Chapter Ten

 

Mad dash through Granite Park. Was this real life? It had to be a dream. Nothing this dizzying, or this unseemly, ever happened in Meredith’s little world. Wait, the groceries she’d gone out to fetch…what did she need, again? No clue. No underwear, either! She’d thrown them in the ravine. No shirt, no shoes, no service. Was it illegal to visit the grocery store wearing no underpants?

Just go home, Meredith. Back to the comfort and familiarity of the house.

By the time Meredith reached her front door, she hadn’t even contemplated what she might say to Jeff if he were home. She’d left for the store hours ago and was returning only now without groceries. Tom and Jane were visiting their grandparents, and Jeff had planned to check in on them. Hopefully he wouldn’t be home yet. But later, when she was alone with her husband, would she tell him what she’d done? It was very wrong of her, wasn’t it? Perhaps he would know, just by looking at her, that she…that she’d done what she’d done. Or perhaps he wouldn’t know, and perhaps she wouldn’t tell him.

There was a bizarre feeling about the house when Meredith finally opened the front door. It seemed empty, but in fact Jeff was upstairs, calling to her. Something about his birthday.

Meredith’s face went crimson. She could see herself in the hallway mirror. Slowly climbing the staircase, she pressed cool fingertips to her cheeks. They weren’t just hot, they actually felt as though they were popping. Goodness gracious, Jeff would take one look at her and know her crime. He would divorce her, she would be deemed an unfit mother, she would never see Tom and Jane again and she would die, alone and disgraced, on the streets of Sheridan. What a mess!

“I didn’t hear you, Jeff. What did you say?”

Jeff was in their bedroom, sitting in front of his laptop. With a sly smile, he asked, “You know how you were saying you couldn’t figure out what to get me for my birthday?”

“Oh, darn it! I haven’t even found a gift yet.” The words were out before she could stop them.

“Don’t worry about it,” her husband chuckled. “I kind of got it for myself.”

What gift did he get for himself? Glancing around the bedroom, Meredith realized there was dirty clothing and a dark wig strewn upon the bed. How perplexing.

“Were you following me in the park this morning?” she asked. “It was you, wasn’t it? What were you playing at?”

“Sorry about that.” Jeff nodded sheepishly. “You spook so easily. I knew if I put a scare into you in Granite Park, it would send you straight to Joyce’s house, since it’s the only one close to the path.”

“I don’t understand,” Meredith replied, pressing a palm to her forehead.

Jeff closed his laptop. “For as long as I’ve known her, Joyce has been famous for her little get-togethers. I guess I was sort of curious. I wanted to go to one together, but how do you raise a topic like that? ‘Hey Mer, want to go to a wild sex party Saturday night?’ I didn’t know how to ask in a way that wouldn’t offend you.”

Blood cells burst madly in her cheeks. Meredith tried to piece together exactly what had occurred that morning. Jeff had followed her in the park in order to scare her into seeking refuge at Joyce’s house. Why? Was it all a test?

“You know what a chicken I am,” Jeff continued. “I couldn’t bring myself to ask you along, but I didn’t want to go alone. When I started thinking about my birthday, and the one thing I would wish for, I realized I wanted to see you happy again.”

“I was never unhappy,” Meredith contested, easing against the frame of the bedroom door. Just because each day was exactly like the last didn’t mean she was unhappy. Perhaps a little bored. Or a lot bored…

“Okay, but I thought you might like to get out of the house, meet some new people, try something different. I figured you’d probably just watch Joyce’s friends, you know, do their thing. I know you like looking; you’re always into my magazines.”

Jeff knew about that? He never let on. Thank goodness he was smiling.

“I’ve been e-mailing Richard, Ash and Sheena to make sure they were trustworthy people. I didn’t want to throw you into a lion’s den, after all. When I started talking about you and about why I wanted to do this, they all got really into the plan. For your security, I had Joyce set up a web cam to transmit everything back to my computer. That way, I could have picked you up if I saw that you were uncomfortable.”

“Oh…”

“Well, that’s not the whole reason for the web cam. What kind of a birthday gift would your excursion have been if I hadn’t been able to watch? I could hardly believe it when you started kissing Sheena. Oh, Mer, that was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. My wife with another woman. Unbelievable! And then to see you going at it with that blond dude, to actually hear you asking for it and really enjoying your body. This has been best birthday ever.”

For the second time that day, Meredith couldn’t contain her tears. Everybody had been in on this? How silly she must have appeared, thinking Sheena was a mystic. Jeff had simply told her all those personal things. What a quagmire this was. And Jeff had been witness to her indiscretions! He’d seen every minute of her kissing Sheena in that outfit of roses, of her calling out to Richard, asking him to get naughty with her, of being rubbed by another woman until she shrieked like a cat. And after everything she’d done, Jeff wasn’t angry in the least.

But of course he wasn’t angry. He set her up! Why would he feel betrayed? It was she who ought to feel deceived by Jeff! Those remorseful tears turned indignant. June Cleaver would have been livid. Her own husband arranged for her to have a mad, passionate encounter with a group of gorgeous people…

And Meredith wanted to feel angry about that?

Standing in the doorway to her bedroom, staring into her husband’s excited eyes, Meredith tried to summon her rage. Without warning, bubbles of laughter began to simmer inside her cheeks. Suppressing them, she formed her lips into a grimace. The harder she tried to feel angry, the more she wanted to laugh. Her lips did battle with themselves, turning down in the centre and up at the sides. When she caught sight of her quivering lips in the bedroom mirror, all was lost. The laughter escaped in bursts.

“Happy birthday, Jeff.” She ran to the silly darling and wrapped him in a loving embrace. There was much to be said for a familiar male body. That hug came straight from the heart.

“Tom and Jane are still at my parents’ place,” Jeff said with a wicked glint in his eye. “So we can do whatever we want tonight.”

“Let’s go back to Joyce’s house!” Meredith exclaimed.

Laughing, Jeff picked her up and threw her over his shoulder like he used to back in High School. Despite her playful protest, he carried her down the stairs and through the neighborhood.

Earlier that day, Sheena had said something Meredith didn’t give much weight. She’d said something like, “There’s nothing sexier than watching your husband ramming another man.” True, Ash appeared exceptionally masculine when he was pounding away at Richard, but Jeff? After today’s trickery, it would be beyond sexy to see her husband taking Richard’s big cock up his ass. Meredith giggled at the thought.

“What’s so funny?” Jeff asked, setting her down at the entrance to Granite Park.

Meredith just smiled a mysterious smile, offered a little shrug, and turned on her heels. With her blue cotton skirt flapping in the breeze, she was off like a shot along the tree-lined path.

“I know what I want for my birthday…” she called out, her mischievous man in hot pursuit.

The End