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PERRY'S POV

The private room she had in mind was upstairs in a wine bar three streets over.

Dark walls and low lighting and a door that closed properly and a bottle of something red that arrived without being ordered because apparently she was known here.

She poured two glasses and handed one to me and sat on the arm of one of the low chairs rather than in it, her long legs crossed at the ankle, watching me  over the rim of her glass.

She took a slow sip of wine. "Do you love her?"

"She is my wife," I retorted.

"That is not what I asked," she said.

I looked at her across the low light of the room. "No," I said. "I do not think I do. Not anymore."

Something in her expression settled.

She set her glass down and stood up from the arm of the chair and crossed the room toward me slowly, the way she did everything, it was like the pace was entirely hers to set.

She stopped close enough that I could smell her perfume, something dark and clean, and looked up at me with those pale eyes.

"Good," she said quietly. "That makes this simpler."

Her hand came up and rested flat against my chest and I stood there and looked down at her. Then I put my hand over hers and pulled her in.

She kissed me first, directly with no pretense about it. I kissed her back and my hands found her waist and she made a soft sound against my mouth and her fingers curled into my shirt.

We moved toward the low couch at the back of the room and she pushed my jacket off my shoulders and I pulled her down with me and the wine sat untouched on the table.

She broke the kiss and looked at me, her pale eyes darker now, her breath slightly uneven.

"I want to know something," she said.

"What," I said.

"Are you doing this because you want me," she said, "or because it annoys you that he has her."

I looked at her for a moment. "Both," I replied honestly.

Something flickered in her face. Then she laughed, short and real, the first completely unguarded thing she had done since she walked through the restaurant door.

"Fair enough," she said. "Same."

And then she kissed me again and this time there was nothing controlled about it.

I pulled her closer and my hands moved down her back and she arched into me and the conversation was over.

I laid her back against the cushions and ran my mouth down the curve of her neck and she tipped her head back and made a sound low in her throat that had nothing to do with it. 

My hands moved over her slowly, learning the shape of her, and she pulled at my shirt impatiently and I let her pull it off and then I moved lower.

Her breath caught when my mouth reached her stomach and I kept going,  taking my time with every inch of her, her hands going into my hair as I worked lower still.

When I finally put my mouth on her cunt she gasped so sharply that her whole body lifted off the cushions and I pressed her back down with my hands and kept going. 

I took my time with it. Long and slow and thorough, my tongue moving against her in steady and slow circles, learning what made her breath catch, what made her grip my hair harder, what made her stop trying to stay quiet and just let the sound out.

She was not quiet for long.

Her thighs trembled against my shoulders and her hands pulled at my hair and she was saying things in a mix of German and English that I did not fully follow but did not need to because her body was saying everything clearly enough.

I did not rush any of it.

I brought her right to the edge and held her there, keeping the pace steady and even, until she was pulling at my hair hard enough to hurt and her back was arching completely off the cushions and the sounds coming out of her had gone past words entirely.

“Perry!” She groaned louder.

Then I let her go over.

She came hard, her whole body shaking, her head thrown back, both hands gripping my hair like she needed something to hold onto. I stayed with her through all of it and only came back up when she went still and her breathing started to slow back down to something close to normal.

I lay beside her and looked at the ceiling and listened to her breathe. After a moment she turned her head and looked at me. 

"He never did that," she said quietly.

I looked at her. "What."

"Take his time," she said. "He never took his time."

I did not say anything back as she looked back at the ceiling.

We lay there in the quiet for a while and my mind started moving to the pieces I had not had yesterday. Pieces I was going to use.

She rolled toward me after a while and looked at me and something in her eyes was still the complicated thing it had been all evening, jealousy and bitterness and something that might have been a relief all sitting together.

"You are going to destroy him," she said. 

"Yes," I said.

She nodded slowly. "Good,"