Page 69 of The Wrong Husband

"I've been waiting for this to happen," Tech announced gleefully while Torture laughed hard, thumping his fist on the dining table. I now had one of those too with six chairs. Damian insisted and when I said I'd think about it, he told me to do that while the table lived in our place.

Our place! I liked the sound of that. I also like it when he said, "Let's go home" or "Do we have food at home" or "We need to get home before I fuck you in the car."

"You've been waiting for one of Moana's clients to walk through my door?" I crossed my arms and glared at Tech and Torture.

They didn't stop laughing.

"Cut it out." Moana punched Torture on his arm, which probably hurt her because T and T were jacked.

"Something smells good." Duncan took a seat next to Moana to her obvious chagrin.

"The paella is almost ready." I had gotten it right this time. The socarrat looked perfect. The burnt crust at the bottom of the paella pan required allowing the paella to cook undisturbed over high heat during the final moments of cooking, which caramelizes the rice at the bottom of the pan. I usually messed it up and Damian and I had ended up eating burnt (not caramelized) rice during my trial runs.

Damian helped me plate food for everyone while Torture opened a bottle of Chianti and filled wine glasses.

It wasn't Michelin-star, but it was the kind of meal I liked. Especially the easy company where I wasn't worried I'd be judged. So, okay, with Duncan here I had thought I'd feel restrained, but he'd just admitted to only sleeping with hookers, so I didn't worry about him giving me a hard time about losing my filter at all the wrong times. It looked like he didn't have much of a filter either.

"So, how many times did you two…ah…meet? Is that the right word?" I mused as we dug into what everyone declared was awesome paella.

Damian went as far as saying it was better than what he had in Spain. That probably wasn't true, but my husband was being sweet.

"Fuck is the right word," Duncan replied without inflection. "Or do you prefer meet, Moana?"

"Fuck is the right word," Moana agreed. "We only did it that one time…right?"

"I think so. I asked for you another time, but you weren't available."

They were talking like this was a normal conversation.

"Why do you only sleep with hookers?" Tech wanted to know. He was a six-foot five black man who was a complete teddy bear. His husband Torture, was a six-foot five Latino man who had the sense of humor of a teenager. If you said penis in front of him, he giggled. They were nothing like I thought military men with big tats and bigger arms would be like.

"I don't like the word hooker," Moana interjected.

"What would you prefer?" Damian asked.

"Sex worker."

"Ex-sex-worker." I raised my glass in a toast. "Let's all congratulate Moana for passing the bar and getting a kick ass job with Davenport & Lyle, only the biggest corporate law firm this side of the Mississippi."

We all cheered.

Duncan explained he preferred the transactional nature of relationships with escorts. There was more to the story, but he wasn't the kind of guy who spilled his guts after good paella and decent Chianti.

"I have flan for dessert," I whispered to Damian.

He kissed the side of my head. "My favorite."

I didn't miss the look of speculation Duncan threw our way. Damian was affectionate, as was I. But we didn't spend a lot of time with other people, so it was how we were in private. Moana, Tech, and Torture had already seen us together for a few months and had gotten used to us. I wondered what Duncan thought, considering I knew the Archer family disapproved of me. Damian had stopped going to the Sunday lunches and even though he said it was because he didn't want to, I guessed it was because his mother didn't want me there.

Marcela had sent me an email after I resigned, telling me how disappointed she was in me. She had given me a job and I hadn't had the decency to talk to her before I resigned. I didn't reply to the email and pretended I never got it. I didn't think she deserved a response, considering how she made a concerted effort to ignore me while I worked there. I didn't tell Damian about it either. I didn't want to cause a rift in his family—but I had a feeling I already had. When Damian told me Duncan would join us for dinner, I was thrilled. I didn't want him to lose his family as I had mine.

I knew my parents had not forgiven me. My father had come to the museum once and given me a dressing down for being jealous of Bianca and creating a scandal. They all behaved like I got married to Damian all on my own, like he wasn't responsible at all.

Ours was a strange marriage. We lived together. Made love. Spent a lot of time with one another; but there was a sense of temporariness to it all because we knew that this would end soon.

I didn't want it to.

In the past few months, I had fallen in love with Damian, and I hoped he had gotten past affection to more than that for me as well. The attraction between us—the chemistry—was off the charts unbelievable. I didn't even know I could feel this way about a man. It was all consuming and yet the most freeing thing in the world.