ROMANCE: Mason (Bad Boy Alpha Male Stepbrother Romance Boxset) (New Adult Contemporary Stepbrother Romance Collection) (238 page)

I clicked on her browsing history. I wasn’t sure why I did it. I wasn’t the type to snoop or pry. I was just curious what her life looked like when I stepped out of the door. She was such a closed book most of the time.

I read through the URL’s frowning. She’d been on it as early as four in the morning. When I was sleeping. Sex sites.
Erotic toys. Light bondage. How to spice up your love life. When things are stale between you and your partner. Letting loose.

An iron fist clamped down on my stomach, and my chest felt tight. I struggled to breathe.
Karma Sutra. Positions that got the most out of
—

I closed the browser before I could read anymore. She was hiding this from me. I leaned back in the chair and pushed my fingers into my hair. What was she doing with all of this? We never did anything like this. We did it once a week, usually. Maybe not even then, because I was tired. Or because she had a headache. And when we did do it, it was very straightforward. Very tame. Like Lucy.

Nothing like
this
. A thought suddenly dawned on me. If she wasn’t doing this stuff with me, who was she doing it with?

I got up and paced the room. I started going through files, notes, anything I could find. Anything that would give me a clue who the hell he was. And what made him that much more special than me.

He was human. I could guess that much. There was no way she would go for another creature, if I wasn’t good enough. After everything I’d done to try and keep this life away from her… was it too much? Was it too little? What had I done wrong?

Granted, our life wasn’t the best, but it had been enough for me. Why hadn’t it been enough for her?

I found nothing I her office. Nothing that could point to anything. I opened her e-mail but she had a password. I wondered if I could get her phone away from her to see if there was anything on there. He had to contact her somehow. I was away from home so often…

I squeezed my eyes shut and willed the thoughts away. My hands were trembling and I could feel rage build in my chest. Anger was never a good thing for werewolves. It could bring on a change I couldn’t stop. I had to be able to control myself.

“Don’t lose it, Chris,” I said out loud. “It’s going to be fine. She’s just…” I couldn’t even think of a valid excuse where all of this would make sense. I stormed out of her office.

When she came home just before six, I was sitting on the couch, flipping through the television channels, not seeing anything.

“You’re home early,” she said, surprised.

“I needed to get out of the office. It becomes too much, sometimes.”

“I know what you mean,” she said. Oh I bet she did. “So are we going out?”

I’d forgotten about my offer that we go to dinner. Why not? Maybe if I confronted her in public it would be different, there wouldn’t be a scene.

“I was thinking we leave at seven?” I said. She looked at me, a smile spreading across her face and her brown eyes sparkled. God, she was beautiful. Why didn’t I notice how absolutely beautiful she was? Her blond hair was perfectly straight, and ending at her jaw. It made her sharp features seem even more pixie-like. I remembered how her petite figure, her gentle way, had drawn me in the beginning. Such a change from the raw, pure-power kind of life I knew. I’d been afraid she wouldn’t have wanted me after she’d found out I was a wolf. But she’d managed to love me regardless.

Well, that was how it used to be, anyway.

She changed into jeans and a green blouse that made her milky skin look like porcelain. Even in her casual clothes she looked prim and proper, not a hair out of place.

We drove to Cisco’s, a restaurant in town that was sort of in between stars. It was classy enough for a date, but people brought their children, too. I used to think that if we had children, we didn’t have to give up our regular place.

If we ever had children.

“How was your day at work?” I asked her after we’d ordered starters.

“Ugh, it was alright. You know how Barry gets. I’m so glad I don’t have to be there more than once a week. I would jump off a bridge. At least the rest of the time I get to stay home and relax while I’m doing what I need to do for him.”

Or not stay home, and relax, I thought darkly.

“What’s wrong?” Lucy asked, and when I looked at her, her eyes were on me, concerned. “You’re pale.”

“I just had a rough day,” I answered.

“Even though you left early?”

Because I left early, I thought, but instead I just nodded. “The Mullens project isn’t coming down and I don’t know if we’re going to be able to make deadline.”

I could see by the blank look on her face she didn’t really know what I was talking about. When last had we spoken about anything in our lives? When last had I explained to her what I did, what it meant, who was giving me hell at the office? When last had I asked her about her life? When had we fallen into this hole where we were two strangers, dancing like we knew each other.

“Lucy, I—“ I started. I wanted to tell her about the websites I’d found. I wanted to know who the hell he was, and why she thought he was better than me. But she cut me off.

“Speaking of work, something came up.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah… Barry is sending me… on a course.”

“A course?” Barry had never sent her on a course before. He didn’t really care about her, as far as I could tell. The only reason he kept her on was because she worked for next-to-nothing.

Lucy nodded, not making eye-contact. She stared at her salad instead.

“It’s this weekend. I’m going to be gone most of Saturday, possible Sunday too.”

“You’re leaving for a weekend?” I struggled to wrap my mind around it. First the websites, and now she was going away?

“Oh, no. I’m not staying overnight. It’s in Atlanta, so I’ll just drive through. I don’t even know if they need me on Sunday as well.”

If
he
needs you, I corrected her in my head. I nodded slowly.

“Alright,” I said. “That’s fine. I’ll see if I can find something to do.”

“Yeah?” she asked, looking surprised. When I asked about it she blushed. When last had she blushed? Her reddish cheeks made her eyes look deeper.

“You look surprised,” I said.

She looked down at her salad again. “I just didn’t think you’d be find with it.”

I narrowed my eyes at her while she wasn’t looking. “Why would you need to ask permission for a work thing?” I asked. She looked up, something in her eyes that I didn’t understand and smiled.

“I supposed you’re right,” she said.

Damn straight. I was right. I didn’t confront her. I was going to wait until the weekend, and when she left, I was going to follow her and find out who this jerk was once and for all. Nothing as intense as being caught red-handed. There was nothing she could do then to avoid me, or to cause a scene.

Two more days. I could pretend like everything was fine for two more days. When our mains arrived, I ate hungrily. I would have to keep my strengths up for when it came down to it.

Two more days.

Chris

Getting through two days with the kind of information I had was hard. I kept wanting to say something. Every time Lucy disappeared to her study I had to force myself not to follow her and say something about it.

I didn’t want to give her a chance to cover her tracks. Deny everything and get rid of any evidence she might. I didn’t think she was the kind of person that would do something like that, but then again, I hadn’t thought she be the affair-type either. Lucy had always been very conservative, even before we were married. I’d played along with her to-do list for our lives together because it was important to her.

I was starting to think I’d made a mistake.

On Friday she ran out to the store to grab the milk she’d forgotten, and she left her phone behind. It was a stroke of luck. Usually I would have been upset. I preferred it if she had a ways he could contact me in a case of emergency. There were all sorts of men out there.

But this time I was glad. I hadn’t had a chance to get her phone away from her since Wednesday.

I figured out the password for her screen lock on the second try. It was my name. Ironic. I felt a shiver of anxiety travel through my body when I opened her messages folder. What I would find in here…

But there was nothing. Nothing at all. Most of the messages in her inbox were from me. A few from Barry, and one or two from a woman named Sandra. When I opened them and read them, it turned out Sandra really was just a woman, not a lover in disguise. Didn’t some women do that? Save their lover’s name under a woman’s name so it wouldn’t seem suspicious when someone saw it?

Well, whatever the case was, Lucy wasn’t other women. I hadn’t thought so before, and I still didn’t think so now. She was really good at covering her tracks.

When she came home half an hour later she handed me a chocolate bar.

“What’s this for?” I asked.

“They were on sale, and I know how much you love them,” she said, putting her handbag down on the counter.

“Why are you being nice to me?” I blurted out. She blinked, looking confused.

“Wasn’t I supposed to?” she asked. I realized how stupid I was sounding. I opened my mouth to say something. To confront her. To jump on her and demand to know what was going on. But I stopped myself and closed my mouth again. I could wait one more evening, couldn’t I? Tomorrow I would find out. Tomorrow it would be over and I would know the truth.

“I’m sorry,” I said meekly. “I just had a bad day at work.”

“I’m sorry, sweetheart. How can I make it better?”

I shrugged. “It will be nice just to spend an evening together. Just the two of us.”

She nodded and carried on making food.

“With no distractions,” I added pointedly.

“Okay, honey,” she answered, carrying on without missing a beat.

Boy, she was good at this.

When we sat down at the dinner table I watched her. She moved with a fluid grace. It was what had drawn me to her the first time. Why hadn’t I paid more attention the past couple of years? Her fingers were long and slender, and when she ate it was like a dance, precise and calculated. Timed.

I shuddered when I thought of her hands trailing someone else’s body.

“How was your day?” I asked. I watched her reaction. Anything at this point would be a hint. A shift of her eyes. A pause in her chewing. A moment too long before she made eye-contact.

Again everything was seamless.

“It was alright. Barry gave me a lot of things to do when I saw him Wednesday, so I’ve been working at that most of the time.”

And the rest of the time? I wanted to ask but I stopped myself. As good as she was at hiding things from me, I had to admit I was pretty good at keeping control of myself. I’d wanted to lose it a couple of times.

“What time is your course starting tomorrow?” I asked. She looked up at me, frozen for just a second. It was tiny, but it was something. Finally an irregularity.

“I think at eight in the morning, but I’ll have to check up on that, dear,” she said. “I’ll check my e-mail in a minute.”

“Why don’t you just phone Barry?” I prompted. She shook her head.

“He forwarded an e-mail with the details. He wouldn’t know.”

So e-mail was definitely how she communicated with him. No wonder I hadn’t found anything on her phone. And I hadn’t been able to guess that password.

“Where is it?” I asked.

“In Atlanta. I’ll leave an hour before it starts so I’ll definitely be on time.”

“Do you have an address for me?” I asked. She paused again. I didn’t know why these small little hints were so satisfying. I’d started thinking I was going crazy.

“I’ll have to look that up too,” she said.

Missing a time I could understand, but a place? It was unlike her.

“Well, let me know,” I said.

“Have you decided what you’re going to do?” she asked, changing the subject. I shrugged.

“I was thinking I’ll head out early for a round of golf with the boys,” I said. She nodded.

“Good, you haven’t been taking enough time for yourself.”

Unlike you, I thought again. I surprised myself at how bitter I was. I was also surprised  at how I managed to bite back.

“What time are you heading out?” she asked.

“Around six,” I answered. She nodded and took another bite.

“Good,” she said.

Oh, I bet.

When the sun came up I was out of bed and in the shower before Lucy woke up. It was our normal routine, but today I didn’t want to face her until I was ready. In pajamas I felt vulnerable somehow.

I was lathering my face with shaving foam, the towel around my hips, when Lucy walked into the bathroom. I glanced at her. Her eyes rested on my body.

What did she see in me? I realized with a pang I didn’t even know anymore.

“I’m leaving soon,” I said to her.