Chapter 3: Risking it All

Tuesday morning was just another boring, mundane work day for Terri. It had been over two months now since her husband walked out on her. She was one day away from their fourth marriage counseling session and she was no closer to knowing if she could save her marriage to Brad or not.

As lunch time approached Angie, her best friend, stood at her desk waiting to go out for a bite to eat. Just as they hit the door to the parking lot Angie's phone started to buzz indicating she had a text message.

"Oh, oh," she said excitedly, "Nate's at the furniture store down the street, I think he's finally going to buy me that chair I've been drooling over. You go ahead and eat, Terri, I have to go meet Nate." Angie jumped into her car and left Terri standing in the parking lot.

Terri stood there for a moment thinking she might just go back inside and eat something out of one of the machines, then crinkled her face and said out loud, "Naah," as she got in her car and started out for her usual luncheon café.

As she walked in and took a small empty table in the corner, she didn't notice the tall, good looking black gentleman in the back of the room; he noticed her though. He recognized her from a picture that was sent to him from Brad's phone.

Steve watched the beautiful features of her face as she gave her order to the waitress, and even under the conservative skirt and blouse she wore, he could see the voluptuous curves of her delectable body.

This is going to be fun, Steve thought. Husband or no husband, his job was to seduce and fuck her silly and he was going to try his best to do just that.

"Excuse me, ma'am," Terri hadn't heard him approach and was a little startled by his voice. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean to scare you."

"That's okay; I just didn't hear you coming. How can I help you," she asked as she looked up and took in the chiseled structure of his rugged face and piercing black eyes for the first time. My, what a handsome man she thought to herself.

"I'm a stranger here. I'm from Indianapolis and out here for a few days on business. I was on the way to my next appointment when my stomach started growling at me so I swung in here to grab a bite, now I'm all turned around and don't even know what direction to go in when I pull out of the parking lot."

Terri smiled; "Where are you going?" she asked in her most pleasant voice.

"Ah, I have to get to York Road and Thornberry in Elk Grove."

"Okay, it's not hard to get there," she said with a smile, "make a right out of the parking lot and go down three lights, then make a left. You can't miss it, there's a big gentleman's club on the corner; that's York Roa..."

"Is that where you work?" he interrupted.

"Me," she said sounding a little perturbed, "you think I work in a strip joint?"

"I'm sorry," he said quickly, "I didn't mean to insult you, believe me, it's just ... well, with your beauty it isn't hard to imagine you working in a place like that."

Good come-back, she thought.

"I really do apologize for my remark. I'll tell you what, if you'll let me sit and have a cup of coffee with you, I'll pick up your tab for lunch." He could see her thinking it over. "Please, for the last two days the only people I've talk to are a bunch of stuffy old men in three piece suits, I sure would enjoy the company of a pretty woman, if only for a few minutes."

Terri quickly sized him up. The only other guy she knew from Indiana was from her college days, she remember him as being a hunk as well. It must be that home grown cooking she thought. "Sure," she said with a smile, "have a seat. I'm Terri," she said as they shook hands.

"Hi, Terri, I'm Steve," he said pulling in his chair. He ordered a coffee then turned toward Terri. "Since all that beauty isn't on display at the gentleman's club, what do you do?"

She giggled at his flattery a little as she answered him. "I'm an executive assistant," she said; "How about you?"

"I'm a systems analyst for a software company. I go around to prospective clients and figure out how our computer applications can improve their work performance and increase their bottom line."

They talked a little about their jobs before Steve thought it was about time to get back to business. He reached over the table and lifted her left hand. "I see you're married."

"Yes, I am," she replied.

"I hope your husband appreciates the treasure he has." Terri pulled her hand away from his and looked down at her salad. "He doesn't, does he? I can tell. Well if you ask me he's a fool," he told her.

"My husband appreciates me just fine," she said as a small tear formed in the corner of her eye.

"I'm sorry, I've made you cry," said Steve passing an embroidered white handkerchief to her. "My apologies again," he said. "It's just that I see it all the time, beautiful married women being take for granted by their husbands."

"Well that's not what you see here," she said using the hanky he gave her.

"I sure hope not," he said, "what a shame that would be, especially in the bedroom."

"Wow, you work fast, don't you. How did we get into the bedroom already?"

"Terri, the majority of people think it's finances that break up most marriages, but that's incorrect. Actually the reason for most of the break-ups starts in the bedroom with a husband who can't satisfy his wife."

"And just what makes you such an expert on marriage problems?" Terri asked.

He looked directly into her eyes. "I sleep with a lot of dissatisfied wives," he said with a small smile.

"I see; and are they satisfied after sleeping with you?"

"Why don't you find out for yourself, Terri? I'm only in town for a couple more days; spend the night with me tonight, I can make all your fantasies come to life." Terri laughed to herself. "Did I say something amusing?" he asked.

"No, I just thought of how funny life can be sometimes. Not long ago your offer would have been very tempting. In fact, I don't honestly know if I wouldn't have taken you up on it, but you're too late, Romeo. I learned there are things in life that are way more important than my fantasies. The answer is a flat, emphatic no."

Steve scooted his chair around to the other side of the table and sat facing Terri. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a business card. "Terri, if you should change your mind, and I hope you do," he said flipping the card over and writing on the back, "here is my hotel and room number," he said handing her the card, "no need to call, just knock on my door."

Terri took his card, and without even looking at it, promptly dropped it into his coffee. "Sorry, Steve, I wouldn't wait up if I were you."

Undaunted and still not giving up, Steve leaned in a little closer and deftly reached under the table. "Think about it, Terri, please; one night of passion you'll never experience with your husband; one night of wild, uninhibited, smoking hot sex; eight inches of hard black steal giving you more pleasure in one night than you've ever known before; It'll be a night you'll never forget, our night, just you and me, and when it's over I'll be gone and no one will ever know."

Just then Terri felt his fingertips slide up her inner thighs. She jumped up from her chair and slapped him hard across the face. Shocked, Steve put his hand to his cheek. Terri, still not satisfied with teaching Steve a lesson in humility, grabbed what was left of her salad and dumped it in his lap, bringing chuckles from some of the other patrons.

Steve jumped up just as the restaurant's manager rushed to the table. Immediately he recognized Terri as being a regular customer. "Excuse me, is there a problem here, is this man bothering you, ma'am?"

"Not anymore," she said; "he told me he would pick up my check and that my lunch was on him," she said with a chuckle. Terri turned and walked out the door to the applause of several of the other customers and leaving Steve trying to wipe the Italian dressing from the crotch of his suit.

Brad anxiously paced back and forth in front of his desk while waiting to hear back from Nate. What's taking so long, he thought; with every minute that ticked by he was getting more and more worried. Perhaps she's already in his room, maybe she called in to work and took the rest of the day off; damn, he thought, I wish I had never agreed to this.

It was almost two o'clock when Judy announced Nate on line three. "Nate, what took you so long? Well, what happened; have your heard from Steve yet; did she go to his room; did they do anything?"

"Hey, hey, man, jeez, take it easy, I couldn't call you until I could get away from my wife."

"Okay, fine, tell me happened."

"She dumped her salad in his lap," Nate said laughingly. "But first she slapped him."

"Slapped him, you're kidding; she really slapped him?"

"She sure did; Steve had a small digital recorder in his pocket and has the whole thing on tape, but he said he's almost too embarrassed to give it to you. He also told me to tell you, if the stain doesn't come out of his suit you owe him eight hundred bucks," said Nate with a chuckle. "I wouldn't really worry about that though, he only has about thirty more to pick from."

"Nate, you don't know what this means to me, tell him I'll pay for the suite, no problem."

"Brad, he played a little of the tape for me over the phone; I don't think you have anything to worry about. He spread it on pretty thick and she turned him down flat. She wasn't even tempted."

Brad sighed with relief as Nate went on, "I'll get you the recorder so you can hear everything for yourself, but one of the things she said was that there were more important things in life than her fantasies. I'm telling you, Brad, if there was ever a reason not to trust her before you don't have it anymore."

Brad slunk into high-back, leather chair with a sigh of relief once again. "So;" Nate asked, "what are you going to do? Are you going back home tonight?"

"I'm not sure, but I don't think so, not yet. Actually I think these counseling sessions are good for us, I just might hold off going back home until we've had a couple more," Brad said.

"Man, that's kind of cruel, don't you think; letting Terri go on worrying like that?"

"I don't know," replied Brad, "don't forget, she did start this thing and I'm not doing it to be cruel, I'm doing it because I think it can make our marriage stronger."

"I understand," said Nate, "I just wish there was some way to relieve some of her worry. I hear about her every day from Angie, she's really torturing herself, Brad, she's going through a lot."

"Nate, let's not forget, she caused this whole thing. Maybe I CAN trust her again, and maybe I've forgiven her ... well, mostly anyway, but I'll never forget the cavalier attitude she had while walking out the door to go have sex with you. I don't mean to be a hard ass, but she deserves to feel rotten."

Nate assumed his little plan to test Terri had made everything alright but he could hear the anger that Brad still had stored up inside. He realized Brad was right; they probably both needed to continue with those counseling sessions. "I understand, Brad, you're right."

"Well, like I said, I don't want to be a prick either, maybe there's some way I can make her feel a little better, I don't know, I'll think of something." He thought about the recorder. "When can I get ahold of that recorder? I do want to hear everything that was said."

"I'll have Steve give you a call; you guys should get together over dinner and he can give it to you then."

"Would you be joining us?" Brad questioned.

"No, I can't; I don't dare tell Angie about Steve being in town. I'm sure Terri will tell her what happened; I'm afraid she'd put two and two together; she's pretty damn smart and she knows me way too well."

"Okay," Brad said with a chuckle. "Tell Steve to call me and that I'm picking up the tab for dinner."

"Will do," Nate replied; "Hey, would you mind if I told Angie you and I talked again and that I thought you were softening up a little bit? She'll go tell Terri and that might give her a little hope anyway?"

"No, that's a good idea, go ahead," said Brad.

That night Brad and Steve met for the first time over dinner. At first both were a little apprehensive; after all, Steve had tried to seduce his wife earlier in the day. As they talked though, both began to feel easier with one another's company. Steve gave Brad the recorder. "I don't know all the troubles you're having," he told Brad, "Nate said only that your wife had fantasies about sleeping with a black man and that you were having trouble trusting her, so you wanted to see if I could seduce her. Well you'll hear on that tape that I did my best. I never even had her going, Brad, not once did she even consider coming to my room. Take it from a man who has seduced many married women, you have nothing to worry about, not a thing."

Brad thanked him, paid the bill, and returned to his motel room. He fixed himself a drink and relaxed while listening to the recording of his wife's redemption. For the first time since the whole mess started, Brad went to bed feeling good and got a restful night's sleep.

The following night Dr. Lawrence noticed a change in attitudes right away as Brad and Terri took their customary seats. Terri had abandoned her usual face of gloom and doom for a slight smile and Brad, although not smiling, was not scowling either.

Even the atmosphere in the room did not seem to be so heavily charged with tension. This was quite a change in one week since Brad's rampage and Terri's almost total breakdown. Dr. Lawrence wondered what was behind such a change, it was unusual to say the least, but then why question success, she thought. Let's just go with the flow and see where it leads us.

Terri, of course, earlier in the day, heard from Angie that Brad's attitude was softening. It was her first real hope of some possible future happiness with the man she loved. She was also very proud for the way she handled herself with Steve. She knew she had done a lot of growing up in last few months and Steve was proof of that. She hadn't told anyone about it, not even Angie, and she wasn't sure she would. It was enough that SHE knew how she reacted to Steve's advances, besides if she told Brad he might think she was making it up; no it would remain her little secret.

Brad, on the other hand, sat poised with knowledge. He knew Terri's secret already. He knew that unless something catastrophic happened, he would be returning home in the near future. He also knew he was going to use as many more of the counseling session as possible to try and find out everything he could about his wife and about how he could make his marriage stronger. He didn't ever want anything like this to happen again and he was going to do everything possible to make sure it didn't.

"Dr. Lawrence," Brad started, "I'd like to ask my wife a question." The doctor indicated for him to go ahead and ask. "Terri, you said you had been fantasizing about all this rough, animalistic like sex for the last four years, but in four years, you never once came to me and told me about it; why?

Terri looked at the doctor, then at Brad. "Because I didn't want you to think I didn't enjoy the way you made love to me, because I did, very, very much so. I didn't want to take a chance that we could lose what we had by you trying to do something that ... well, maybe you were no good at. I didn't want you to think I was dissatisfied in bed."

"You didn't want me to think you were dissatisfied in bed, so you go off to have sex with another man," Brad said coldly, "that makes a lot of sense."

"I know, Brad, that's why I kept telling you I was doing it strictly as a favor for Angie. I thought if I could really convince you of that, thinking I wasn't satisfied with you in the bedroom wouldn't even enter the picture. I know now, thinking like that was not only extremely hurtful, but was also an insult to your intelligence. You saw right through my charade, you knew exactly what I really wanted and told me so when you called that night. I knew then how much I hurt you," she said wiping a little moisture from the corner of her eye.

"Okay," said Brad," he looked at Dr. Lawrence, "I have one more question." She nodded her head as a sign to go ahead and ask.

"Terri, as far as I know you don't have a prejudiced bone in your body, if all you wanted was to experience rough sex, why did the guy have to be black?"

"Oh he didn't, it was just that Nate is black. It was Nate who I kept hearing about for the last four years, although..." she hesitated and appeared to be in deep thought for a few seconds, "wait, that's not quite right now that I think about it; I guess the fact that he was black did play into my fantasies a little."

Terri looked down and started fidgeting with a tissue again. "During my sophomore year of college, before I met you," she told Brad, "I had a roommate that dated a black guy. He was a nice enough guy; we even double dated a couple times with a friend of his who was also black. He and I didn't hit off though so nothing ever became of it, but Marge, that was my roommate's name, and her boyfriend would sometimes rent porno movies; of course they were all interracial. Sometimes when they were out I'd sneak a peek. There was never any love making, just hardcore sex, so unconsciously maybe I did tie those movies in with the fact that Nate was black, but if Nate was white it wouldn't have made any difference."

By the end of the hour Terri had revealed things from her past that Brad had never known. This was definitely a good decision, he told himself, and was looking forward to the session.

Dr. Lawrence was especially enthused with the last hour. Brad asked good, thought provoking questions that showed his interest with learning more about his wife. That was a very good sign; and Terri answered every question as completely and honestly as she possibly could. If more married couples communicated like this, she thought, she'd be out of a job.

"Dr. Lawrence," Brad spoke as they were getting ready to leave, "what about talking to each other. You didn't want us to do that before, what about now?"

"I think that would be fine," she answered, "just try not to argue with one another; I'd still like to keep any arguments inside the confines of this office, at least for now," she said with a smile.

Terri was already heading for the door when Brad surprised her. "Terri, would you like to have coffee?"

Terri's emotions started getting the better of her and tears started to well up as she answered. "Really? Yes, I would, very much so."

"Okay," Brad said with a smile, "but you have to promise not to get the table all wet with tears."

She giggled, "I promise," she said.

They always had simply enjoyed each other's company. They both knew to avoid talking about the last few months and simply discussed their jobs, current events, and some happy times they both shared. As it turned out, their coffee break lasted almost three hours and ended with both of them laughing. Brad walked Terri to her car and left her with a small kiss and high hopes.

The next week's session started pretty much the same way until Dr. Lawrence interrupted. She turned toward Terri, "Mrs. Gilliston, you've been answering a lot of questions for the last couple of weeks; I'd like to know if you have any of your own. Do you have any questions you would like to ask your husband?"

At first Terri shook her head and said no then stopped, "Wait, yes I do have one," she said. "Brad, I've answered all your questions as thoroughly, as completely, and as honestly as I can. Do you still believe I was discontented with you in the bedroom? I have to know the truth. I just can't let you think I'm unhappy with the way you make love to me."

Brad sighed a little and leaned forward in his chair. "I believe you," he said. "After listening to your screwed up logic about why you did what you did, I believe your motives had nothing to do with being dissatisfied with me."

Terri breathed a sigh of relief. "Brad, you have no idea what that means to me. I know I've hurt you terribly and I will live the rest of life regretting that, but I don't think I could live with myself at all, if you continued to believe that what I did had anything to do with your love making skills."

Once again, Terri's honesty and sincerity was very apparent. Brad looked over and gave her smile; even with all the troubles in their relationship, one smile from Brad made her heart flutter. She smiled back.

At the end of the hour Brad once again asked Terri out for coffee but as they got to the parking lot Brad staggered her with another question, "Or, would you like to see where I've been living for the past several months?"

Was he really inviting me to his room, she wondered? There was only one reason she could think of for the invitation, he wanted to make love to her; oh God, she thought, could it be possible? Almost every night since he walked out she dreamed of having him inside of her again. She missed him so much. Was he really going to make love to her tonight?

"Ye ... yes, I would love to see your room," she stammered.

"Follow me," he told her as he slipped behind the wheel. She pulled out right behind him and tail gated him the whole way to make sure she didn't lose him. Terri's heart was bounding like a drum as Brad swiped his key card and opened the door for her.