Unclad: Behind The Mystery Door

With a loud grunt, Jake came.

Breathing harshly, he fell to the bed beside her. Grace closed her eyes and grimaced as his semen trailed down between her thighs.

Jake exhaled with a loud puff. “Was it good for you?”

Grace’s eye popped open. How to answer that loaded question? 'Yes' was a lie. A lie she’d carried on her shoulders for years. The truth? Her husband did nothing for her.

Grace forced her facial muscles into the semblance of a smile. “Y-yes,” she croaked. “Yes,” she repeated more forcefully, “you were brilliant.”

Photo by @twiceuponatime

He was the only man she'd ever loved. The one who'd brought indescribable beauty to her life.

Jake turned his head to regard her with an inscrutable expression. Her heart jumped into her throat, her pulse pounded and Grace tried to meet his searching gaze with as blank an expression as she could muster.

She had overdone it.

She reached out to caress the rounded muscles of his shoulder. “I’m fine, really.”

Jake turned away, his silence a weight upon her chest, pressing down and leaving her breathless.
Her husband of three years rose. Tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth; Grace stared at the rigid lines of his back. With a smooth, graceful glide of muscle over bone, he twisted his head this way and that.

He turned towards her. The corner of his lips curled upwards, and his eyes darkened. “Well,” he drawled, “since my wife’s satisfied, I need to get to the office.”

Thirty minutes later, Grace listened to the sound of his car pulling out from their drive. Her phone on the nightstand beeped with an incoming message. She arranged the covers over her nakedness and reached for the phone.

Unidentified Number: The Renaissance Hotel Room 6. My darling, I will be waiting.

Her chest tightened, and her eyes stung. Grace stared at the message for a full minute and tears fell down her cheeks. She closed her eyes in despair.

What sort of a woman was she?

A woman about to cheat on her husband minutes after making love to him and lying through her teeth to his face.
For months, she’d struggled with the decision to end her marriage to the man of her dreams, her husband, her confidant, her lover. He was everything she’d always wanted. And if she were to choose again, she would pick him.

Only him.

But she had to do this wrong thing to remain true to herself. Grace couldn’t recall the last time Jake brought her satisfaction in bed. She’d tried. He’d tried.

She had to know if she was still capable of responding to a man’s touch. She had to know she was still human, not an unfeeling, empty shell.

Grace straightened her shoulders, gritted her teeth and pulled up the message to reply.

Grace: I’m on my way.

Dressed and ready to go, Grace stopped before her full-length mirror. She stared at her reflection and closed her eyes in shame. A cheat and a liar, that was what she was.

A sob burst from her throat, choking the breath out of her. She didn’t deserve Jake, she never had.
But she must leave to live. Grace had to know she wasn’t just an empty shell.

Grace exhaled and opened her eyes. She forced herself to take a hard look at the pale, guilt-ridden woman in the mirror. Her phone beeped an incoming message.

Grace grimaced. She was late.

With one last guilty look at the bed, she’d just shared with her husband, Grace walked out on shaky legs.

Five minutes later, she was on the road. She’d met 'theuncladman' on Facebook exactly six months ago. Somehow, they’d hit it off. He reminded her so much of Jake before they got married. The way he listened and his responses to her complaints. The way he cheered her even when she was silly.

She pulled into the Renaissance Hotel and got out of the car on trembling legs. A loud buzz sounded in her ears, her mouth went dry, and her teeth chattered as she walked into the hotel. Grace barely paid her surroundings a glance as she left the lift and entered a carpeted hallway.

Tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, head pounding a sickening rhythm her heartbeat echoed, Grace put one leg in front of the other until she arrived at room 6.

Photo by @twiceuponatime

Yet, she would betray him.

Grace’s heart lurched in her chest, her head swam and the buzzing sound in her ears increased.

She was going to be sick.

Grace pressed a hand to the door and closed her eyes. Behind this door lay the end of her marriage and the beginning of her life as a cheat. Huge sobs rose up her chest and tears trailed down her cheeks. Did she really want to see what lay behind the door?

She should go.

It wasn’t too late.

She could turn around and undo this sin.

Grace straightened away from the door. Her phone beeped with an incoming message. Her fingers trembled as she read the message.

Unidentified number: Chickened out?

A slow smile pulled at Grace’s lips. With renewed resolve, she reached out and closed her hand over the doorknob.

Grace pushed the door open.

She stared.

Seated on the bed with his feet spread wide apart, and his phone in his hands, Jake smiled at his wife.

“Hello, Grace.”

This is an entry to @onceuponatime Behind The Mystery Door contest