Just Too Easy

Just Too Easy

Gail McFarland

Copyright 2014 by Gail McFarland

Smashwords Edition

Other Titles by Gail McFarland:

CreateSpace Books:

Doing BIG Things (Loi Cramer Journals, Book 1)

Lie Down With Dogs (Loi Cramer Journals, Book 2)

Genesis Press/Indigo:

Dream Runner

Dream Keeper

Wayward Dreams

BET/Arabesque:

Summer Wind

The Best For Last

When Love Calls

Bouquet (Mother’s Day Anthology)

LULU Books:

All For Love

Lady Killer

Available Ebooks:

Doing BIG Things

Lie Down With Dogs

All For Love

Lady Killer

Once (or Twice) In A Lifetime

The Twentieth Century Fox

This Side of Forever

Heart of Justice

If Ever

Eye of The Beholder

What One Won’t Do

A Matter of Marriage

Gail McFarland

Just too

Easy

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

JUST TOO EASY Copyright © 2014 by Gail McFarland

All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be hired our or reproduced in any form without author permission.

For information, address: P.O. Box 56782, Atlanta, Georgia 30343.

Author website: www.http://the-fitwryter.wix.com/gail

"When your lover is a liar, you and he have a lot in common.

You’re both lying to you!"

~ Susan Forward, author

"Women might be able to fake orgasms,

but men can fake whole relationships."

~ Sharon Stone, actress

Acknowledgements

Writers are always blessed by readers. I consider myself doubly blessed: I have friends who are passionate and dedicated readers. I especially thank God for readers like Priscilla, Sandi, Yamina, Tandra, Susan, Ruth, Nancy, Veronica, and Melvin. Thanks for keeping me sane.

Angel and Jacee, I will forever love you both more than words can ever say, and I hope to always make you proud.

Just too

Easy

Chapter One

It’s not supposed to be this way...

My breathing tightened, then quickened beneath his weight, and I closed my eyes, wondering if I was really supposed to feel like this. His hands slid over my skin, knowing exactly where to go and what to do as he removed my silken gown – the one I’d chosen with him in mind. His fingers moved through mine, owning my hands, sliding them across the sheet and his breath was warm and moist, deceptively sweet against my cheek. He was speaking now, saying something soft and gentle, though I didn’t know the words. He was probably saying something he thought was sensual and loving, saying it with that intense look on his face, the one that was engraved on my heart. For the first time in a long time, I was glad I couldn’t hear the lies I knew he was murmuring into my skin.

Deaf since the age of ten, I wasn’t sure what I would have done if I could have heard his voice. Knowing that he would be away on business for the whole of next week, I already missed him, in spite of what I knew. Swallowing hard, pressing my lips together, my face turned from the probing heat of his kisses, I tried to ignore the betrayal of my body as he pushed deep and my arms and legs went around him out of habit.

Habit was a bitch; much too hard to fight.

The flat of his tongue lapped at my throat and my teeth caught the flesh of his shoulder. Not caring, he plunged deep, connecting with a part of me that no man who betrayed me the way he had should ever have been able to touch. I felt the wordless cry of base passion tear from my throat, felt his groans of satisfaction as my hips lifted and pumped hard to meet him. My hands clawed his hot sweat-slicked skin and pulled him closer. I should have pushed him away when I saw stark possession crowding his face as he strained above me, but I didn’t.

I should have pushed him away, but my body wanted what it wanted. My body, just like always, wanted Ben.

When we finally separated, I tugged the damp now-wrinkled sheet over my body and rolled onto my side. Habit had taught my husband that I would expect something more from him, so he draped his solid body over mine and I felt my name in the rumble of his breathing against my back. He repeated my name again, then said something else, but I dropped my eyes, pretended that I was falling asleep. If I had turned, looked into his face, I could have read his lips, but I didn’t want to know. Right then, I didn’t know if I would ever again trust the words that crossed Ben Marshall’s lips.

It wasn’t what he said to me; it was what he didn’t care enough to say. It was the lies he would use to try to keep me next to him; lies that would flay flesh from bone and shred my heart.

It’s not that I’m stupid or anything. I didn’t have to let him get away with it. I could have rolled over, faced him, told him what was on my mind. I could have told him what I found, but I would have had to find a way to trust him in order to do it. How do you trust a man you invested your love and more in, after you find a stash of letters written – really – written on thin sheets of pale pink paper and scented with Ralph Lauren’s Romance? And I knew the scent the very second I found the letters. It’s the same one he gave me for our anniversary three months ago.

Bastard didn’t even bother to come up with an original gift… That was just like Ben, using what he already knew would work. Part of me wondered whether she got hers first, or if I’d taken priority.

At his side, in our bed, I folded my lips against everything I was thinking and froze when he spooned my body with his. His face pressed my neck as he draped an arm possessively across my body and drifted into sleep. I kept my breathing even and my body still, but didn’t seem able to keep my mind from going back to the letters I’d found.

How stupid does he really think I am? I damned near choked on the words I couldn’t say. Lying, cheating, selfish… The list of things I wanted to accuse Ben of was long and mean, but I didn’t say a word. Instead, I stayed quiet and gave him ten minutes, then he did exactly what I knew he would do. He snored and that was good enough for me. I slipped out of his loose embrace and headed for my laptop. I needed to know more.

Carrying my computer into the bathroom, I locked the door behind myself and stood in the dark for a long time, trying not to cry. What was the use? Tina Turner might have asked, "What’s love got to do with it?" and I would have had to answer, not a damned thing. I’d already spent a couple of weary hours feeling sorry for myself and mourning the dead-ass wreck of my marriage, and I didn’t have a whole lot left.

Maybe from the outside, looking in, no one else would think that I was drifting along in a dead marriage, but what the hell else could I call it? I had already put in more than a year trying to get over the last time something like this had come between us. I showed up for the counseling and tried to cling to trust. I pretended that the calls Ben took when he thought I didn’t notice were no threat to what I hoped we had. I tried hard not to watch the clock when his emergency meetings lasted late into the night – over and over again. I did time on my knees with my hands clasped and my head bowed, trying to find a way to forgive him, and I thought that I’d succeeded – then I found the letters.

And how in the hell did he think I wasn’t going to find the letters? What was he thinking – borrowing my laptop computer, then leaving it sitting on top of the letters in his desk drawer? Yeah, he closed the drawer, but did he even care? Maybe he wanted me to find them…

I’d heard stories about people doing crazy stuff, trying to get caught, but what good would that really do? Ben didn’t want to get caught. He didn’t want to go through all of the embarrassment and cost of breaking our marriage apart, whether he loved me or not. So, why? Why put us through this again? It was like some kind of really bad joke: how many women did it take to make Ben Marshall happy? Answer: I don’t know. How many have you got?

In the bathroom, clutching my laptop in the dark, it took all I had not to tear up again. Then I made a decision: it wasn’t fair for me to be a victim, so no more tears for me. Feeling along the wall, I found the light switch and let the lights come up around me. The bathroom was beautiful, all Travertine marble and stainless steel, with big thick towels in shades of blue and green, scented soaps and lotions in cut crystal vials, and a deep tub big enough for two. Ben had the bathroom remodeled for me the last time he … There was no way I could even finish that thought. The bathroom was a promise that he would change for me, a promise that he truly loved me, that he would be faithful, and I believed it.

I believed it every bit as much as I’d believed him the first time he smiled at me and told me that I was going to be his wife. The memory almost made me smile, then I recalled his exact words. What he’d actually said was that I was good wife material, and when a man as tall and sleek and pretty as Ben Marshall says something like that, women usually listen. Unfortunately, they usually hear what they want to hear, not his actual words. I thought of those pink letters again. Sometimes when a man as pretty as my husband said things, women listened and then their clothes fell off.

Mine did and apparently so did the letter writer’s.

Setting the laptop on the vanity, I slid the letters out of my robe pocket and looked at them again. Signed only with the initial ‘A’, they were filled with words of silky limpid sweetness, clearly written by a woman in love, and it took a lot of strength for me not to tear them to bits. Instead, I folded them and set them on the counter next to my computer – I was going to put them back the way I’d found them, I didn’t really know why. What I did know was that my husband was making a fool out of two women, again.

Why, again? My dark brown eyes went to the mirror and I took stock of myself: a little taller than average, with skin the color of well-polished cherry wood, and cheekbones still sharp enough to cut glass even though I carried more weight than I wanted or needed to. My fingers plucked at the folds of my robe, smoothing it over the fullness of my bosom, and I had to blink fast to deny the tears that would have fallen, if I’d let them. But I wasn’t about to let tears fall: my looks and a few extra pounds weren’t what this was about.

Maybe if I … What? Worked a little harder? I was already cooking, cleaning, running a full-time home business, bending over backward to keep my family on track, and sexing up my husband like my name was Baby Bend-and-Flex. Hell, when I wasn’t being Wife and Helpmate to Ben, I was trying to fit in a pilates or yoga class, just to stay flexible. Just In Case I needed to be ready for whatever he wanted.

Running my fingers through my short thick bed-frazzled hair, judging the woman I saw in the mirror, it struck me harder. I wasn’t the problem; damn it, I wasn’t the one cheating. I wasn’t the one treating our marriage like a convenience. I wasn’t the one running around in the world giving away something that was precious and belonged only between the two of us. Before I found the letters, I was so sure that Bennie loved me, was faithful to me, that he’d found a way to mature and appreciate our marriage. I was so sure that this mess was forever over, and that it would never again come between us. Now, here it was again – live and in living color.

The evidence, printed on fine scented, pink stationary was right there in front of me. A sharp rush of acid shot through my belly and I could have slapped the piss out of her. Tramp had more nerve than the law should allow. With no more manners than an alley cat, she was just a disrespectful whore, coming into a marriage and trying to make somebody else’s husband her man… why couldn’t she just…

Gritting my teeth, I booted up the laptop; watched it flash and burp its features at me, then I signed on and stared at the screen while the connection was made. Anybody sneaking a peek at me or reading my mind right then might have had the same sudden thought I had. Why was I mad at her? I wasn’t married to her, I was married to him. He was the one who stood next to me in front of God and everybody. He was the one who promised to love honor and cherish me, not her.

But she’s not innocent… I had to stop and get a grip on my thoughts. I wasn’t in a forgiving mood but the truth was, no matter how bad she was, she wasn’t my husband. That son of a bitch was laying in the middle of the bed snoring after indulging himself in all that he felt entitled to. And just like he slept with me, he slept with her…

Without regard for consequences…

Mindful of my promise not to cry anymore, and determined not to let Crazy take complete charge of me, I tried to put him and his whore out of my mind when I placed my fingers on the keyboard and typed quickly. My breasts rose and fell with my rapid breathing as I tapped into Ben’s email account.

Not fully trusting myself, I traced a finger down the list of email senders – then I found her. Honeypot, that was her screen name, and I sort of hated her for all that the name implied. I probably could have wallowed in that hate, but I decided to pull on my Big Girl panties, because I was on a mission. I was going to find out about the woman who raided my marriage and tried to leave me on empty. More, I was going to find out why my husband chose to be a part of what he already knew had nearly destroyed me the last time.

My eyes stole away from the computer screen and up the wall to the corner-angled medicine chest. The last time, I took pills. I didn’t even know what kind they were, but I’d gotten them out of that medicine chest. I took more than a hundred of them and wound up in the Intensive Care unit on a Suicide Watch list. The recovery was painful and embarrassing, but the scary part was that I’d almost succeeded in killing myself.

I pulled my eyes back to the computer screen and remembered the big lesson I’d learned. Suicide was an awfully permanent solution to a temporary problem. But this time, like I said, I was wearing my Big Girl panties. I scrolled down and hit the earliest email for the week.

My lips were tight as I read, but then one line caught my eye: My heart hurts for your lost marriage – I would never want to hurt your wife.

Hurt me? Then why was she sleeping with my husband? Would she be with him next week when he was away from me? My lips turned down, I went to the next message.

I can’t believe she just told you that she didn’t care any more. Love is too precious and fragile to be tossed away like that.

My lips parted in surprise. Honeypot sounded more like a poet than a hoochie home wrecker. I moved through three or four more emails.

As much as I love the touch and feel of your body against mine, I need to know for sure that your wife is through. I can’t bear the thought of stealing from her…

Well, if this heifer thought … then I caught myself. I was sitting here blaming the wrong person. She wasn’t the one violating everything that the bonds of matrimony defined: it was him. She wasn’t my husband, he was and Ben was more than a liar. He was as seductive as a satyr, and he had lied, as much to her as to me.

Being with you is the only time that I am truly alive and I’m living for the time when it’s just the two of us…

Was she kidding? Ben wasn’t about to leave me for her or anybody else. This chick was dreaming… or was she counting on Ben telling her the truth? Ben, I realized, she was counting on Ben.

This was all so damned wrong.

Sitting there, staring at the computer, with the memory of her words echoing in my head, part of me was deeply and ineffably pissed. That part of me wanted to make him pay, make him feel as bad as I did. But another part of me was almost numb with the reality of it all, and didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of my anger. But I shouldn’t have to put up with his bullshit in the meantime, and I knew it as well as I knew my own name.

I stared at the computer for long minutes, then decided that I needed a plan. I needed to protect myself and my heart from a man who gave less than a damn about marriage and who was intent on stringing women along for as long as he could get away with it. He doesn’t deserve to get away with it, I reminded myself as I sat there in my bathroom copying Ben’s Sent emails and Honeypot’s responses to my personal email address. I didn’t know what I was going to do with them, but when I came up with an answer, I meant to have them handy.

Not sure, but knowing that I needed a plan if I didn’t want to wind up being Ben’s Token Wife, I shut the computer down. My brain was in high gear, ticking along with questions, seeking answers as I picked up the laptop and the letters, and shut off the bathroom lights. I need to call my doctor. Yes, that much I knew for sure. An AIDs test, a test for STDs – that was paramount. Ben had already taken my heart and shattered it; I wasn’t willing to give him my health or my life.

I padded barefooted back to my desk, tucked the laptop into its drawer, with the letters underneath, then went back to slip into bed with Ben. When I flipped the sheet back, his arms automatically opened for me, and he continued to snore as he closed himself around me. I couldn’t help staring at him as he lay sleeping in the moonlight swathing our bed.

Sleeping the sleep of the righteous.

Closing my eyes, determined not to be the only one enduring a sleepless night, I let my imagination range freely. Behind my closed eyes, I remembered that Honeypot’s real name was Angelique Loring, and she worked for the bank that held the mortgage on my husband’s business; I knew that because of the signature line at the bottom of her email messages. I’d never seen her, but I knew what she probably looked like. Ben had a type and that type looked like me – so maybe I would know her if I passed her in a crowd.

My eyes moved rapidly behind my lids, shifting with my thoughts. Maybe, I thought, I needed to get a look at the woman who seemed to have enough compassion to worry about a discarded wife, and was still willing to sleep with and comfort the man who told lies about walking away from that wife.

I squeezed my eyes together even more tightly. If Honeypot, er, Angelique was really so tenderhearted and empathetic, maybe I needed to let her know where she stood in the equation built around Ben and me, her, and our marriage.

Right, and she’ll just smile, thank me for the information, and walk away? Knowing that that would be just too easy, I kept my eyes screwed shut and continued thinking – as if I could stop.

Ben’s snoring changed tone slightly as he stirred and rolled to his back. I rolled to my stomach and turning my face to him, let my eyes open, just a crack. Studying his face, I wondered what it was about him that made him worth a fight. Yes, he was handsome, almost too good looking. Creamy, molten gold skin, bronzed by the sun he enjoyed on his long distance runs, covered his entire body. Sheets of muscle, naturally toned, meant that if he’d chosen to avoid gyms for his entire lifetime, he would have still been built like a classically carved statue. That classic carving extended to his face, with its thick black brows, strong nose, and full curved lips. It was hard to look into the depths of his nearly black eyes and not fall in love with what you saw.

Neither forgiving nor forgetting, I closed my eyes again. I knew why Angelique Loring had fallen for Ben. It was because he wanted her to. He used his God given gifts and just reeled her in. Knowing Ben as I did, I was pretty sure she never stood a chance. Rolling my face into my pillow, I couldn’t look at him anymore. I knew what it was to fall under Ben’s charms. For sure, from the moment I first looked into his face, my fate had been sealed.

The first time I’d succumbed to Ben’s magnetism, I was young, a junior at Gallaudet University. My boyfriend, a guy whose name I can’t even remember now, had just broken up with me, and I thought my life was over. Blindly running from him, I’d just run – right into the path of an oncoming car. I never heard screams or the screech of car tires, but I felt the strong hands of the man who pulled me to safety, and I shivered when I looked into the face of Ben Marshall.

Ben was a truck driver with high aspirations back then, and it was just my luck that he was alert enough to save me from myself. In his arms, pressed against his chest and watching the curve of his lips as he spoke, I was nearly hypnotized. The boy I’d run from was nothing like this man, and this man looked at me like I was a fragile and delicate flower, and he wanted me. He looked at me like I was the one thing he needed to make his life complete, and three months later, when I read the words on his lips, I believed him.

My mother and father shook their heads when they met him, told me that there was something ‘off’ about him, but it didn’t matter to me. My mother said something about him being good looking and no good, and I didn’t pay her a bit of attention. She might have done more to warn me, but the second Ben’s lips touched mine, I was his. Seduction was second nature to Ben, and I believed him so much that I left school and married him.

Now, nearly twenty-six years and two grown sons later, I wasn’t enough. Being married to me wasn’t enough. Looking me in the face and telling me what he thought I wanted to hear wasn’t enough, and I couldn’t even hear him. For a long minute, I was jealous. I’d never heard his voice, just felt it against my skin. If I wanted to know what he was saying, I had to read his lips when he spoke, or his hands when he signed for me. Now, he’d gone and given away the one thing we’d never shared, and he gave it to a woman outside of us.

Wondering if his voice was as beautiful as the rest of him, I tried not to be jealous and lost the fight, even if I was the woman with the ring and the house out in Woodmoor. Angelique Loring had heard his voice. Not that I was really feeling sorry for myself, after all, I’d lost my hearing as a child but I still spoke clearly. I raised two hearing children and operated my own small web development business. I was a whole person and didn’t need anyone’s pity, but she had a part of him that I could never possess, something that my husband had never shared with me.

I didn’t cry, but damn it, it wasn’t fair. Ben didn’t deserve to get away with betraying me and lying to this other woman. It wasn’t right that my faithless husband was manipulating two women, playing with us like we were puppets just made for his personal amusement. It wasn’t right that he cavalierly took so much from two women. It wasn’t fair that he got to put both of us at risk for who knew what kind of diseases, and to give us the ragged edges of his life… and what if there were other women, some that I didn’t know about?

Somebody ought to fix him.

A big breathy sigh escaped me and I turned my head just enough to be sure that Ben was still sleeping soundly, but I didn’t need to worry, he was sleeping like the dead. Yeah, the dead, but that was the first thing I crossed off my list. I had children; there was no way I could kill their father, but for just a moment, Lorena Bobbitt’s name floated through my head and an ugly chill danced along my spine.

I