Lucy shook her head. “She told me it was too soon for that. She’s not ready to go all the way, not tonight.”
“And if she goes into his bedroom, she might be tempted,” he nodded. “She’ll want to take things slowly, knowing Maddie. Cautiously. On their first date, they were kissing in doorways, she said. Couldn’t get their hands off each other. But no more than that. So maybe something more will happen when he takes her home this time.”
“You won’t get to see her if it’s in a taxi.”
“The concert’s at the Met—so maybe they’ll feel like a late-night stroll through Central Park after the symphony’s over—how late does it stay open?”
Lucy fumbled with her smartphone a moment or two. “One.”
“You think we might see something if we’re lucky?”
Lucy smiled knowingly, and Hugo couldn’t help but think he was being set up for something. He said quietly: “You’re going to turn me into her own personal stalker.”
“I’m not sure it’ll be that bad. Besides, I’m not sure you’re allowed to call them stalkers any more. Obsessive American, I believe is the acceptable label,” Lucy grinned. “And you’re her beloved husband, you’re allowed to be obsessive.”
*
The taxi took them up 10th Avenue and then Amsterdam, and promptly snarled up in traffic when it came time to thread through the narrow W81 St over to the transverse across Central Park.
Halfway through the park, Hugo was quietly suggesting they bale out and proceed the final part of the way on foot.
“We have time,” Lucy insisted, and Hugo gave her a sharp glance that questioned whether she knew more than she was saying about Madeleine and her plans for the evening.
“The music’s only 45 minutes long.”
Lucy shook her head, “The program’s ninety minutes—they’re doing a few other numbers as well.”
Hugo nodded. “God, it’s so random. There’s no way we’ll find them at a place as huge as the Met.”
The taxi dropped them off on the corner of 5th, so they could walk the short distance up the avenue to the museum. Hugo felt himself shivering a little, though it actually wasn’t too cold considering the time of year.
“Do you feel bad—that you’re allowing her the freedom to see other guys, but you don’t get to date other women?” Lucy asked him, almost as though she was trying to keep his mind occupied, distracted from the nervous tension running through him.
“Actually, not at all,” he said. “It seems weird, doesn’t it? Ten years ago, my biggest fantasy was having sex with more than one woman. Now, though, I’m just in a different place.”
“Wait, you don’t fantasize about having sex with two women at once any more?”
He shrugged. “Not really. I’m more likely to imagine that Madeleine is one of the women, and the guy is some stranger—but I get to watch.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah, it’s not for everyone.”
“Have you guys ever talked about any limits on what she does?”
“She knows my biggest fear is that she’ll fall for someone else. But I really don’t want to restrict her—it has to be her choice in this.”
“Seriously. I have got to get me a husband like you.”
As they came to the museum’s iconic façade, Hugo’s heart was beating double-quick time again, his breathing becoming shallow in anticipation of what they might see. Would they notice a lone couple exiting the building, descending the broad stone stairs down to street level?
Lucy indicated that they should sit on the top step, on the south side, where they could pose as a couple of tourists or young lovers sitting to appreciate the architecture, casting an eye behind them in case their targets emerged.
“How are we supposed to do this?” he said. “I mean, neither of us are exactly trained in surveillance techniques. They could probably walk right by us and we’d never know.”
Lucy said, “We just have to pay attention.”
There were a few other people milling around on the steps, some in smart clothing, perhaps as concertgoers.
“And if they come right this way?” he asked. “Where are we supposed to hide?”
“You’ll just have to kiss me, pretend we’re a couple of love birds.”
“I’m not sure Madeleine would be too happy about that.”
Lucy laughed. “Relax. She’s kissed me enough times, what matter is it if you did too?”
Hugo coughed, tried not to choke. “Uh… say that one again.”
Lucy rolled her eyes. “Why do guys always obsess about that kind of thing?”
“She used to practice kissing with you?”
“It’s what college girls do—well, the non-slutty ones, anyway. Practice on their friends.”
Lucy suddenly looked behind her, peering over her shoulder toward the museum entrance. A few people were coming out, now, wearing suits and tuxedos. The audience from the concert? Was Madeleine on her way out with her date?
None of them were Madeleine and Connor.
“Maybe they’re still inside,” Hugo said in a loud whisper. “They could have found a quiet gallery somewhere to make out.”
Lucy shook her head. “No,” she said, again making him feel certain she knew more about this situation than she’d let on. “She wouldn’t do it like that.”
A few moments, and the trickle of well-dressed people became a flurry, and it was quite clear the concert was over. Hugo was suddenly aware that there were so many people now coming out of the building that it was impossible to assess all their faces—Madeleine and her date could have easily blended in with the crowd, and they’d never know they had come out.
“I can’t see properly,” Lucy whispered. “Let’s stand up. We’ll have to get familiar if we want to keep our cover.”
Hugo stood up, the question “what?” imprinted in his open mouth before she grabbed him and pulled him in for an embrace. They didn’t actually kiss, but Lucy wedged her face against his, pressing cheek-to-cheek, so that he could feel her soft skin, breathe in her Chanel No.5. To anyone behind them, it would probably look as though they were in a full-on PDA.
Hugo felt her pressing her hips to him, and realized she would be able to feel his semi-hard cock pressing against her.
“Hey,” he said, pulling his hips away from hers. “Careful.”
Lucy grinned, her dark eyes full of mischievous mirth. “Who knew you were so gifted?” she said. “It’s a wonder Maddie feels the need for alternatives.”
“Okay, okay.”
“Although,” she added, “If you were mine and I knew the thought of me being with another man made you that hard, I’d want to do it too. Who are we kidding, I’d probably want to do it anyway, just because you’d let me.”
“Shh! You want to blow our cover?”
It took a while, and it seemed to Hugo that Lucy was as nervous as he was in watching the various people coming out of there. Where were they? It would be such a disappointment if they did hang back, make use of an empty theater to misbehave.
Then, suddenly, there they were.
Twelve
Hugo felt a strange dizzying energy sweep through his system on seeing them.
Madeleine looked simply dazzling in a stylish crimson dress that clung to her curves and fell mid-thigh, which perhaps wasn’t quite as short as some of the skirts she’d worn to work that summer, but seemed a touch scandalous for the classical music crowd. She was wearing a coat over the top, but left it open to reveal her dress, her legs looking divine clad in black nylon.
Somehow she seemed different than the Madeleine he knew so well—initially, he wasn’t sure if it was just the strangeness of seeing an unfamiliar man on her arm. After a moment or two, he realized it was her confident bearing as she stood there with him, waiting for him to retrieve and light a cigarette.
With her dark eyeliner, heavy mascara, and jarringly bright scarlet lipstick, she looked a little like a movie star from some bygone age, when the con
trast had to be exaggerated because everything was in black and white. Hugo recognized the look from some of the girls they sometimes saw hanging around in the college students’ apartment across the street. The thought prompted a little burst of zesty jealousy within him, along with a piquant hint of arousal: her make-up was designed to attract a younger man—Connor, not her husband.
That lipstick seemed to straddle the border between sleazy and ultra-sexy glamor. It made him think of how it might smear while her lips were gliding up and down her new boyfriend’s cock.
Connor himself looked dashing in a smart dark suit, his crimson shirt making him match Madeleine’s outfit as though they were dance partners. Hugo hadn’t really seen him except from a distance, and now felt quietly pleased that he was so well turned out. Worthy, perhaps, of Madeleine.
Lucy held Hugo tight, like a lover, standing on tiptoes as though her petite frame might hide him. He was confident neither Madeleine nor Connor would spot them.
He watched them pause, Connor saying something to Madeleine that made her smile, then look at him with adoring eyes.
Jesus. This man really was on course to take her, if he so wanted.
“Are you okay with this?” Lucy whispered as she continued to cling on to him.
He had lost his erection. It wasn’t that he wasn’t still blooming with quiet excitement, it was simply the shock of realizing what was going on.
“Yes,” he replied. “I think so.”
Lucy said, “You better know so. Very soon, you won’t get the option of stopping them.”
Hugo watched Connor offer his cigarette to Madeleine, who accepted it, drew a great long toke on it, startling her husband, since as far as he knew she’d been a non-smoker as long as he’d known her. She handed it back to him without any hint that it wasn’t some completely normal occurrence in her life. Then the two of them turned, and slowly walked toward Lucy and Hugo, who now regretted not shifting further over to the side of the steps.
Hugo felt panic rising in his chest—that paranoid part of him concerned that they would be seen, that Madeleine would be angry at having her privacy invaded, that she would wreak her revenge by going straight home with Connor, spending the night with him. He buried his face in Lucy’s neck, as though nuzzling her,
The other couple drifted by without noticing they were being watched. Hugo appreciated that had they been seen, Madeleine probably wouldn’t have been angry. Surprised, perhaps.
“I don’t want to stop them,” he whispered to Lucy, and with the initial shock of This Is Really Happening Now mellowing into his general feeling of aroused-jealous wonderment, he felt a warm tingle in his loins as the blood started flowing back into his manhood.
“Good,” Lucy whispered in his ear, doing a good job in pretending they were a couple unable to resist each other after an evening of performing arts.
“I feel bad we’ve never really done anything like this together,” he said. “You know—dressing up, seeing some culture.”
“You’ve been settling in, there’s plenty of time for all that,” Lucy said.
“We rarely did anything in Boston, either. It makes me feel I’ve neglected her.”
“You were her caregiver. That was the complete opposite of neglect. Connor just comes from a different world—and remember, he has to win Madeleine over, he has to impress her.”
Lucy gave him a little reassuring squeeze. He wondered in that moment why she’d had such trouble finding the right guy. She deserved someone worthwhile.
He said, “You think we could really follow them, and they wouldn’t know we were doing it?”
“We can try,” she said, tentatively turning to cast an eye behind her, to see whether they were safe to follow.
They followed about twenty paces behind their prey, Lucy clinging to Hugo’s arm, both of them completely tense, poised to turn and perhaps pull each other in for another fake kiss in the event that Connor or Madeleine suddenly turned.
They didn’t turn. Arm in arm, they seemed completely absorbed in each other—stoking Hugo’s jealousy as they chatted and laughed flirtatiously. They strolled slowly down 5th before turning into the park, as their followers had predicted.
It was already dark, of course, though there was street lighting along the path they were following. There was plenty of scope for them to go off piste, though, and disappear from sight.
Lucy held Hugo back a little, since the absence of others entering the park this time of night made their presence that much more noticeable. They hung back, held hands like a loving couple, constantly vigilant for signs that their prey might turn and see them. But Madeleine and Connor were too absorbed in each other to be concerned about others.
Descending through the trees to the lake, then skirting around the lake a little to ensure distance from the main trail, Madeleine and Connor paused by the waterside, gazing at the view of the city over the park.
Hugo watched with bated breath as Madeleine tugged on Connor’s hand, and the two of them came together, arms encircling each other, lips closing in on lips.
Hugo gasped, almost giving them away, though the dark bushes leant them suitable concealment.
Somehow, whether helped by the lights of the city, reflected off the still surface of the lake, or the fact their eyes had gotten used to the darkness, Hugo found he could see Madeleine and her new lover fairly well.
She was smiling as she kissed him, and when they finally broke apart, there was clear affection in her expression—clear feelings for Connor. Madeleine hadn’t been open about how much she’d seen this guy so far—well, as far as Hugo was supposed to know, she was on a date with some character called Will tonight. But he wasn’t expecting this level of a connection between them. It cut Hugo to the bone, but he knew he had to choose to take it as simple lust and appreciation for the guy, not love.
He wanted her to be with a guy who was worthy enough, who made her melt inside, that was a good thing. But he had to tell his primordial instincts that it was okay, this man wasn’t going to steal his wife. It wasn’t easy to just switch off those innate hormone-driven feelings.
Connor stroked her cheek, and leaned forward to kiss her tenderly again.
Hugo felt himself tremble as his wife placed her hand gently on the side of Connor’s neck as they continued to kiss, her eyes closing as she sucked on his lips, inhaled his fragrance. A kiss could be worse than anything when a husband allowed his wife to be with another. Sex might be personal, but it could be seen as purely a physical thing—two people rubbing themselves together to satisfy an urge. Kissing involved staring into each others’ eyes, soft caresses of the cheeks, affectionate romance between the participants—it was more intimate than you gave it credit.
It didn’t help that the scene in which they found themselves was wonderfully romantic.
Hugo found himself drifting into some strange kind of dream state as Madeleine continued to lock lips with this comparative stranger, looking so blissed out by the experience that it made Hugo feel as though he was on cloud nine himself. He almost failed to notice her break off from Connor now, then whisper something in his ear.
A smile crept across Connor’s face, as he gave her a slight nod.
Madeleine sank slowly to her knees in front of him. Hugo felt a sudden queasy sensation in his stomach. He looked at Lucy, and she was giving him a pointed stare, eyebrows raised, face silently fixed in the kind of expression that clearly told him—this is your last chance. Speak now or forever hold your peace.
Lucy held out her smartphone to him—indicating that he could call Madeleine, right now, and she would stop. They wouldn’t need some shouted confrontation in the middle of the park.
Hugo took a deep breath and shook his head. He might be feeling dizzy above the neck, but below the waist he was hard as granite. Madeleine looked absolutely gorgeous, the angel corrupted, and the glimpse of her face that Hugo had seen just before she sank was worth any hardship he could go through—she seemed so exhilarated.
In something of a daze, he saw his wife’s hands fumbling with the younger man’s belt. From here, they could see everything—disturbingly close.
Connor reached down, stroking Madeleine’s cheek as she unzipped his fly, and then dragged down his suit pants to reveal his impressive hardness. Even now, the guy didn’t seem concerned that this was a public park, that anyone could come along and see them.
Madeleine smiled up at him, that warmth of real affection still jabbing Hugo between the ribs, and she took another man’s erect cock in her hands.
The night air was suddenly pierced by a squawk from an emergency vehicle’s siren down Central Park West. Both couples there by the lake froze.
But the siren passed. After a sigh of relief, Madeleine was looking up at her new boyfriend, and they were laughing about it together.
They saw Madeleine looking about her, a last check to see they were alone.
Hugo stiffened as he saw Madeleine’s red, red lips curl upwards as she gazed into Connor’s eyes, offering him a last sexy smile.
Her focus was fell onto the sizable beast in front of her—exploring it, feasting her eyes on it as she coaxed it with her hands, slowly pumping him in preparation for her mouth.
With all the clamor in his ears and in his head as she edged her face close to it, Hugo almost missed the fact that Connor was completely bare. Not a single hair was visible other than on his head. It seemed almost as though he was a statue.
No wonder Madeleine had wanted to shave herself for him.
Hugo felt a jolt of shock tear through his chest as Madeleine ducked down, pushing her face against Connor’s body, nudging her cheek against his hardness as she kissed his abdomen just beside it. She brushed it with the silky blonde hair that strayed over her forehead and then slowly trailed her mouth and nose up from his sac all the way up his hard, straight cock, breathing in his scent, feeling the softness of his skin, the heat of his body.
Madeleine replaced her nose with the tip of her tongue as she caressed his twitching shaft, licking him, down, then upward, until the tip of his prick was at her lips, and she only needed a slight movement for him to be inside her.
Madeleine Strays: A Wife-Watching Romance Page 9