So I man the fuck up.
"That's great, honey," I truthfully tell her. "I'm glad you're going to have some help, particularly since this is part time."
"I know, right?" she says with glee. "I was so relieved to hear that. If I can get someone really bright and focused, this should be a piece of cake to handle along with mommy duties."
"You're amazing," I murmur. "You're like Wonder Woman."
If you thought I'd get a gushing reply of "aww shucks" and "self-deprecation" over my compliments, you don't know Moira. Instead, she's telling me, "I gotta go. Jaime just took the spoon away from Cannon and is trying to stick it in his nose right now. Love you, babe."
Then she's gone.
And I'm still feeling guilty as hell that I didn't give my wife the time she needs, and I'm slightly unsettled that she has apparently moved on without me giving her what she deserves.
For once, I'm at home in the evening with the kids and Moira is not. She had texted Randall and me around five PM and said that interviews were still ongoing for the internship as there were several well-qualified candidates that wanted a shot at this. Apparently, Senpace is a hot-ticket company, and there were many potentials chomping at the bit to get their foot in the door.
So I stop for pizza and bring it home, where Randall and I eat it with the kids and discuss what a fuckwad Charlie Lascola is for leaving Cannon's high and dry. Well, I'm the one that puts him in the fuckwad category, but Randall's a bit more circumspect. While he acknowledges that it's totally unprofessional at that level not to give some type of significant notice, pilfering of high-ranked people from other companies happens all the time. They'll wave big dough at the prospect, lure them over, and hope to gain insight and intelligence that's not protected by confidentiality agreements and non-competes.
After the kids go down, Randall and I sit in the living room and watch a re-run of the Pebble Beach Classic on the Golf Channel. Randall is the one who first introduced me to the sport when we'd come to visit him on holidays before we moved here. I really took to it, which was amazing seeing as how the only sport I had ever engaged in before was trying to shoot a howler monkey out of a jungle tree, and that wasn't really sport... that was survival.
Filled with pizza and drowsy with fatigue, my eyes pinned to the TV... seeing, but not really seeing... I don't even notice Moira walk into the living room until she's two feet away.
It happens more often than not, but that first moment when I see my wife after not having seen her for more than a few hours, I get a jolt of supreme awareness of her beauty. Early on in our relationship, that was because visually... she was utter perfection. Sinful red hair, jungle-green eyes, and a body that was the sexiest thing I'd ever seen or will ever see in my life. Over time, it's morphed. She still has all that and a bag of tricks, but she's even more ethereally beautiful because she bore me two beautiful children, loves me even though I often don't put her first, and still loves to swallow when she sucks my cock.
"Hey baby," I say, my voice going down an octave when I look over and see Randall has drifted off on the couch. I hold my hand out to her, and she crawls onto my lap. She squirms a little, settling in and tucking her face into the crook of my neck.
"Hey," she says softly, punctuating it with a yawn. "The kids go down okay?"
"Yup. Stuffed them with pizza and a shot of bourbon. They were out like a light."
She gives a fatigued chuckle and burrows in closer.
"How'd the interviews go?" I ask quietly, my hand stroking her back.
"Great," she mumbles, her voice sounding so tired. "I hired a really smart guy. Name's Josh. He's from Boston."
"Josh from Boston," I say in acknowledgment that I'm listening. "Got it."
She doesn't reply, so I give her a slight squeeze. I don't get one back.
"Moira?" I whisper.
Nothing.
I tilt my head to the side, angling my eyes sharply down and to the left so I can see her face.
She's sleeping. Dead asleep in mid-conversation.
My beautiful, exhausted wife can't even give me five minutes to hold a conversation, and I can do nothing but chuckle internally, because now it seems I know exactly how she's been feeling when I come home at night with the weight of my work pressing me down so hard that I can't do anything but succumb it.
Chapter 7
Three weeks later...
Moira
A cold, rainy day.
An opportune meeting with a colleague I have to attend in downtown Atlanta, only four blocks from Cannon's headquarters.
An equally opportune lunch hour freed up when my meeting got cut short because my colleague's wife went into labor.
A quick stop into the restroom that sits just off the lobby of Cannon's, and I am ready to surprise my husband.
I open the heavy, glass door with the word Cannon's etched in big, bold letters, and the receptionist looks up.
"Hello, Mrs. Easton," she says in a sweet, southern voice. "This is a nice surprise."
"Hi Gloria," I say with a smile, cinching the belt of my trench coat a little tighter around me. I'm feeling unbearably vulnerable since I stripped off my dress and shoved it in my purse while in the bathroom, intent on reveling in the look of surprise on Zach's face when he offers to take my coat for me. "Just thought I'd see if my husband has time for a quick lunch."
Or a quick something, I think to myself with an inner grin beaming.
My decision to try to seduce my husband at work wasn't taken lightly. I have so much work to do when I get home that I feel like I'm drowning, and even as good as Josh the Intern is, I'm still feeling the pressure. I'm doubting myself and my abilities, thinking it would be a piece of cake to handle this position.
What I didn't count on was an employer who says, "Yes, this is a part-time job," and then crams sixty hours a week of work on me. If they hadn't given me an intern, I would have had to quit within the first week, but I'm hoping things will start to settle down now that we are entering into the recruitment phase of the project.
So yeah... I should get my ass home and take advantage of the fact I have a sitter for the entire day. I should sit my ass down at my computer and review resumes while Josh sits at my kitchen table and works on obtaining government permits. That would be the responsible thing to do.
But still, I'm here and I am actually aching with the need to have a few spontaneous and uninhibited moments with Zach. We have seemingly set into a survival pattern now, both of us being driven by work and kid demands. I don't think I really appreciated just how exhausting it all could be from Zach's perspective until I went back into the workforce, and I fully understand now how life will just slip by.
I used to be so annoyed with Zach that he could just seem to forget about all the ways in which our marriage was hurting, convinced that work was more important than I was. What I've come to realize instead is that it's very easy to let other things interfere, particularly when you find those other things to be a refreshing change of pace to your life.
Yes, work is stressful, and yes, it's exhausting, but it's also rewarding and makes my brain tingle to be able to use all of my education and knowledge again. And while my love and attraction for my husband hasn't diminished one bit, I do see how the comfort of knowing he'll always be there for me ma
kes it so fucking easy to put my attention on other things.
Bottom line... I think we both take each other for granted. In one way, that's horrid, but in another, it just shows how sturdy our relationship actually is... that we can devote time to other things, knowing that when all is said and done, we are still each other's rocks.
But I am bound and determined that I can't let this get away from us. I've got my mind absolutely set that we can still find little ways to connect with each other. I want to repetitively grab onto that deep-in-your-soul connection that seems to get pushed aside time and time again because of other demands. Now, while our time together is certainly limited because of our other obligations, our sex life hasn't been dormant. It's been quick and hurried at times, and it's survived, but it's also getting a little routine.
Today's plan is to be anything but routine.
I walk past the main lobby desk and head down a hall toward Zach's office. Directly ahead is Lila's office, which sits beside Zach's, and her head raises as I approach. She gives me a smile and curiously looks at me. When I reach the end of the hall, I cut a glance to the left and see Zach's office door is closed. I step into Lila's open doorway.
"He in with anyone?" I ask her.
She shakes her head as she stands from behind her desk and steps around it. "No, but he told me he wasn't to be disturbed. Let me just let him know you're here."
I cut her off by holding up a hand. "No need, Lila. I'll just pop in."
"But--" she says, her eyes wide with surprise I'd step on her turf.
"But nothing," I assure her with a pleasant, but firm, smile. "I'll take any heat if he gets mad at you for letting me 'disturb' him."