Husband Sit (Husband #1) (3 page)

He
bounded out of his chair and grabbed my arm, saying, “Wait, Maree!”

But
hearing the fake name I’d created only made me feel worse. I’d been kidding
myself that I could handle this in a businesslike manner, and in that moment I
felt like a tramp, thanks to him. I glared at him and tried to pull away but he
held on, and something hot licked the space between us. His fingers tightened
and his eyes widened, as if he’d just realized something about me, something
that shocked him.

I
wanted to hate him—sanctimonious bastard—but all I could think about was how
sexy it felt to be restrained by a man I wanted to fuck. My breaths got
shallow, and something about the intensity of his gaze made my skin prickle and
my head feel light. Up close, I could feel his warm breath on my face and I
couldn’t help glancing at his lips, wondering for an illicit second what they’d
feel like sliding across mine.

Then
I remembered that the attraction was one-sided. He didn’t want me, so I lowered
my voice into what I hoped was cold disdain and snarled, “Let. Me. Go.”

Unfortunately,
Katinka chose that moment to return. She took one look at Finn’s hand on my arm
and my cranky frown, and her own expression clouded over. “What’s going on?”
she asked. Reasonable enough question.

“I
was leaving.” I snatched up my handbag with my untouched questionnaire and
stormed for the door.

She
trailed me there, alternating between questions and pleading that I reconsider,
but I couldn’t get out of her house quickly enough. Unfortunately for me, my
hands were trembling so much I fumbled my keys and they dropped out of my hand
and bounced off the decking trail and into the goldfish pond below it. I
watched them hit a lily pad before disappearing into the murky depths.

Just
like that I was trapped, and whether it was the emotional build-up of getting
there, the wine she’d fed me, or mortification at being so blatantly rejected
by a hot man, I did what any overwrought female does. I put my hands up to my
face and burst into tears. The next thing I felt was Katinka’s arms around me
as she crooned to me in Russian which was vaguely soothing. Then she pulled me
back into the shade of the entryway where we sat side-by-side on a padded bench
seat, her stroking my hair while I blubbed on about being a
bad girl
who
nothing nice was ever going to happen for
.

When
I finally had myself under control, I glanced out at the street, wondering if I
should ring the auto club, and in that moment I realized Katinka had stopped
crooning and was now nuzzling at my neck.

I
went still, blinking, wondering what the hell else could happen to me that day,
then I felt her fingers slide up my cheek and turn my head toward her. Suddenly
I was looking into her face at close range, and her breath smelt like
peppermint. Her eyes were beautifully made up, and her teeth were so dazzling
white, they must have been capped.

“I
want him to be with other woman,” she said, “because I am not faithful wife.”
Her English was slipping.

“Oh.”
I hadn’t expected that.

“I
have lovers,” she said, “but he pretends that I do not. I feel guilty.”

“So
would I,” I said, because that was true, although I wasn’t sure why she had to
tell me so close inside my personal space. Was she worried he’d overhear us? I
was still wondering about that when she leant in and kissed me, and for some
odd reason, despite all that had gone before, that took me completely by
surprise.

I
think I gasped against her lips, then she was brushing hers against mine and
the peppermint taste was strong. I could feel the wetness of her lips, then her
tongue came into my mouth and I was still so shocked I wasn’t registering that
this was weird. In fact, it was totally, completely and absolutely so far
outside what I’d expected to happen that day, it went beyond freaking me out. I
just froze.

She
kissed me softly, not even as if she were coaxing me, but as if it was some
bizarre apology. Then it was over and she was pulling back to look into my
eyes. “I want you to fuck my husband,” she said. “Please tell me you’ll stay.”

I
shook my head. “I have to go,” but I didn’t. I sat there, not because I had no
keys or even because I’d just had my first-ever girl kiss, and my legs were
wobbly. I stayed because I remembered Brittany. The money. I forced myself to
ask, “What if he won’t do it. Will you pay me anyway?”

She
nodded.

“Are
you sure?” Dear God, could it be that easy?

“I
pay either way. But I want you to try and seduce him. I don’t want to be the
only one guilty.”

I
stared into her eyes, realizing I didn’t need to walk away from this. It was a
house sit with a husband in residence. I didn’t need to have sex if he didn’t
want it.
But
…Katinka had just given me permission to do the nastiest
thing I’d ever imagined—
seduce
another woman’s husband.

I
already had the hots for Finn. Not to mention the heat that had jumped between
us when he’d touched me. Sure, I was cranky with him for rejecting me, but that
only fed a perverse determination to
prove
he couldn’t resist me. So I
gazed back into her eyes and said, “All right I will.”

She
smiled then and the transformation was amazing—from solemn pleading to femme
fatale in a second. No wonder he tolerated her infidelity. She was impossibly
sexy. “We will devise a plan, you and I,” she said. Then she winked. “I will be
gone a month. He will not resist you for that long.”

As
easily as my self-esteem had plummeted, it resurfaced, buoyed by Katinka’s
confidence that I could seduce her husband. And after all, she should know,
right?

More
importantly,
forty thousand dollars.
A third of the money Brittany
needed.

“Alright.”
I straightened my shoulders. “Let’s sign the contract.”

She
winked again, this time a knowing gesture between two sexy women. Or at least
that’s how it felt, because her kiss had somehow re-established my desirability
in my own mind and—nuns be damned—the seduction of Finn felt like an exciting
challenge.

Katinka
sealed the deal there and then. She even fished my keys out of the pond with
her expensive tennis racquet. After I’d made my escape and my emotions had
settled down, I cancelled the other appointments, determined to learn from this
first husband sit before I booked any more. Katinka and Finn’s interview should
never have been that upsetting. It was obvious even to a beginner like me that
I needed practical experience of the job to handle future prospects more
professionally.

I
had a month to find my next job, and my inbox told me there were plenty of
potential clients, so I could afford to be choosy.

That
decided, I cancelled my next three months’ worth of house sits and finished
Helen’s week, spending lots of time petting Princess Jasmine, imagining how it
would be to pet a husband, to pet Finn. I tried to make myself laugh about
that, remembering the fun we’d had before Katinka had gone to make her phone
call. It could be like that, I told myself. Fun. Laughter. Maybe sex. Well, not
at first because Finn would probably be awkward with me, but Katinka had
promised to leave a letter that would explain exactly how to seduce him, and if
I followed her instructions, he might succumb.

The
jury was still out about whether or not I’d try. Either way, two days before I
was due to arrive at her house, Katinka paid me for the whole month up front.

Forty
thousand dollars.

It
was more than I earned in a year. When I saw the deposit in my online banking
statement I was so overwhelmed, I wept. Then when I’d pulled myself together, I
rang Brittany on Skype.

“Brat.”

Her
face was pixilated on my phone, and the audio was crappy but I heard her say, “
S’up
sis?
”

“I’ve
raised forty thousand. I’ll transfer it today.”

“
What!
How?
” Her pouty little mouth and upturned nose—which I’d always said made
her look like a squirrel—seemed even more pronounced.

“Scientific
testing.” I knew she’d never bother to check on me. “I can earn ten grand a
week. Should have you sprung by Christmas.”

Her
eyes were wide, and I cursed the signal lag that kept freezing her image, but
at last I heard, “
Fucken A!
”

I’ve
never understood what that meant.
Amazing? Astounding?
I shook my head.
“So keep your head down and don’t rack up any more bills. You hear me?” Putting
on my best big sister voice.

The
next image I saw was her face collapsed into tears. “
I want to come home,
but… I look ugly!”

Marginally
lopsided wasn’t the same as ugly, but I said, “Sweetie. Don’t worry. We’ll fix
that. When you get home
,
” I added, in case she had any ideas of finding
another ‘cheap and cheerful’ plastic surgeon. She cried some more and I
so
much
wanted her hug her then, which was rare. She was usually such a nuisance. But
in that moment, I missed her like hell. So I sucked in a calming breath,
knowing I had to be strong for both of us. “So text me whenever you want, but
don’t ring me unless it’s an emergency. They get annoyed if you… interrupt the
experiments.”

“
Okay,
”
she sniffed. “
They’re moving me into a recovery hotel tomorrow. I’ll text
you the address.
”

Typical
Brat, only thinking about what was happening for her. I knew she’d never ask me
what the ‘experiments’ were, and if they might harm me. And that was okay. I
had girlfriends who worried about me. Brat had no one. Well, occasionally she
had a bad boyfriend, like the twit who’d given her five grand for the cheap
breast implant job, then bailed on her when it went wrong.

Which
reminded me, I hadn’t reassured her in this phone call that I wouldn’t tell
anyone about her ‘problem’. I opened my mouth to do that, but she cut over me
with, “
Food’s here. I gotta go.
”

“Sure
honey, I—”

No.
She was gone.

And
that was okay too. I transferred the money to the hospital, then rang their
accounts receivable section to reassure them I’d pay it all within the next few
months.
They
reassured
me
that Brittany wouldn’t be getting her
passport back until the account was finalized, but at ten grand a week, they
were happy.

There
was nothing more I could do for Brat, so focused on the coming husband sit.
Katinka had promised me a $5,000 bonus if I could get Finn to go down on me—that
being the ultimate betrayal by her standards. And I suppose it was. Any guy
could turn the other way while his dick was sucked, and maybe switch off while
he was fucking a stranger, but to actively give another woman pleasure was
stepping across the line.

I
told myself I wasn’t going to try and work for that extra money. It wouldn’t be
right. But at night, when I was alone in bed, I couldn’t stop fantasizing about
Finn and his sexy mouth making me squirm and moan as his dreadlocks brushed
against my thighs. It made me feel so guilty, I knew I had to stop, but the
image just kept sliding back like a hot, hard tongue against a throbbing
clitoris. I had no self-control whatsoever.

I
only hoped I could find some in his house…

Katinka
was gone when I arrived. That’s how I wanted it, so that’s how we did it. Finn
dropped her at the airport on this way to work and she flew out at 7am for Los
Angeles. I arrived at noon, found the garage door remote control in the
letterbox and let myself in. After parking my car, I took my belongings to the
guest room, just like I did on a normal house sit, but there was nothing
‘normal’ about this, and now that I was installed in her house, my nerves were
all over the place, jumping between mortal sins of greed, lust and pride.

It
didn’t matter how many times I told myself that even if we had sex, I was
strengthening their marriage by easing Katinka’s guilt, I could almost see
Sister Carmel, my fifth grade teacher, preparing to hand out a penance. I had
to distract myself, so I focused on unpacking into my temporary ‘home’.

My
bed was a king-sized sled with crisp white Sheridan sheets and a gorgeous
lime-green satin quilt. Candles of different shades of green lined both sides
the room along a shoulder-high railing, and beyond the end of the bed was a
mirrored wall-to-wall wardrobe that Katinka had thoughtfully populated with
silk kimonos, negligees, baby doll pajamas and a leather cat suit that was
clearly made for sex with strategic cut-outs and a neck-to-pubes zip.

I
felt self-conscious putting my boring tops and bottoms and a couple of good
cocktail dresses in the other side. At least I had good shoes, and I lovingly
stored the boxes below my dresses, stacked in piles of three, color coordinated
from black to white with all the shades in between. Over the years I’d spent
any spare cash I had on them, because like Carrie Bradshaw I knew that an
expensive pair of shoes could lift any outfit from good to stunning. Besides, I
had good legs and I wanted to draw attention to them.

Only
when I’d put all my things away did I look under the pillow to where Katinka’s
letter was waiting. Then I made myself a coffee and took it out by the pool to
read.

Dearest
Jill
(I’d
told them my real name. I couldn’t be Maree for a month)

Finn
will expect you to use the main bathroom but I have broken the shower so you
must use his ensuite to bathe. I suggest the spa bath, availing yourself of the
jets to find pleasure. Swim in the pool often, so you are in your bikini. Eat
mangoes and let the juice run over your breasts. Tell him you adore art house
films and make him watch erotica with you. Sleep nude and have loud nightmares.
I want him to come to you, but if all else fails, massage his feet. That makes
him hopelessly turned on. I cannot stop cheating and the guilt is eating me up.
You are my last hope.

Katinka.

I
could almost hear her accent, and it reminded me that both Katinka
and
Finn had agreed to my visit. If he had sex with me, it was his decision, his
marriage. If he didn’t, I still kept the money. I really needed to stop
torturing myself about this. I wasn’t the bad guy in this story. Cheating
Katinka was. I was merely providing a marital service, like a sex therapist or
something.

Sunlight
sparkled off the water in the pool beside me as I tried to convince myself I
wasn’t a sinner, but some wretched internal compass was pointing north, toward
virtue, and I could feel myself sliding further south with every second. My
anxiety felt like a neon sign flashing
MORTAL SINNER
inside my brain.

I’d
never done anything like this before, and I suddenly wondered if I could. What
if Finn touched me and I freaked out? Damn Sister Carmel and her lectures on
the dangers of wearing short skirts and sitting with your knees not touching.
This was her fault! She’d indoctrinated me, and I had to get over that.

I
was living in a beautiful house with a very sexy man. We might have sex, and
that would undoubtedly be pleasurable. We might not, and that could be awkward.
Bottom line, no matter how I reacted to Finn, I
would
stay for the month
because I’d already spent their money. I could see no alternative to that.

Strangely,
that revelation brought peace. I tore Katinka’s letter into tiny pieces and
binned it, telling myself that the best way to get through this was to hang on
to my sense of humor. Because soon enough Finn would be home and we had to live
in the house together.

Luckily,
we’d agreed on gourmet pizzas the first night so I didn’t have to cook, and
with a few hours to wait before his arrival, I decided to swim. I went to my
bedroom and donned my black polka-dot bikini and stared at myself in the
mirror. Okay, I wasn’t drop-dead gorgeous, but I did have dark Italian eyes
that Doug had told me were sexy, and shiny brown hair that teenage boyfriends
hadn’t been able to keep their hands off, plus enough tits and ass to
compliment my long legs.

I
was attractive, and Katinka was convinced Finn would be attracted to me. Maybe
a whole month was long enough to get under his skin. Or maybe I’d just live
here like his housemate. Either way, I was okay with it, so I headed to the
pool to do laps. I lost count at forty and only stopped when my arms ached,
exiting on wobbly legs to flop face-down on the poolside lounge and soak up
some rays which did wonders for my relaxation. So much so, in fact, that I
succumbed to the exhaustion of several nights’ broken sleep.

Finn’s
hand on my shoulder woke me later that day.

“You’re
burned,” he said.

“Oh
shit!” That wasn’t the plan.
Now
who was awkward? I tried to get up.

“Are
you okay?”

“No.”
I peeled myself off the sweaty banana lounge and stood, trying not to stretch
my back. What I hadn’t realized until I looked down was that my bikini top had
stayed on the lounge. “Jesus!” I squealed and covered my breasts.

Finn
stood there in designer jeans that hugged his thighs, and a black Oxfam
tee-shirt that clung to his very nice chest. His dreadlocks wriggled from side
to side as he shook his head. At first, he smiled. Then he laughed.

“What?”
I said, trying to frown and failing. “This isn’t funny. I’m injured. You better
have personal liability insurance, mister.”

He
kept smiling and I couldn’t hold it back any longer. We smiled at each other
for a full minute before he picked up my bikini top and put it into my fingers
so I didn’t need to uncross my arms.

“I’m
glad you’re not trying to seduce me,” he said.

I
raised an eyebrow. “It’s a piss-poor job if I am.”

“You
need a cool shower.”

I
opened my mouth to say,
I’ll go first
, then I realized I had to pretend
to use the main bathroom, so I could
discover
that the shower was
broken. Damn Katinka’s plan. I now had to fluff around in my own bathroom,
before I could ask to use his.

My
back desperately needed to cool down, but you can’t help rotten luck, so I
nodded and set off for my bedroom to grab some clothes, only to wince when I
surveyed the damage in the wardrobe mirror. Even if Finn did show interest in
sex, I was going to be out of commission for the first week at least. I could
only hope Katinka didn’t ring, or I’d have to tell her I was lulling him into a
false sense of security.

I
gathered my toiletries and a pair of pink cotton pajamas; you know the type
with the long shorts and the tee-shirt top that has a cute logo. This one said,
Pink is the new black
. Nothing suggestive there. Anyway, out of my
bedroom and into the bathroom I went, holding my toiletries bag over my boobs
so I didn’t look like an exhibitionist.

The
bathroom was a white marble affair with a huge shower compartment and one of
those trendy square vanity sinks with gold taps—a tad pretentious, but probably
Katinka’s style. I put my toiletries bag down and didn’t bother to unpack it.
Then I opened the glass door of the shower cubicle and turned on one of the
taps.

Surprise,
it worked. A steady flow came out, which I knew hadn’t been her plan. So I
turned on the other one and nothing happened. No more water came out. That
meant Katinka had sabotaged one of the taps, but not the other. Bottom line: I
couldn’t have a shower here, and I was just deciding whether I should have
stripped off by this time, or if it was natural to still have your pants on
while you were mucking around with taps, when I realized that the water
splashing onto my ankle was stinging me.

About
then I realized there was steam everywhere—it was the hot tap working—so I
should turn it off before I went to get Finn, because otherwise the hot water
tank would empty while I was mucking around and we’d both be stuck with a cold
shower. Even with sunburn, I could never tolerate icy water. It also seemed
cruel to inflict that on Finn, so I reached in to turn it off—and scalded my
wrist. For some reason the shower head was angling the stream of water toward
the taps.

“Shit!
Fuck!” I screamed and groped at the tap, only to realize I was turning the
wrong one! “Fuck, fuck,
fuck!”
I shouted as I reached across, copping a
stream of boiling water across my already burnt shoulder.

The
next thing I felt was Finn wrenching me away from the shower and putting me
beside the sink. Then he snatched up a towel, wrapped it around his arm and
calmly reached in and turned off the tap.

I
stood sobbing in my bikini bottoms with my hands over my mouth, because my
wrist stung and my back was burned and I was also a complete fuckwit.

In
the meantime, Finn had dropped the towel onto the shower floor, shut the glass
door and turned back to me with a look of bemusement on his face. “Are you
okay?” he asked, for the second time in ten minutes.

“I’m
a complete fuckwit,” I blubbered.

“Kinda
looks that way,” he replied, “But I won’t hold it against you.”

That
made me cry more, but somehow I was laughing at the same time so it was okay.
“My back hurts more. And I burnt my wrist.” I held it up for inspection like a
toddler showing her dad.

Finn
frowned in sympathy, both of us ignoring the fact that I was topless. “Looks
bad,” he said, and he made that soothing
tisking
noise adults do when
they want to show kids that they care. God help me, even that was sexy. “We
better soak that,” he said. And with those big hands of his, he moved me gently
out of the way and ran cold water into the sink. I stood sniffing back tears,
very aware of how little I was wearing and how close we were. My mind was
battling with thinking he was kind, and thinking he smelt like sex against the
shower screen.

About
then I realized Katinka was the fuckwit. How could she be unfaithful to this
amazing man?

“Here,”
he said, taking my hand and leading me back to the sink, all solemn
concentration while I bumbled about like a three-year-old. “Hold it under the
water.” I did. He left me in the bathroom for a minute and came back with a
towel that he’d soaked in cool water. “I’m going to put this on your back. It
might sting at first, but we need to cool that skin.”

We
.

“Okay.”
I wiped my nose with my free hand. Then he laid the towel gently across my
shoulders and I tensed, but I didn’t let myself make a sound. I’d done enough
squealing like a girl for one afternoon.

“There
you go,” he said and I looked up through my damp hair at the two of us in the
mirror, me hunched over to hold the towel in place, and him standing behind me
with a
you poor thing
look on his handsome face.

“I’m
a fuckwit,” I said again, as if the situation needed further clarification.

“So
you said,” he replied, but it made him smile, and he was so delicious I wanted
to groan. How on earth was I going to stay out of this man’s bed for a month?
At this rate I’d be pouncing on him tonight, sunburnt or not. He patted my
shoulder gently. “I’ll run you a bath. You stay here.”

“Okay.”

It
was only after he’d gone that I looked back at my reflection and realized that
the hunched posture did nothing for my boobs. Rather than the perky mounds I
displayed with shoulders back, they currently looked like a pair of mangoes trying
to meet in the middle over a belly that made me look three months pregnant.

“Fuck,”
I said again softly. If Katinka could see this, she’d be demanding her money
back. Bedraggled hair, smeared mascara, all I needed was a whisky douche and
the crack-whore impersonation would be complete. “Fuck. Wit,” I whispered to my
reflection. The idiot in the mirror shook her head in despair. I’d be lucky if
he didn’t kick me out the first week.

“Bubble
bath?”
Finn’s
voice floated in from down the hallway.

“Please!”
I shouted back, and straightened up, using my free hand to pull the ends of the
towel across my boobs and secure them in a bunch at the front. “I’m coming!” I
said, hoping I could think up a way to redeem myself. I pulled my burnt hand
out of the sink so I could use both hands to wipe mascara off with the edges of
the towel. Then I bunched it up again demurely, grabbed my toiletries bag and
trotted off down the hallway, thankful that the house was tiled instead of
carpeted as I dripped water everywhere.