Madeleine Strays: A Wife-Watching Romance Read Online Free PDF Page B

placed blame on the alcohol, on the potential awkwardness she faced in such a new situation, on the undoubtedly intense attention she must have been getting from her date. It would have made it difficult to pull out her phone and start texting her husband.
    Anyway, there was something so sexy about his wife having independence in her dating, even if it conflicted with his desire to watch. He couldn’t entirely put a finger on why.
    That final wait for her to arrive home was so jittery—he was a bundle of nerves, still, not knowing which way the date had gone, how far she had gone with Matthew. His assumption was that she must have done something. She’d been emailing the guy and talking to him on the phone all week, she definitely liked him.
    *
    At last, down the hallway he heard the quiet ding of the elevator arriving on their floor and the doors opening.
    Having been sitting on the couch, attempting to focus on the late night chat shows, he suddenly made the last-minute decision that when Madeleine came in, she should find him in bed. He wanted her to think he’d been relaxed waiting for her, perhaps even sleeping a little since she was so late.
    He didn’t want her to think he’d been so unbelievably nervous all evening.
    Quietly, he slipped off the lights and stole through into the bedroom, pulling off his clothes before diving onto the mattress to switch on the bedside lamp. By the time he heard the rattle of the front door being unlocked and opened, he was giving a passable impression of someone who had only just woken up.
    And there she was, and Hugo could not believe how desirable she looked—and that she had actually gone out to dinner and more with another man, wearing a dress as tiny as that.
    She’d taken her hair out of her ponytail. What did that mean?
    “Hey, you’re still awake?” she said, her voice sounding a little dry, a little hoarse. The bar must have been loud, forcing their conversation into loud voices.
    Or had she been screaming too much as her date had thrust inside her?
    “Of course,” he said, trying his utmost to sound casual. “You have a good time?”
    She sauntered over to the bed, and he saw that she had been carrying her shoes, which she now dropped. She shrugged, “We had a nice dinner.”
    Hugo’s stomach shrank.
    “Anything happen afterwards?” he asked.
    Standing in front of him, by the edge of the bed, she slipped the dress over one shoulder, then the other, allowed the little thing to drop to the floor to reveal her black lingerie and those sexy hold-ups.
    “I guess I could tell you that it did,” she said, and he caught his breath as she reached behind to unfasten her bra strap, allowing it to fall, revealing those gorgeous breasts, her nipples so hard.
    But she wrinkled her nose, and that was enough for Hugo to know her date had not ended as hoped.
    “Matthew wasn’t the one?” he asked her.
    She shook her head.
    “I think to start with, I was just too nervous,” she said, climbing onto the bed. “But the thing was, I just didn’t feel it for him.”
    Hugo felt a touch of disappointment, but he’d been through her role-plays before, when hopes and even sure-fire certainty that she had finally experienced extra-marital passion were dashed. Bottom line: he was just happy to get Madeleine back, and still apparently fired up.
    “You must have had some fun,” he said. “Staying out so late?”
    She smiled, and now peeled down the bed sheets, her eyes lighting up as she revealed her husband’s bare torso, and then the bulge in his boxers. “He was an interesting guy,” she said. “We talked a whole lot—and I guess I wanted to see if it was just nerves, you know—”
    “You just didn’t find him attractive?”
    “I can’t explain it—I mean, he wasn’t hideous. I’d seen pictures of him on the website. I talked to him on the phone, he seemed nice. But when I met him in real life…”
    “You didn’t have chemistry with him.”
    Hugo finished her