that he’d said it out loud.

She finished up her glass of wine. “Oh, it was.”

“Did he ask you up to his room?” Matt asked. At the same time, he pulled her legs open, letting the pressure push her dress up her thighs, almost to her waist. Her slit was partially open and obviously wet.

“They all do.” She was absorbed in what Matt was doing. 

He bent his knees and dipped his face in between her legs, seeking out her tangy nectar. She was so hot. So excited. She easily parted around his tongue.

“But yes, he asked me. He was pretty persistent. He even described what he would do with me, to me, in me.” She sighed. “Oh Matt, that feels so good. I’ve missed this...”

She was right. It had been far too long since he’d gone down on her. He vowed not to let that happen again.

“He told me how beautiful I was, and how sad it made him that I might sleep alone.” She moaned, draping her legs over Matt’s back as he ate her. “Sounds cheesy when I say it now, but at the time, it was actually tempting.”

Tempting? Matt’s body convulsed. His tongue stiffened to a point, driving deep inside her.

“Mmm, baby, that tongue of yours is amazing. Does it upset you that I was thinking of what he would feel like inside of me?”

Matt shook his head. He pulled back enough to look up at her, replacing his mouth with two of his fingers. “It doesn’t upset me. It’s so fucking hot to imagine you with him and you thinking of saying yes to climbing into his bed.”

He didn’t normally use the F word around her—not anymore. It was the absolute right word to use now. He easily buried two fingers deep inside of her, enjoying how wet she was, and how hot. It felt like she was burning up.

“You should have taken him up on it,” he said, with his mouth breathing onto her fevered skin.

“Nooooo...” Her denial was drawn out as he returned to her pussy, lashing his tongue along her clit.

“Imagine that I’m him now. Imagine you’d said yes.”

Leanne swooned back, braced on her arms, her chest straining for the ceiling, her breasts almost totally exposed. Matt licked faster, rapid chaos on her clit, timed with the frantic tapping of his fingertips along her g-spot.

“Uh! Uhhh!” And she was gone.

But Matt wasn’t, and now it was his turn.

He pushed off his robe and boxer-briefs and climbed up onto the counter. They’d never used it like this, he realized, despite joking about it when the realtor had shown it to them five years ago.

He found the zipper of the dress under one arm, pulling it low. She wore a bra after all, transparent, strapless as the dress, and just as just as new to him. When had she bought all these new things? And how could he have missed it?

He pulled her dress over her head as she recovered from her orgasmic rush and moved to help him strip her body naked. The bra went next, freeing her perky, high-sitting breasts, her nipples hard and sensitive at the tips.

“So if you’d accepted his offer, think it would have led here?” Matt asked. He placed his cock against her pussy and entered her in one fluid motion.

“Ahh...” Leanne moaned, lying flat on her back, her chest arched with her arms stretched out above her head as her husband officially welcomed her home.

“That’s what you were really tempted about, wasn’t it?”

Her answer was tight—a valve releasing pressure. “Yes. I wanted to. S—sorry.”

Matt held her hips and pumped her hard, driving into her in a way that he hadn’t in a long time. He knew without doubt that, right at that moment, his wife was fantasizing about another man’s cock deep inside her body.

“Lee, baby, I love it. I love that you wanted him. I love that you could have had him.” She clawed his back, something she only did when she was extremely turned on. “Did you think of him when you went back to your room? Did you think of him when you were alone?”

“Yes.” Her whisper came on like a scream, but muted.

“Did you touch yourself? Did you play with yourself after?”

“Yes.”

Fuck, she’d never admitted to masturbating, let alone fantasizing about other men. Matt’s balls tightened. His libido cocked up like a loaded gun.

“Did you come, thinking about his naked body on top of yours? His cock deep inside you? Your legs wrapped around his waist?”

“Yes! I did...over and over.”

He gritted his teeth, holding his orgasm at bay. One last question. One more thing. “And now?”

“Yes, baby. I’m thinking about him now. I wish...ah!” She looped her legs behind his back, squeezing him against her. “I wish I’d gone back with him. That I’d fucked him. Ah!”

“Ah, Lee. Oh, fuck!”

They came together, pulsing heat riding the thrumming wetness to higher and higher heights. Matt closed his mouth over his wife’s at some point, swallowing her cries in a messy kiss.

He came down like he’d run a marathon—heavy of breath and taxed to his limits. The orgasm didn’t wipe away Leanne’s confession. Her admission was still there, a confusing mess that he still struggled to understand. But he wasn’t upset, or even all that jealous now that the heat of the moment had passed.

When he opened his eyes, she was staring back at him, worry around the edges.

“You know I love you, right, Matt? I never meant to hurt you. I’m sorry I—“

“Shhh, Leanne. It’s okay. It’s really okay.”

“So that guy who hit on me? His name is Alejandro Bautista.”

The worry was still there, waiting for her husband to connect the dots like they were a sizzling fuse. At first, the name meant nothing to him. The few Spanish colleagues that he did know were all old professors. He didn’t know any that fit her description, nor were named Alejandro. Matt did know a Bautista, though, but he was old enough to be his father...

Leanne’s breath caught when she saw Matt figure it out.

“I didn't realize the connection until the very end of the night. He got a call from his father. Miguel Bautista was there in London on sabbatical and Alejandro was visiting.”

They’d both worked with Professor Bautista for years. They’d even met his son a couple times, but he was just a teenager then.

“Did he recognize you?”

“I don’t think so. But if he did...”

“Then it may have gotten back to me somehow. So you finally came clean.”

Leanne nodded, looking terrible. “That was the last time. I promise. I’ll never do it again.”

Matt didn’t know a whole lot about what was going on inside his head, but he did know that he didn’t want her to stop. “Leanne, baby, don’t overreact. He probably didn’t recognize you, we’ll never see him, and besides, nothing really happened.”

“Yeah, but... You’re not upset?”

Matt gave the question the serious consideration that it deserved, but he knew his answer almost immediately. “I’m only upset that you didn’t tell me about it earlier.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I think it’s great that you’ve found something like this.” He nuzzled her nose with his. “If it makes you feel sexier—and more confident—then don’t stop.” He grazed her lips, felt the heat pouring off them. “Just come back and tell me all about it, ‘kay?”

“Baby, I love you,” Leanne said. She yanked him down for the kiss he’d been teasing her with.

***

“So did you pack the white dress?” Matt asked as he watched Leanne fill her suitcases.

Two weeks had passed since her last trip and her big confession. Things had been volcanic in the bedroom. They’d had sex almost every night, although neither of them brought up Leanne’s flirtations. It was like they were pretending that it was still a secret, despite it being on their minds all the time.

Then, inevitably, Leanne got the call for another trip—to Paris this time, for a week—and the subject was impossible to resist.

“I wasn’t planning on taking the dress. I was actually thinking of taking a break.” Leanne’s expression turned the statement into a question.

“Hope you’re not doing that for me,” Matt said. “Because I was kind of looking forward to hearing more about it.”

Leanne went to her lingerie drawer. “Yeah?”

She pulled out a few things, some black, some brightly colored, but all of them lacy and small.

“Yeah.” Matt leaned against the doorframe, watching as she laid out the lingerie. His cock stiffened when he realized that they were all thongs. “You should treat yourself when you’re out there. It’s Paris, after all—the city of romance.”

“You’re really sure about this?” She knew he was; this was all reassurance.

“The last couple weeks should be proof that I am.”

Leanne giggled. “It’s proof that you like the idea of it.”

“Seriously, I won’t be mad. And...” He cut himself off, realizing what he was about to say. He couldn’t, could he?

“And?” Leanne asked.

Matt’s body grew hot—like standing in front of a fire. Was he really about to tell her that she could go further? And where had that idea come from?

“Just a little thing.” His face burned. He stumbled on before she suspected what he was thinking. “Um, you have to tell me all about it.”

Leanne beamed. “I’ll do more than that...”

Matt looked at her quizzically, but she just shook her head, saying instead, “And maybe it’s time for a new dress. Paris is known for its fashion, right?”

***

Matt received the text from Leanne around three in the afternoon—nine o’clock Paris time. She’d been there for five days, and when they’d talked, she made no mention of flirting.

Now, it was Friday—secretly, Matt hoped today was the day. He just didn’t want to press it. Leanne didn’t disappoint.

–Went shopping today. If you liked the white dress, you’re going to love this one.

Instantly, Matt was hard. He looked at the door to his office, which he always kept open. He was here for office hours, but considered knocking off early.

He thumbed out his reply with his heart climbing up his throat.

–you going to wear it tonight?

The reply was almost instantaneous.

–I’m wearing it right now. It’s soo short.

Matt snuck his hand between his legs, surreptitiously adjusting his erection. Another text came in, this time with a photo attached.

–Does this make me look fat? ;)

Matt's eyes went wide as he maximized the photo on his little screen. She wasn't lying, the dress was short. It was also really tight. Black with long, lacy sleeves—the detail repeated at the short hemline at her legs—Leanne had coupled it with a pair of tall, open-toed pumps that were high. The neckline was the most modest part of it, although the bodice hugged her pert breasts like a second skin.

Her hair was salon perfect, done up and off her neck except for a couple loose ringlets that framed her beaming face. 

Another photo came in before he could reply, this one from behind. The plunging back of the dress more than made up for the conservative front. She couldn't possibly be wearing a bra.

–wow!

The black material molded to her lean and curvy butt, tight and so temptingly juicy. If she was wearing panties, they had to be tiny.

–I take it you approve?

He could practically hear her laughing. He swiped back and forth between the photos, glancing at the photo he had of her on his desk just as a reminder of her “family self.” In that photo, she was dressed in a turtleneck sweater, wholesome and smiling.

A third photo came in, this one a close up of Leanne blowing him a kiss. Now he saw that her lips were painted red. Her eyes were smoky, rimmed in kohl and mascara. Any guy who saw her alone at a bar would think that she was there for one thing only, and she’d have them lined up to get it.

Matt shifted in his seat again, rubbing his cock through his trousers as he did so.

He picked up the phone, typed out his reply, and took a deep breath. To hit send was to send her on her way. To send her into the lion’s den. What if she met another Alejandro? What if this time, she couldn’t say no? His erection throbbed in response to the thought.

He read his message again.

–go. flirt. first drink’s on me. ps: you make me incredibly hard‼  

Matt looked one last time at that photo on his desk—at the smile that lit up his day every time he sat down. He lived for that smile. For that happiness. This was just another way of making her happy, right?

He hit send.

Author's commentary

If you liked this story, again, you can check out more from the collection in my anthology, Wife Sharing Shorts, Vol. 1. And again, there's only one volume right now, but hopefully I can change that with some of the newer things written here.

I wrote this over ten years ago, so it's hard to remember what some of my inspirations were. Reading through it now to get it prepped for Patreon, though, I can't help but notice some of the similarities to "Mike and Jen" from Xleglover's stories around the time (who now publishes his own books under Pete Andrews, if anyone is interested).

I love the anxiety and uncertainty that comes with a long-distance setup. Being away from home gives the characters a freedom, but when only one half of the couple has the freedom, tension enters the scene, and I love how juicy that can get.

In fact, I love this setup so much that my current work-in-progress, a series called "While We Were Apart," takes this premise and explores it to its fullest extent. The time apart creates the seed at which the entire hotwife fantasy is borne. Look out for that series either here, on Medium, or published on Amazon.