The Husband Game

“What if someone wanders in?” I murmur, finally remembering what I wanted to say. Remembering where we are and why I should be protesting this.

“What if they do?” he replies with a coy arch of his eyebrow, as if it doesn’t matter. As if he does wild stuff like this all of the time.

Maybe he does. He seems pretty sure of himself. But even as the doubt begins to form in my mind, he shakes his head, chuckling under his breath as if my every thought was written across my face. “Relax, Lila,” he says softly. “We won’t let anyone catch us.”

His eyes dance where they find mine. In the dark, they seem bluer than ever, deeper, like pools I could fall into. Drown in.

“It’s a little hard to relax with you touching me like this,” I point out, but I’m smiling, too. I can’t help it. I can’t not smile when I look at him.

Then, without warning, he drops to his knees and presses his face into my belly. I suck in a sharp breath through my teeth, gazing down at him kneeling before me.

“I can help you with that,” he says, before he opens my coat, pushing it aside so he can kiss my belly. Even through the fabric of my dress, which admittedly is pretty thin, I can feel the hard press of his lips, the faint buzz of his stubble. I try and fail to suppress a shiver that has nothing to do with the cool evening air around us, and everything to do with the man driving me wild at my feet.

“I think you and I have different definitions of relaxing,” I whisper, my gaze rising from him to glance around the courtyard. Still empty, and all the windows of the rooms overhead are farther up. Too far up for someone to see us where we are, crouched in the shadows of the flickering fire pit, beside the building at our backs. At least, I don’t think anyone could see us?

But they might be able to. The simple possibility—that someone might be watching, even now, as Charlie kisses his way down my stomach, his lips hot through the my dress—makes my pulse race faster, my breath come harder.

Am I… excited by this? By the risk of getting caught. I can’t deny, there’s something sexy about imagining it. About us being so desperate to get our hands on one another that we’re risking everything just to do it right here, right now.

“It will be,” Charlie promises, his mouth so close I can feel the heat of his breath. Fuck. His face is pressed right up against the top of my panties now, his mouth inches from my mound. “Well, first, I plan to make you scream.” He grins up at me, sly and eager. “But after you come for me like a good girl, then you’ll feel relaxed.”

My knees weaken at the sound of those words. Fuck. The man knows how to talk dirty, I’ll give him that.

“Of course, if you’d prefer I stop…” he adds, before he leans in to press his lips right over the sweet spot, against my pussy. Even through my dress and my panties, he knows exactly where to press, the spot to touch to make my whole body twist as I inhale a surprised breath.

“Um… No,” I manage to gasp, sinking back against the wall for support. “No, you don’t have to… stop.”

He grins, watching me. I swear he’s enjoying this, enjoying the control he has over my pleasure. He likes making me come undone. “So… you’re saying…” With each word, his mouth shifts lower. At the same time, his hands creep around the back of my legs and slide up to my knees. Higher. As his hands rise, he pushes my skirt up with them, moving it toward my hips. “You’d like me to… Keep going?” He finishes on a question, just as he pushes the hem of my skirt past where his lips hover at the middle of my thighs.

He kisses my upper thighs slowly, one after the next, then presses his face between them. I spread my legs, but he pauses there, waiting, tilting his head to gaze up at me, those blue eyes dancing with amusement.

“Yes,” I breathe. I let him part my legs wider and reach down to bury my hands in his thick, blond hair. “Yes, keep going, Charlie, please.”

He grins. “Whatever you want, wifey.”

He’s joking, I know he is, but that one word, that one reminder of what we’re doing, of how we’re supposed to get married, even if it is for an article, to play pretend so I can write about how modern marriage is a sham that’s doomed to failure… Even so, that word makes my stomach flip, because coming from him, it doesn’t sound so insane or ridiculous.