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At the sound of Emma opening the bedroom door, Jericho sat up on the couch and tossed the book in his hands to the pile of other books scattered over the coffee table. "So, you've been up to some dirty tricks of your own, I see." He gestured to the mountain of erotic romance novels laid out before him.
"What are you on about?" She frowned and shook her head as she continued walking toward the bathroom.
He grabbed a book and started reading out loud. "Annamica threw caution to the wind and mounted the massive onyx cock she'd been longing for. She'd never felt so hot or out of control with lust as she rode the stiffest dick she'd ever had in her life."
Emma stared, wide eyed, first at him, then at the books.
"Is this guy anyone I know? Or the woman, the sultry vixen on the prowl?" Jericho leaned down and picked up another book, this time reading in a dark whispery tone. "She wrapped her legs around his waist panting and moaning and whining in pleasure, biting down on his muscled shoulder, her hands in all his gorgeous red hair. And when he growled that Scotsman's burh in her ear, she erupted into a mindless orgasm, coming so hard on his throbbing, pulsing dick, her juices flooded through his fiery nether hair."
Emma crossed her arms and looked at Jericho with a bored expression. "I'm surprised you can even read all of those big words."
He scowled and tossed the book on the table. "What the fuck, Emma?"
She nodded to the pile. "Where did you get them all? Some of those are out of print now."
He picked up a hard cover book and stood. "The guys on my platoon were only too happy to give me the copies they confiscated from their wives. I just got around to reading them last night." He flipped the glossy edition over and over, the 3D hologram of the hero's penis appearing to swing with the movement. "Seems you've been busy writing about our sex life for the whole world to read."
Emma snorted. "Don't flatter yourself. You could never be any of those men." She smirked at the book in his hand.
"Really?" He flipped open the cover to a dog-eared page. "Not even as the geeky cop husband with the q-tip size dick that has no idea how to a please his own hand, let alone his stacked, sultry wife?"
Emma chuckled. "Well, maybe him."
Jericho slammed the cover shut. "You're very pleased with yourself, aren't you?"
She twisted her mouth. "Not gonna lie. That was some of my best work."
He clenched his jaw so tight a muscle twitched. "Were you writing from experience?"
She furrowed her brows and crossed her arms. "Whatever do you mean?"
"I mean," he bit out and stepped forward. "Have you been out revenge fucking every man with a dick to get back at me?"
Her brows shot up. "Again with the self-flattery. Your ego knows no bounds."
He dropped the hard cover onto the table, the impact shaking the floor between them. "You have fucking humiliated me in front of my whole department!"
"Oh, I don't know," Emma looked upward in thought. "I wouldn't say the whole department. I'm sure not everyone over there reads erotic romance."
He ground his jaw and inhaled. "How long have you been doing this? There are hundreds of reviews listed up one side of the internet and back down the other—"
"Really?" Her face broke out in a genuine smile. "Hundreds?"
"Like you didn't know." He picked up his phone and scrolled through pages and pages of comments, finally settling on one. "Annamica Jayne is one hot writer. Her husband is a very lucky man. No, he's a clueless punk bitch. She's probably been steppin' out on his ass for a long time."
"Oh my God, does it really say that?" Emma held out her hand for the phone.
"You know it does. You gave the comment a big thumbs up."
"Oh." She withdrew, trying to hide a smile. "Ya, sorry 'bout that."
He flinched. Those were the exact words he'd used when apologizing for the trash talk that happened after the sex video of himself and his informant was leaked. He tried to but couldn't stop the verbal harassment and locker room banter that spread through his department like wild fire. "You are so not sorry." He pushed aside the table between them. "I cannot believe you've done this. Seriously. What the hell? Is nothing sacred to you?"
"Me?" she scowled up at him when he glared down at her. "All I did was write few books."
"You put our sex life out there for the whole planet to see."
She rolled her eyes. "Please. Nobody knows who wrote those books. Annamica is my writing name and it can't be connected to me, or you for that matter. You're just being paranoid." Again, she used his own words from when he was trying to cover up what happened that night in the biker club.
Snakehole had become violently suspicious of his cover and was doing everything possible to force his exposure. One of the hookers that frequented the club house was Jericho's prime informant. So, when Snakehole ordered them to bang in front of everyone, he couldn't get out of it without exposing himself and her. The woman had a kid and had only turned informant because he'd promised to get her out of the club for good. The whole thing didn't even last a minute, sixty seconds, but it was long enough to save her life and ruin his.
Jericho inhaled slowly, but there was no stamping down the bitter 'shoe on the other foot' feeling rocking his insides. He wanted to fucking throw something. "Here I thought what happened in our bedroom stayed there, something private and just between us."
She steadfastly kept her mouth closed.
"It doesn't bother you that you've announced to the entire planet how you like it, how I gave it to you, how—fuck." He drove a hand through his hair. "You just put it all out there. Everything special I thought was just for me. I feel so fucking betrayed."
Emma's mouth fell open. "You feel betrayed?"
"Ya, I do." He turned and headed for the front door. "I can't even look at you." He reached for the doorknob and something hard crashed into the back of his head. "What the fuck!?" He grabbed his hair and turned around. The book Emma hurled at him bounced onto the floor. "Crazy bitch!"
"You think that's crazy?" She picked up another one and fired it across the room before he could duck. The edge hit him square in the forehead, forcing his head to snap back. "I'll show you crazy, you hypocritical asshole!" She bent for another hard back. "You feel betrayed?" She wielded the book high as he bore down on her. "You were caught on camera with another woman using your dick for her snatch's pole dance!"
He grabbed her wrists, book and all before he jerked her into his body. "How many times, How many times have you fucked him, that asshole lawyer and don't lie to me?"
She pursed her lips and grinned.
He leaned right down into her face. "You don't think I'd recognize that fucking asshole in those books? The blonde gentleman who learned how to please her with his tender hands and artful fingers? The fucking fuck." He wrapped his arms around her and lifted her off the floor.
"Jericho, put me down. Put me down right now!"
"I don't care how many times you've fucked that prick." He stormed across the room, ignoring the sharp kicks she deftly delivered to his shins. "But, I'm going to make sure you never spread your legs for him again." He kicked open the bathroom door and dumped her in the shower. Before she could react, he turned on the cold-water jets, full blast. "Cool down your hots for that jerk off." He pushed the glass door closed so hard he was surprised it didn't shatter. "Put him on notice. Next time I see him, I'm putting two in his limp dick."
Jericho left the bathroom and then the house with his insides shaking with an uncontrollable jealous rage.
***
EMMA TURNED THE WATER temperature from cold to warm then peeled off her pyjamas. She reached for the soap and lathered a huge pile into her hands before she smoothed it over her body. She repeated the process with the sweet-smelling shampoo and conditioner before she leaned out and grabbed a washcloth and wide-tooth comb. She combed the conditioner through her hair, then used the razor and face scrub and finished off with an all over body slough and moisturizer. After she rinsed, she stepped out and dried herself before she wrapped herself in a towel and applied thick body cream everywhere. After, she re-wrapped the towel around her and exited the bathroom.
Jericho turned from the window. "Jesus, I thought I was going to have to send in a search party after you."
Emma looked at him from head to toe, snorted and walked into the bedroom. She barely let go of the door handle when he knocked on the wood.
"Emma?" Jericho cleared his throat. "I want to apologize for—"
She dropped the towel and opened the door and stared at him with a lifted eyebrow.
When his eyes traveled down her naked body, she put her finger beneath his chin forcing him to look back at her eyes. She held his gaze and tapped his jaw like he was a troublesome toddler before she stepped back and closed the door and twisted the lock into place.
"I'm sorry I got your hair wet." The next morning at breakfast, Jericho may as well have been alone in the house for all Emma paid him any mind. She effectively ignored him all evening and froze out every overture he made toward her.
"You can't ignore me forever," he pointed from across the room. "We're in this together, you and me."
Emma didn't look up from reading one of her books.
"And you're going to tell me how many times you've betrayed me with other men."
Emma lifted the side of her mouth.
"It's not funny, Emmaline. You're acting like I'm the asshole when someone else has been fucking my wife."
She shook her head.
"How much of all that," he nodded to the table of books, "is true? Have you been screwing around on me that much?"
She rolled her eyes and returned to the bedroom.
"I'm going to find out, Emma. You may as well be the one to tell me."
She snapped the lock with a distinct click.
Jericho tried, for the entire next day, to use every interrogation method and tactic he could think of on her.
In his defence, reading about her lude sexual adventures, real or imagined had set fire to his insides. He could never unsee the scenes and pictures she vividly painted of herself fiercely enjoying the attention of so many other men; in restaurants, luxury cars and posh hotel rooms, to dirty men's rooms, office lounges and his bloody precinct—on top of what she accurately described as his desk, right down to his favourite pen and good luck pet rock he had since he was eight years old.
No man should have to endure that. He had made a mistake. One genuine mistake that had saved a life. She, on the other hand, had been repeatedly banging other men, on purpose to punish him for one necessary act of transgression.
How the hell did this get so out of control?
He looked at her, standing at the sink as innocent as fuck in a breezy little dress, washing dishes like she didn't have a care in the world.
Fuck it. He stalked toward her. He knew this woman. She was his wife. He hadn't worked his ass off for an entire year stalling, delaying and otherwise sabotaging this divorce she was so hell bent on getting, to let himself get distracted now.
He may have been looking the wrong way all this time—he scowled at the pile of books on the table—but he had a plan and a goal and the discipline to see it through.
***