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"I don't even call Katherine sweetheart. I don't call her anything, actually. You're the first woman I've wanted to give an endearment to in many long years. Just felt natural, I guess."
My cheeks bloom with heat and I feel stupidly giddy. I smile at that. James sits up so we're chest to chest and then he takes control. I love how he knows exactly what both of us need—and like. It doesn't take long until we’re both climaxing on breathless moans and sighs.
I fall back onto the bed and smile dreamily up at the ceiling. "What a way to wake up," I say. After a few minutes of blissful harmony in his arms, something dawns on me. My voice lowers to a quiet tone, slowing the pulse of my heart. Unsure. "What are you going to tell your wife when she asks why you didn't come home?"
He's quiet for a moment. "Nothing. She won't ask," he says, and it intrigues me.
I roll onto my side to look at him. I lace my fingers with his and fold our hands so they're pressed to my chest. "Really? I'd want to know where they hell my husband was all night."
"She doesn't question me. I don't question her. This is nothing new, trust me."
"But why? I don't understand why anyone would want a marriage like that," I say.
James sighs deeply and looks at the ceiling, lost in thought. His fingers tighten around mine. "Where we come from, divorce isn't an option. You have to remember, I'm in my fifties. It was a different time then. Once you get married, you stay married. It's just how things were done."
"So, what? If you divorced you'd get twenty lashes? I don't understand."
James goes into detail about both their backgrounds, about how her family is just a step below the Kennedys, but no one knew who he, or who his family was, the way people did hers.
"The problem is that the heat of the moment resulted in a pregnancy. Twenty years ago, when you came from a well-heeled background like her, the only way to cover up a pregnancy was to claim love and marry. Natalie is the only reason we're married and so we stay together for her. I came from a low-class background, which humiliated her family. They paid my family quite well to stay quiet. Marriage was not something either of us wanted. Yeah, we were both attracted to each other, but it was nothing more than a few hot drunk hookups and that was it. Believe me, we tried to make it work for years through counseling, but it just wasn't in the cards for us. Turns out, we don’t do it for each other when we’re sober."
"So that's why you have a membership at Sanctuary Cove," I state in understanding.
He nods. "She thinks something's wrong with me. Like there's some deep-rooted issue that stems from childhood bullshit because I'm too dominant for her. She wants a soft lover—"
A burst of laughter flies from the back of my throat and I cover my mouth.
"What's so funny?"
"You're anything but a soft lover. I could tell that the second I met you."
Leaning over to look at me, his eyes twinkle. "Don't tell me that bothers you and you're only with me for my money."
"No. I mean, at this point, the money is just a plus to me." James stares at me, blinking a few times like he's lost in my eyes. Lowering my voice, I palm his jaw and tell him the truth. "No, it doesn't bother me, James. I actually like the way you handle me. Not because I like it rough, but there's something about the way you touch me that makes me forget everything on my mind. Like your hands understand my body in ways no one ever has. I have this notion that sex is stress-relieving for both of us, like there's an understanding, a connection, and it just works. I've never experienced anything like that before you, so now it's going to be something I always seek. I don't think I'd like a soft lover. That being said, I think you could probably do rough but soft sex it would be really incredible."
James leans in and gives me an emotional kiss, one filled with need and acceptance. His hands roam every inch of my body he can reach, and I draw closer, only for him to break the kiss and lie back.
"The one and only time I got hands-on the way I like it, she said she felt like she was being assaulted, that it came off as rape, and hitting a woman to have sex is repulsive. I never touched her like that again. I would never hit a woman. I have certain tastes my wife doesn't approve of and I hate when she tries to make me feel guilty for them. I need a rougher kind of sex, but she doesn't fulfill my needs, so I look for it elsewhere."
I think it's hot when James is dominant, but I don't tell him that right now. It's not the time.
"But you fulfill hers."
"Yeah," he says, his voice is low and so empty that it hurts my chest. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to have sex with your wife and hate it? I want to be able to connect with my wife, but I never will."
I feel bad. I know what it's like to have bad sex. I can hear it in his voice how unhappy he is and I want to try to fix it.
Gently, the next few words I utter are spoken with hesitation. I don't want him to get the wrong idea, like I'm being pushy or intruding, but maybe he needs to be reminded.
"It's the twenty-first century, James. I don't think anyone would care if you guys divorced. It happens every day."
He shakes his head. "The divorce rate is high these days because millennials have an argument and can't talk it out. Ten seconds later they're googling where to find a quick divorce lawyer and crying about it. Honestly, I've never had a reason to file because I've never found that one person who just does it for me mind, body, and soul. Part of the agreement was that we stayed married for a period of time. After that time was up, we just sort of stayed. Divorce is messy and costs a lot of money."
It's cheaper to keep her, I want to add, but I don't. "That's because you haven’t really had the chance to find that person."
"The one thing we both actually agreed on was to give Natalie a good family, so we've made it a marriage of convenience and stay together for her. Katherine's tried too, but we're just oil and water now. She does what she wants, I do what I want, and everyone stays happy."
I frown. "But you're not happy."
