Dishonor Thy Wife

by Belinda Austin

  Tears cloud my eyes and my heart squeezes in my chest like a sponge. Why is he asking for forgiveness after all this time?

  It seems he can read my mind and he shoves a foot out to prevent the elevator from closing. “I could have died and gone to my grave with you on my conscience.”

  Oh, is that all. He feels guilty.

  The walk to the parking lot never seemed so long.

  Chapter 84

  JAYDEN

  “This isn’t the way to your house,” I said in a grumpy voice. My foot was throbbing. I escaped from the hospital since the doctor really did not release me. I checked the x-rays and brain scan and there was nothing wrong with me that a good wrap around my ankle would not help along with a few aspirin. Yeah, I am one of those idiot doctors who believes in self-cure.

  “You just took the Sixth Street exit, Ronni.”

  “Well you said you’re okay.”

  “I am.”

  “Can I interest you in a game of pool then, Dr. Tremblay? I win, I get what I want.”

  “And what do I get, princess?”

  “You win, you get whatever you want, Jayden. It is a blind game. After the game, then we'll name the win.”

  She pulled into a parking place and shoved her hand out so we could shake on it. “Promise you'll give me whatever I want if I win?” She refused to let go of my hand until I answered.

  I gave her a guarded look, hiding my panic, and said, “Yes.”

  “Good. Let's go play some pool then. You, uh, sure you’re feeling up to it?”

  Now she asks if I am feeling strong enough to play pool. I did not confess that I was extremely weak, but only where Ronni was concerned, which is why I agreed to play. She wore a short skirt and I imagined her leaning across the pool table, her skirt riding her butt and some panty showing. I swallowed. Yeah, I am feeling really, really up to it.

  She was sneaky. I had paid no attention to where she parked, and the car ended up at Lovejoys again. “Can’t we go somewhere else? I lost to you before here. There is such a thing as bad karma and you’re not playing fair,” I said like a sulky child. “Besides, their felt is green.”

  She laughed. “Your face is green. By the way, I almost forgot. Traci told me to give you this.”

  Ronni shocked the hell out of me. She leaned across the seat and kissed my cheek. She really was playing unfair, getting me all wound up with her lips when I needed to be calm to play pool. She was setting me up. The odds were she would win. Blind bet indeed, she would order me to move back to Canada and never see Traci again.

  She held her hand out. “I’ll give you one more chance to decide since you accuse me of being unfair. Do you agree to play pool with me at Lovejoys on a blind win?”

  I looked at her extended hand and licked my lips. This was it, the chance for Ronni to get me out of her life for good. She would kick my ass in pool. There was no way I could beat a pool shark like her. She could overturn the lawsuit with a bet. Nevertheless, stupid me held out my hand and shook hers. I was too macho to back out now. “Agreed,” I said too speedily before I changed my mind and showed my yellow backside.

  “Come on then,” she said.

  She walked fast, probably to tire me into losing. The woman had no mercy for an injured man. I limped after her, cussing myself out for not demanding a handicap, like the first seven balls. The bandage on my head should have earned me a handicap for the eight ball. Face it; I had no balls where she was concerned.

  Oh, yeah, she played the nurse all right once we were inside. She tried to drown my brain in alcohol to make me drunk so I would lose. Sweat poured from my forehead and Ronni dabbed my head with a napkin soaked in whiskey, probably thinking my sweat was because of the accident. Yeah, my old buddy Whiskey, soak into my brain and numb me.

  I had hoped to bleed my heroic actions for all it was worth but I was the biggest fool in the world, gambling everything on one game of pool with a hustler.

  “Should you be drinking? Aren’t you on drugs?” she said while pouring another shot of whiskey down my throat with a devilish gleam in her eye.

  “After this game I will get stinking drunk,” I mumbled and then ordered the bartender to, “Hit me with another whiskey.”

  “I'll break,” I snapped at her and aimed dead center for the balls. My face paled because only one ball went into a pocket. I squinted. My eyes were blurry from hospital drugs, whiskey, pain, or all of the above.

  I cursed myself for missing the next ball. Pride filled my chest because I stopped myself from picking up the ball with my hand and making a basket in the pocket, sort of like a game of dwarf basketball.

  I cursed Ronni when she made four balls in a row before missing.

  I sobered, playing as if my life depended on this game, which it did. Her short skirt distracted me. “Pool shark wore it on purpose,” I mumbled.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  I really tried not to gape at Ronni when it was her turn to shoot, but her butt drew my eyes like ants to a picnic, the way she leaned over the table. Her skirt rode up right below her rear end, giving me a panty flash. My head swam and my blood pounded, and I had a hell of a time concentrating on my next shot.

  Damn her! What a cheater. She wore red flashing underwear on purpose just so I would lose. She was using my own nature against me with this...this sick attraction I had for her.

  As usual, Ronni played like Minnesota Fats from that movie The Hustler.

  After just three rounds, I had six balls on the table and Ronni had only the eight ball left, and the eight ball was about an inch from the top corner, right pocket.

  I hung my head and groaned. You Idiot! This is it. May as well hang up your cue stick. Even Traci could make that shot. I'll be on my way back to Canada...I checked my watch...in about four minutes.

  I turned away from the pool table and went to hang up my pool stick, feeling sick to my stomach.

  Ronni actually had the nerve to say loudly for the entire bar to hear, “I just love a man who knows when he is beat.” She laughed. “Eight ball. Back corner. Left pocket.”

  My shoulders slumped in defeat. This last shot was it.

  I spun around. Wait a minute. Did she say back corner, left pocket instead of top corner, right pocket? Why would she risk losing and not take the easy shot?

  Because she wanted to show off, of course, and rub in how good she was.

  I watched with stunned eyes, Ronni purposefully shoot the eight ball straight into the top corner, right pocket, the pocket she should have called, the pocket that was so easy.

  “You must have accidentally made the wrong call,” I said.

  Ronni leaned on her pool stick and grinned. “I called the shot correctly. Well, Dr. Tremblay, I scratched on the eight ball which means I lose and you win.”

  She was smiling. Ronni was actually smiling at me.

  I must have been dreaming. Maybe I was still in a coma. I touched the pool table. It was made from real felt.

  Ronni lost on purpose. On purpose. Why would she lose? Unless...Unless...

  I locked eyes with Ronni. Say it! I urged her with my eyes to please, please say the words I long to hear. I begged her with my face. She already met me halfway by deliberately losing, or so I thought, so I hoped. Now I needed her to come to me, all the way. Ronni never said she forgave me. She had to be the one to make the first move.

  With long strides and eyes glittering like a woman who knew exactly what she wanted, Ronni walked up to me.

  I simply stared back at her and thought, Is she going to slap me again?

  Ronni stood on her toes and wrapped her arms around my neck.

  I simply blinked at her, hardly daring to breathe.

  “I want you, Jayden Tremblay,” she said in a gentle voice.

  My breathing was ragged.

  “I need you, Jayden Tremblay,” she said and touched her lips with mine.

  There was a pain in my chest as if my heart was exploding.

  Her
eyes sparkled. “You are impossible, Jayden Tremblay, but I can't stand the thought of being without you, a world without you, of never seeing your face again.”

  I rested my forehead against her forehead and rubbed my mind with hers because I could not believe this was happening. I had wanted too long and waited too long.

  “You're maddening, Jayden Tremblay, but I'm only complete when I'm with you. And even though you've put me through hell...”

  I started to open my mouth and she touched my lips with her finger. “Hush now, it's all okay. Love is still love by any other name and I realize now that what you did, you did out of love for Traci.”

  “For you, too, Ronni. All I have ever done was because of you.”

  She swallowed nervously. “I’m about to dive off a cliff here but I must confess that I do love you, Jayden, with all of my heart, all of my mind, and all of my soul. All I want is to be with you, to love you, to be swept away by you. Always. You win. I surrender. So what do you want for your blind win, Jayden?”

  She looked up at me expectantly, her face raw and vulnerable.

  I stroked her hair and whispered into her ear, “I want only you, Ronni. Always you, my Love, forever. From the very first, until the very last all I ever wanted, all I ever wished for is you. I want my face to be the last thing you see before you go to sleep at night and the first thing you see when you wake up in the morning. No one can guarantee future happiness but without you, my today, tomorrow, next week, next month, next year, is an endless time of nothingness. I only felt alive again when you found me in Canada.”

  I bent Ronni over my arm and kissed her.

  My identical twin and I, though separated at birth, lived similar lives. We were both doctors. We murdered and framed someone for our crimes. We both technically raped Ronni and in the end, we probably both married her. The statistics were correct; identical twins often marry a woman with the same name. The experts were just in the dark about how we sometimes reach that sameness. Whoever said that blood is thicker than water did not know Brad O’Boyle.

  Did you know when kissing Ronni that I actually lifted my leg and thumped my foot against the floor the way a dog does when his master pets him behind the ear?

  Yeah, everyone at Lovejoys clapped.

  Man, I love that place!

  Belinda Austin’s Memoirs & Other Books

  If you are curious about Belinda Austin, she has written some memoirs. (Click here to find out more)

  Belinda Austin writes Psychological Thrillers and Romantic Suspense. For other books by the author in these genres (click here).

  Belinda, also, writes YA Dystopian and Science Fiction under the pen name B. Austin (click here).

  She, also, writes Historical Fiction and Fantasy under the name Belinda Vasquez Garcia (click here).

  A Thank You from the Author

  “Thank you so much for purchasing Dishonor Thy Wife. Readers like you are awesome and motivate me to write the most riveting stories my imagination can conjure.

  If you enjoyed this book, please consider leaving a review at Amazon or some other favorite online retailer and/or Goodreads to help others discover it.”

  Best wishes,

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