The Escort Next Door
Read The Escort Next Door Online
Authors: Clara James
The Escort Next Door
by
Clara James
Copyright © 2013 by
Clara James
This is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely
coincidental.
The Escort Next Door
All rights reserved.
This book is protected under the
copyright laws of the United States of America.
No part
of this work may be used, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording and faxing,
or by any information storage and retrieval system by anyone but the purchaser
for their own personal use.
This Book may not be reproduced in
any form without the express written permission of
Clara James
,
except in the case of a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages for the
sake of a review written for inclusions in a magazine, newspaper, or
journal—and these cases require written approval from
Clara
James
prior to publication. Any reproduction or
other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited without
the express written permission of the author.
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Time With Friends
P
aul and I had known Ben and Linda for a long
time, long enough to make me feel ‘old’. In fact, it was through us that the
pair met. Linda had been a close friend of mine when we were both part-time
clerks in an accountancy firm. She was working her way through college; I was
expecting my first child.
Ben on the other hand was a friend of Paul’s, they’d met in
the gym and often played basketball together. Ben and Linda were eventually
brought together when Paul and I threw a housewarming party. The rest as they
say, is history.
“Why don’t we do this more often?” Linda asked, as she
offered to refill my wine glass.
“No, thanks,” I politely declined. “I guess life just gets
in the way,” I added in response to her other question. Life really had gotten
in the way, it had been over eighteen months since we’d seen Ben and Linda and
in that time, we’d moved again; Paul’s father had retired and Paul had taken
over as CEO of the family business.
“I can imagine how busy you’ve been,” she chuckled.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Paul chimed in. He was
reaching for his own full glass and leaning causally back in his chair. His
scarlet tie had been pulled loose enough for him to undo the top button of his
shirt. The jacket of his charcoal suit had long since been removed and draped
across the back of the chair. I tried to remember the last time I’d seen him
that relaxed, but couldn’t. He smiled broadly, that grin that never failed to
light up the room. “You know, I thought life would be easier not harder once I
was the boss,” he added, the index finger of his free hand rubbing at his
temple.
Ben laughed loudly, looping his hand over the back of
Linda’s chair and gently caressing her upper arm with the tips of his fingers.
“I’m glad,” he managed to blurt. “If being the owner of a multimillion dollar
company is a walk in the park, then you’re going to make me vomit.”
Paul’s laugh was muted, but he did shrug good-naturedly at
Ben’s teasing. “You’re doing all right,” he added, a touch defensively.
Ben tossed his bright blue eyes to Linda and they shared a
silent smile. Eventually, he turned his attention back to my husband and
nodded. “We’re getting by. There are things I’d like to do, though,” he added,
his fingers stroking the stem of his wine glass. “I’d love to be able to treat
Linda more. You know, I mean you can just whisk Julia away whenever, wherever.
Money’s never an issue.”
“Yeah,” Paul acknowledged, “money isn’t the issue; it’s
time.” As he shifted his left leg, his knee brushed mine and, even after almost
fourteen years together, I felt a spark of electricity.
My face tipped towards his and I wondered if he felt it too.
However, there was nothing in his face or his eyes that gave it away. Instead,
he continued talking about how insanely busy he always is and the fact that he
spends half his time traveling. I was tempted to correct him to three quarters
of the time, but it seemed like a petty remark and I knew it would only anger
him.
“That must be tough,” Linda said sympathetically. “But you
guys are such a strong couple,” she added brightly. “I don’t know anyone else
who’s still happily married to their high school sweetheart.”
I smiled at her, before turning that grin on Paul. His eyes
however were drawn to his glass, which he quickly drained.
We’d been sixteen, both starting our junior year, when I
moved schools. At the time, I’d thought it was the worst thing that had ever
happened to me. I distinctly remember hating my parents that summer. But in my
very first class at my brand new school, I met Paul. I knew nothing about him,
had no idea about his family business or how wealthy his parents were. All I
knew was he was the most handsome guy I’d ever seen. Dark hair and deep brown
eyes, tall, athletic, with a warm smile. The more I learned, the more I liked.
He wasn’t just a pretty face or a mindless jock, he had a brain too.
I, on the other hand, had issues. I was a bit too thin, a
lot too flat-chested, ignored by the popular crowd and socially quite awkward.
I’d felt sure that Paul didn’t even know I existed. Little did I know that he
had, indeed, been taking an interest in me. It wasn’t until years later that he
confessed to sneaking peaks at me during rehearsals with the dance team.
Anyway, at the time, I was oblivious and so completely shocked when he asked me
out on a date.
Those years had been magical, I was so in love with this man
and giddy at the realization that he felt the same way. It was like every
single one of those teenage romances I’d seen in the movies.
“I think it’s wonderful,” Linda commented, pulling me from
my memories.
“Yeah,” I agreed, nodding. “It is wonderful.” Another glance
at Paul found him examining the desert menu. “I mean, I know it’s old
fashioned,” I added, “but I love that Paul is and always will be the only one.”
“Hmm,” he hummed in reply, his eyes still staring at the
menu.
Giving up on attempts to get his attention, my own face
dropped catching a glimpse of the cleavage that had been enlarged by three
pregnancies. In many ways, I was physically more attractive than I had been at
sixteen; my boyish figure now had some womanly curves, my breasts were
significantly bigger and I felt much more comfortable in my skin. Wasn’t that
supposed to exude confidence and make me glow? Perhaps the problem was, I
didn’t feel very confident. Although I liked what I saw in the mirror, Paul
always seemed to look right through me.
I’m not naïve enough to expect champagne and roses. I
realize that the realities of day-to-day life don’t lend themselves to the
romance of teenage fantasies. There were other more important things; business
trips to go on; a mortgage to pay; children to look after. I just wished that
didn’t mean my relationship with Paul had to come last on the list.
“Anyway,” I sighed, suddenly feeling uncomfortable with the
silence. “How are things at work?” I asked.
Linda nodded as she swallowed a mouthful of wine and
replaced her glass on the table. “It’s busy,” she replied. “I’ve got two new
clients and I’m trying to wrangle a good deal for them both.” After studying
literature at college, Linda had toyed with writing for a year or so.
Eventually, she’d decided that she wanted to try something different and became
a literary agent. A choice that turned out to be incredibly lucrative for her.
“I’m thinking of slowing down a bit, though,” she added.
“Really?” I asked, confused. I knew she loved her job and
also knew that she and Ben were saving to build their own beachfront property.
“Yeah,” she said, turning to her husband as if seeking
permission. Ben gave no obvious sign one way or the other, but Linda could
clearly read something in his eyes that I couldn’t, because she grinned before
gabbling, “We’re trying for a baby.”
“Oh,” I smiled. “That’s great.”
“We’ve been thinking about it a lot lately,” Ben offered,
with a broad grin of his own. “We see you two with your little family and we
just think...” he inhaled slowly, trying to find the right words. “Well, we
want that too,” he sighed.
I tried to smile, feeling instantly guilty for my rather
self-pitying thoughts. What Paul and I had was enviable. I was in an enviable
position, I had no business wishing things were different. “Well, I’m sure
you’ll make wonderful parents,” I said.
Noticing Paul move out of the corner of my eye, I turned my
face and watched him lift his glass, which now only had a small swill of red
wine in the bottom. “Enjoy all that sex while you can, man,” he joked, offering
the glass toward Ben.
Ben laughed heartily tapping his own glass to Paul’s.
“Thanks,” he chuckled.
Linda giggled too, her slender arm snaking around Ben’s neck
as she leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. “It’s exciting,” she blurted,
turning back to me and leaving a red lipstick print on her husband’s face.
I guessed she was expecting a reply, but with a false grin
plastered on my face, I couldn’t help but turn Paul’s remark over and over in
my mind. On the one hand, I wondered if I was being oversensitive. On the
other, I felt that he’d taken a very personal swipe at me in front of our
friends. Maybe, I silently suggested, his poor attempt at humor is nothing more
than a bit of bravado. After all, I’m not the one that seems to have lost an
interest in sex. He’s always shunning any kind of intimacy, because he’s ‘too
tired’, or he ‘has to get up early in the morning’ or ‘one of the children
might walk in’.
“It’s crazy to think that you were pregnant with Lizzie when
we first met,” Linda continued. “And she’s what now? Seven?”
“Eight in a couple of months,” I replied, automatically. I’d
been unaware of even processing what she’d said let alone formulating a reply.
“Ahh,” she cooed. “Next time we meet up, you’ll have to
bring the kids along, too.”
“Yeah,” Ben agreed. “It’s been far too long since we’ve seen
them. And I’m willing to bet that Dylan’s becoming quite the little football
player.”
Our son was four going on forty. Bright and precocious, he
had such an adult view of life. He takes after his father in many ways and had
already decided that he wanted to be a professional athlete. Which sport, he
was yet to decide. He told me that he needed to grow into his body to find out
what he’d be best suited to.
“That’s the difficult thing about being away for days and
sometimes weeks at a time,” Paul said, tossing the desert menu to one side and
joining the conversation fully. “Every time I come back, they’ve all grown so
much. Especially little Kate,” he adds, shaking his head in disbelief. “One
minute she was a baby, now she’s a toddler already.”
“They must miss you when you’re away,” Linda offered warmly.
“We all do,” I replied, turning my eyes on him and, for the
first time that night, receiving some recognition from him.
He flashed me a quick grin, and I momentarily saw the man
I’d fallen in love with. It’s those precious seconds that I treasured. Those
were the times when I knew that deep down he was still the same and, therefore,
on some level at least,
we
must be the same. He opened his mouth as if
he was about to say something, but the words were never spoken. Instead, he was
interrupted by the waitress, who asked whether anybody wanted desert.
Linda, Ben and Paul eagerly turned to her and ordered. I had
no appetite for it.