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  JACY SUTTON

  Booktrope Editions

  Seattle, WA 2016

  COPYRIGHT 2016 JACY SUTTON

  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.

  Attribution — You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).

  Noncommercial — You may not use this work for commercial purposes.

  No Derivative Works — You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

  Inquiries about additional permissions

  should be directed to: [email protected]

  Cover Design by Michelle Fairbanks/Fresh Design

  Edited by Jennifer Mattison

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to similarly named places or to persons living or deceased is unintentional.

  PRINT ISBN 978-1-5137-0476-0

  EPUB ISBN 978-1-5137-0526-2

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2015917603

  CONTENTS

  COVER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  QUOTE

  DEDICATION

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  THE FOLLOWING SPRING

  THANK YOU

  MORE GREAT READS FROM BOOKTROPE

  “Not till we are lost do we begin

  to understand ourselves.”

  —Henry David Thoreau

  To my sweet husband, who inspired me

  to exaggerate the funny parts

  and shine light on all the love there is

  and all that is yet to come.

  And for my boys - may you never read this book.

  CHAPTER ONE

  ON THE MORNING of her forty-fourth birthday, Olivia lay in that lovely post-orgasmic bliss; her right hand rested gently on her naked chest, feeling the slowly stilling breaths. She flicked her tongue across her lips, enjoying the flood of sensations even as they lessened. After turning her head slightly to look at her husband’s profile, she reached over to stroke Mike’s sleeping face. Removing her other hand from the moist spot between her legs, she thought, not for the first time, Why the hell can’t you do that for me?

  ***

  Olivia protested, but not too hard, when Nancy pushed the small, brightly wrapped package across the tiny wrought-iron table. “You didn’t have to buy me anything,” Olivia said, reaching for it.

  “Of course I did. You would have been disappointed if I hadn’t.”

  “True.”

  The friends sat outside at a fashionable Minneapolis uptown café, enjoying the last heat of Indian summer. Potted sweet potato vines, oversized from several warm, rainy weeks, cascaded out of planters pooling at their feet.

  Olivia unwrapped the present carefully, commenting on the charming pastel buttons Nancy had tied to the Kraft paper.

  “Anyway,” Nancy said, watching Olivia, “I always buy you a birthday gift, and routine is good for me. And obviously for my therapist since she tells me that every week.”

  “Then this is therapeutic for both of us.” Olivia lifted the delicate gold hoop earrings from the box. “Nancy, they’re lovely. Thank you.” She half stood and reached across the table to hug her friend.

  Sitting back down, Olivia touched her hands to her earlobes to check for earrings. Finding them naked, then remembering the extra minutes she’d stolen checking e-mail which left her flying out of the house, Olivia put the hoops in and tilted her head slightly. “How do they look?”

  “Lovely.” Nancy handed Olivia her purse compact. “Gold sets off the hazel in your eyes. So what did Mike give you?”

  “He bought us tickets to Wicked.”

  “Good.” Nancy nodded. “He’s done worse.”

  “Yes, the fishing pole and pink waders come to mind. And there’s been some talk of a trip, although it’s mostly been me talking.”

  “Where to?”

  “Somewhere big and romantic. Hawaii or Europe. But Mike keeps suggesting I travel with you.”

  “I can’t afford a trip to St. Paul right now, much less Paris.” Nancy had put the compact back in her oversized Coach knockoff and was toying with the sprig of mint adorning her iced tea. She glanced in the direction of a young couple who sat at the next table. A moment ago they’d politely asked Nancy and Olivia for their extra bistro chair to hold the bags they’d collected from the Banana Republic next door.

  “I know,” Olivia said, “but he figures if I go with a girlfriend it will only cost half as much. Plus, it will give him more time and money so he can travel this fall.”

  “To?”

  “I don’t know. South Dakota? North Dakota? Timbuktu?” Olivia sighed. “Separate vacations are a bit like him suggesting sex and me saying, ‘Or we could each go to our own side of the bed and masturbate.’ Don’t you think?”

  Nancy laughed, reminding Olivia of soap bubbles blown from a dime-store wand.

  Olivia leaned back and spotted Marti out of the corner of her eye, waving at them from across the boulevard.

  Without so much as a glance in either direction, Marti strode toward the two women, managing to evade the lunchtime traffic. She sashayed up to the table, forcing diners to readjust their chairs in her wake.

  “Are your kids as busy as mine?” Marti asked, by way of a greeting. Everything about her was oversized: her smile, her personality, her rear end.

  She began cataloguing her children’s athletic activities, all of which seemed to end in pre-Olympic training, then academic pursuits, each preceded by the word gifted or talented.

  Nancy waited a few minutes, then interrupted. “It’s Olivia’s birthday today.”

  “Did I know that?” Marti looked at the w
omen as though expecting an answer.

  “I’m not sure,” Olivia said, after a short, awkward silence.

  “Well,” Marti said, leaning over to hug Olivia. “Happy! Happy! Did I ever tell you what Gary did for my birthday last year?” In a tone feigning discretion, she announced, “He took me to Las Vegas and we stayed at the Palms in their….” And here she paused dramatically to make sure the young couple Nancy had watched earlier listened in. “We stayed in their erotic suite. It had a mirrored ceiling and a dancer’s pole.”

  Olivia nodded in what she hoped appeared a knowing, cliquey way, as if she and Mike were also the kind to frequent elaborate hotels for sex games.

  “Gary bought me a pair of black fishnet thigh-high stockings and a little garter belt, and he bought himself a new Nikon DSLR camera.” She tapped the table with plum-colored nails. “Then we had a naughty, nearly naked photo shoot. Oh, that pole made a helluva prop.” Marti took several dramatic breaths as if she were building to a climax. “Let’s just say the sex after was mind-blowing.”

  Marti paused. Nancy and Olivia remained mute, as though searching for an appropriate response. In the end, it was Marti who filled the silence. “Later, we won twenty-five hundred dollars at blackjack.” She flashed her impeccably white teeth and called out, “Have to run, girls.”

  Olivia thought of the Cheshire cat, whose smile lingered long after it was gone.

  Neither Nancy nor Olivia spoke for a few moments, and then Nancy said, “I’m just trying to imagine that big fanny wrapped around that little pole.”

  Olivia gave Nancy a look that was more a sigh than a smile.

  Nancy touched her friend’s hand. “Olivia, don’t look like that. It’s not all about sex.”

  Olivia traced her finger along the sleek metal of the gold hoop earring. “What if it is?”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “WOW. BIG BIRTHDAY NIGHT,” Daniel said, stepping onto the screened porch.

  Olivia looked up from her book and smiled. “Are you all done with homework?”

  “Mostly. I didn’t have much. Thought I’d spend some time with my favorite mom on her big day.” He sat beside her on the ancient porch sofa and playfully took the book from her hands. “What are you reading? Pride and Prejudice? Again?”

  “Jane Austen never gets old.”

  “Neither do you, Mom.” He gave her a small squeeze; if she was generous it could be called a hug. “Seriously, though, it’s your birthday. Pick one of those annoying activities you always ask me to do.”

  “The ones you always turn down?” she teased. Time with her seventeen-year-old was becoming more elusive. “Should we play Boggle or go for a bike ride?”

  Daniel shrugged, so Olivia chose the game since the early shadows of the evening were already upon them. Daniel went down to the rec room to find it as Olivia microwaved popcorn and poured two glasses of lemonade.

  By the second round, Olivia was thrashing him. Her unparalleled success at word games meant Mike and Daniel rarely agreed to play with her.

  “Do you remember,” she asked, shaking the tiles for the third round, “when you had that slumber party and Andy couldn’t sleep? I think you were about ten. Andy and I must have played sixteen rounds of Boggle at two in the morning.”

  “Yeah, and he told me he won every single one. Seems like someone was throwing the game.”

  “Well,” she said, “I used to let you win, too. Do you know what Andy’s thinking about after next year? Does he want to go to the U for college?”

  “I don’t think so, Mom.”

  “He always told me he wanted to be an astrophysicist or a race car driver.”

  “I don’t think either of those are in the plan.” Daniel turned over the timer.

  After the round was done and Olivia’s next victory tallied, she asked, “So what will he do?”

  “Andy? I don’t know. He’s not really at school much.”

  Olivia sat quietly for a long moment. “Is he using drugs? Is he drinking?” she asked, her voice lower than it had been before.

  “Yes and yes,” Daniel said conspiratorially. Then he grinned at her, “C’mon, Mom. You know kids do.”

  “I know. I just never think of them as your friends.”

  “Well, Andy and I haven’t hung out in a few years.”

  They played another round in silence.

  “All right, you win,” Daniel said when they finished. “I should get back to that last bit of stats I have.”

  “Okay, honey.” She studied him. His russet brown hair needed a trim. There was stubble on his chin that was real hair, not peach fuzz. She wondered when that had happened. “Daniel, are you?” she asked. “Have you ever?”

  When he looked at her she could still see traces of him as a toddler, in first grade, starting middle school. “Mom,” he said, “I have tried pot, but it’s not my thing. And I won’t risk getting kicked off the swim team.”

  Olivia nodded and felt her body relax, thankful for his honesty and that the answer was mostly no. She stood to bring the glasses to the kitchen.

  Daniel came to her and hugged her tightly. He was taller than Mike now. Her small stature meant her nose knocked into his collarbone. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I make good choices.”

  She kept hugging him. He tried to pull away, but not too terribly hard. Finally he said, “Okay, the moment’s passed.” As he unwrapped himself from her insistent hug, he asked, “Does it bug you Dad’s not here for your birthday?”

  “It’s fine. We’re going to celebrate Saturday. This way I’ve got you all to myself.”

  “Is he working late?”

  “No, he’s at Pheasants Forever tonight, I think. You know I can never keep track of all his groups.”

  Daniel stepped ahead of her into the hallway. When he reached the stairs, he took them two at a time with his gangly, not-quite-grown-into legs.

  “Thanks for talking with me so openly,” she called to his retreating back.

  As he tramped toward his bedroom she heard him say, “Always,” before the door shut behind him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE COSMOPOLITAN MAGAZINE lay open on the bed. On one page, a gorgeous, twenty-something woman with a mane of thick brown hair, wearing a lacy pink cami and matching silk shorts, lay looking blissfully pre-orgasmic. The facing page had instructions with four black-and-white line drawings of couples engaged in Hot. Wet. More-Gasm Sex.

  Olivia and Mike were attempting number three, as position number one looked slightly distasteful, and number two required a level of flexibility Olivia had not seen since the days when Tom Cruise still seemed like a guy she’d want to have a go with.

  Mike brought one of the wood kitchen chairs into the bedroom, mercifully not the one with the missing spindle.

  He sat down, still dressed in the Minnesota Gophers T-shirt and athletic shorts he’d put on in the morning. “Like this?” he asked, holding his arms out to her.

  Olivia reviewed the diagram. “Yes.” She climbed on his lap, straddling him. They kissed. Lukewarm. He moved his hands along her back, gently rubbing her shoulders and then up through her hair. His tongue pushed her lips apart, driving into her.

  Do not think about chair spindles, she admonished herself silently.

  His hands went to her waist and he grabbed hold of her snug, cornflower-blue T-shirt to lift it over her head. Olivia raised her hands accommodatingly. Mike let the shirt drop to the floor as he kissed down her neck, which she found more enticing. With sloppy, wet kisses, he moved from her neck to the raised curve of her breast protruding seductively from the top of her bra.

  She could feel his erection growing. “Are you comfortable?” he asked.

  Was she supposed to be comfortable, she wondered? If so, then what was the point of the hard chair? Focus, she told herself. Take his shirt off.

  She pulled his shirt over his head and traced her finger from his neck down to his chest. He was still a handsome man, with a slim physique even twenty-three years af
ter he’d lifted his last weights at the college gym.

  “You’re beautiful,” he mumbled appreciatively. He unclasped her bra and let it drop to the floor, just to the side of her shirt. Their naked chests pressed against each other.

  “Do we just screw on the chair?” Mike asked.

  She leaned over to look at the diagram again. He tried to look, too, and their weight tipped the chair slightly so that he had to dig his foot hard into the floor to right them. His hand got tangled in her hair and yanked at it.

  “Ouch.” She jerked her head away.

  “Sorry,” Mike muttered.

  She climbed off him and bit down on her lip to hide a small hiss of frustration. Olivia met his gaze and answered his sheepish smile by sliding her shorts down and stepping out of them gingerly. Mike watched, and his eyes looked more eager, but she saw his erection had fallen a bit, like a palm tree holding too many nuts.

  “Let’s kiss some more,” he suggested.

  Olivia stepped to him, and his arms encircled her. She closed her eyes. He placed his hand below her ear and kissed her cheek gently, which felt too paternal, while his other hand slid to her waist, his thumb making a soft, lazy circle against her skin. Mike made muffled sounds of desire into her ear. Olivia relaxed into him, hoping some sensation would take over, a quiver or a tremble. His lips moved to hers and he pushed his tongue into her mouth in a familiar but demanding way. She dropped her head to the side so he would kiss her neck rather than her lips, and began wondering why that felt better. He slid his hands down to her bottom, cupping her and pulling her hips tightly into him. She felt him harden again. Mike stepped backward, sat back down on the chair, then pulled her onto him.

  “Now?” he asked. “Are you ready, Olivia? Do you want me inside you?”

  What a lot of talk, she thought. “Yes, Mike,” she said. She arched up to take him in.

  He thrust, moving deeper inside her, and she could hear his breathing shallow into short little bursts. “Is it good? Is it good?” he demanded lustfully in her ear.