What I Let Happen

We are Indians living in the northeast US. This is a real story with some fictional elements to make it more interesting. My wife Kavya (name changed) has started her affair with our friend Ravi (name changed) and we are exploring the dynamics slowly. This multipart series talks about how it all started and where we stand right now. Read and enjoy!

Scene 1: The Request

The fan spun slowly above us, casting the soft rhythmic whisper that fills a quiet room after a long day. Kavya was curled up on the couch, legs tucked beneath her, one arm draped over a pillow. She was scrolling her phone, absently, wearing that loose, faded yellow kurti she always reached for when she was completely at ease or when she wanted to look like she didn't care, even when she did.

I was at the dining table with my laptop, half working, half watching her. It had become a familiar habit, the quiet monitoring of her mood, her posture, her stillness. That evening, something felt... expectant. Like she had a sentence ready behind her lips, just waiting for the right silence to fall into.

She looked up suddenly, phone still in hand.

"Hey... don't make any plans for the weekend."

I blinked. "Memorial Day?"

She nodded, twisting her body on the couch to face me better. "Yeah. I mean, for yourself, it's fine. But I'll be out. Friday night to Sunday. Coming back late."

I paused, blinking again. "Out? Where?"

"New York."

Her voice was calm, smooth. Practiced. Not nervous but not casual either. That voice she used when she was stating a decision, not starting a discussion.

I swallowed and asked, "With who?"

She glanced down, then up again. "A friend."

Now the weight of her tone hit me. A friend. Not Shruti or Anika, her usual travel partners. I didn't like that she left the name out. Not because I didn't trust her -- but because it meant she was trying to manage how I'd react. That always meant something deeper was hidden underneath.

I shifted in my chair, kept my voice light. "Which friend?"

She looked at me a second too long. Not defensive. Not guilty. Just... measuring.

"You won't like it."

My chest tightened. There was a strange pressure behind my ears, like a kettle was slowly heating up inside me.

"Kavya... who?"

She folded her legs out from under her, sat straighter. "It's Ravi."

I didn't answer right away. The name hung in the air like incense that turned to smoke too quickly.

Ravi.

I could feel heat rush through my chest -- not quite anger, not jealousy, but something more complicated. Ravi wasn't just any guy. He wasn't a stranger. He wasn't a what-if.

He was history.

He was familiar hands adjusting her saree before I even saw her in it.

He was flirty gym sessions when I was still in India, video-calling her across oceans, trying not to let my insecurity show.

He was her "safe friend." The one who always hovered just at the edge of the line.

I asked quietly, "Where are you staying?"

She hesitated. Then shrugged.

"A hotel."

Silence. A beat. Then another.

"You're spending two nights in a hotel with him?"

"Just once," she said. "It's not a thing. I just... I need this."

Her voice was suddenly softer. Not apologetic just intimate. Honest.

"I want to feel something I haven't in a long time. Something just for me."

I tried to laugh, a short, choked thing. "You couldn't feel that with me?"

Her gaze softened, and she got up from the couch walking toward me slowly, like she knew she was approaching something delicate. Something sacred. Or dangerous.

"That's not what I meant," she whispered. "You're everything to me, Nirmal. You're... home. But this is different. This is about me. For me."

I should've stood. Should've walked away. Asked for a real conversation. But I didn't.

Because somewhere in the middle of my confusion and dread... I realized something.

I was hard.

Not fully. Not obviously. But enough for her to notice. Her eyes flicked down, and her lips parted slightly.

"Wait..." she said gently. "Are you---?" She stepped closer, one knee between my legs. "Is this turning you on?"

I opened my mouth to deny it, but nothing came out.

She bent down, slow and sensual, and kissed me -- long, warm, and patient. And as she kissed me, she pressed herself into my lap. Her hands found the waistband of my shorts.

And that's when I knew...

This wasn't the beginning of something I could stop.

It was the end of pretending I wanted to.

Scene 2: The Ride

She straddled my lap without waiting for me to respond.

Her knees framed my thighs as her fingers curled under the waistband of my shorts. Not hurried. Not demanding. Just sure. Certain of the effect she had on me -- of the control she suddenly wielded like she'd always known it was there, waiting.

I tried to speak. "Kavya, I--"

"Shhh." Her breath brushed my ear. "Don't ruin it by thinking."

My heart was hammering, not from lust alone, but the fact that I didn't know what this was. Was she seducing me to silence my resistance? Was this guilt? Pity? Power?

I didn't know. All I knew was the warmth between her legs as she shifted, grinding against me through my thin cotton boxers. And the heat of her skin under the soft fabric of her kurti, which she lifted slightly, just enough to expose her bare thighs on either side of me.

Her voice dipped low. "Still hard?"

I swallowed. Nodded, barely.

She smiled, not cruelly, but with quiet power. The kind of smile that comes from knowing she was right. That I couldn't pretend anymore.

"You didn't even try to stop me," she whispered.

Then she reached between us and pulled my shorts down in one easy motion, freeing me into the cool air of the room. I twitched under her touch, and her fingers brushed me, a featherlight tease just to make me shiver.

No rush. No ceremony. She lifted herself slightly, adjusted the fabric of her panties to the side, and let herself sink down onto me.

I gasped. So did she not loudly, but with the sharp breath of sudden fullness. Her hips paused, just a moment, to take me in completely.

The silence that followed wasn't awkward. It was charged. Tense. Like we were both realizing we'd crossed something together... and now we couldn't look back.

She started to move.

Slowly. Deliberately. Her eyes half-lidded, her fingers gripping the back of my neck. Her breathing was soft but ragged, and the sound of her thighs brushing mine -- the wet friction between us filled the room with something feral and quiet and obscene all at once.

I wrapped my arms around her waist, as if anchoring myself, but it felt like she was the one holding me.

"You like thinking about it, don't you?" she murmured. "Me. With him."

I shut my eyes. I didn't answer. Because she already knew.

"You say no, but your body says something else."

She rocked harder now. Deeper. Her nails grazed the back of my neck.

"You'll watch me pack. You'll say you don't want me to go. But this..." she clenched around me, "... says you're already letting me."

I felt the edge coming, hot and sudden and close. She felt it too. Her body curled forward, her breath hot on my face.

"Let go, Nirmal."

I came.

Hard. Buried inside her. My body shuddered against hers, silent and overwhelmed. I didn't speak. I couldn't. My mind was a blur of pleasure, helplessness, and something close to surrender.

She didn't move right away. Just sat there, full of me, her chest pressed to mine. Her lips near my ear.

"Don't worry," she whispered. "I'll only be gone for the weekend."

And just like that, she climbed off. Pulled her kurti back down. Walked slowly to the bathroom, her thighs slick, her posture quiet -- but triumphant.

The door clicked behind her.

And I sat there, pants still around my ankles, not knowing whether I'd just been loved... or disarmed.

Scene 3: The Grey Zone

We never spoke about it.

Not the trip. Not the ride. Not the way she kissed me like she was sealing a deal instead of seducing a husband.

Tuesday morning came like it always did. Kavya got up before me, took a shower, dressed in a pale cotton kurti and jeans, tied her hair back. Her routine. Almost painfully ordinary.

Only I wasn't ordinary anymore.

I watched her pour coffee like nothing had changed -- except everything had. Her fingers moved the same. Her tone was light. She kissed my cheek before leaving for work, and I sat at the table with her lipstick still on my skin, wondering if I had imagined the whole thing.

But I hadn't. My body remembered.

So did my mind.

Wednesday night, I lay beside her in bed. She was scrolling her phone in the dark, face lit by the pale blue glow of the screen. Her expression unreadable.

And I remembered something.

That wedding day -- ours. The rush, the nerves. Ravi and Priya helping with the last-minute chaos. Ravi had stepped in to help her drape her saree when I couldn't be there. She laughed when she told me about it that night, still glowing from the ceremony.

"It wasn't anything," she had said. "He's just better at it than Anika."

I had smiled. Because what else could I do?

And later, when I was undressing her that night, I remember touching the folds of that very saree and wondering -- for just a second -- if his hands had lingered. If he had noticed how it hugged her hips, clung to the curve of her ass. Of course he had.

He always noticed.

Thursday, I opened our old photo folder.

The one from Canada, where we visited Ravi and Priya last year. There was a photo of Kavya holding their baby. Ravi standing beside her, a half-smile on his lips. His hand was on her back. Too casual. Too natural.

Another memory surfaced - the moment in the kitchen. Ravi brushing past her while reaching for a dish, his hand grazing her waist. I hadn't said anything. She hadn't pulled away.

"We're just friends," she'd said once.

But what kind of friends flirt with your fantasies?

I remembered the time she called me from her old apartment - Ravi had texted her out of the blue asking about her sexual experiences. She'd giggled as she told me.

"What should I say?"

And I'd laughed nervously and said, "Play along if you like it."

I hadn't realized that meant she actually would. And that she'd share everything - with him, not with me.

I found that out a year later, when I went through her phone by accident. By then it was history. But it had changed the way I looked at Ravi. At her. At us.

They had shared things I hadn't even known were in her. Desires I hadn't touched. Words I hadn't heard.

I was always her first safe choice.

But he... he had been the one she'd let see the dirtier corners of her mind.

Now, she was packing that same mind into a bag. Folding lingerie. Picking perfumes. Choosing which desires would travel with her -- and which ones she'd leave behind with me.

And through it all, we said nothing.

No questions. No fights. No reminders.

Just silence. Stretched tight like a thread that might snap... or tie us tighter.

Scene 4: Just Before Departure

She was packing in the bedroom.

Not rushed. Not secretive. Her suitcase lay open on the bed like it belonged there, half-filled with neat stacks of clothes, folded lingerie, a small zip pouch for skincare. She moved like she had done this a hundred times before. Graceful. Focused.

The strange thing was how normal she looked.

This wasn't the behavior of someone sneaking off for an affair. There was no guilt. No apology. She was humming to herself in a barely audible tune as if this was just a weekend work trip or a spa retreat.

And that's what scared me more than anything.

I stood at the door, watching her roll a lacy bra between her fingers before placing it in the corner of the suitcase.

"Kavya."

She didn't look up. "Hmm?"

I took a breath. "I just... I can't believe you're really doing this."

Now she turned. Not angry. Not defensive.

Just... surprised.

"You still haven't let it go?"

There it was. The shift. The way her voice changed, not in pitch, but in gravity. Like I was the one clinging to something outdated. Like I was the last person in the room to realize the rules had changed.

"I said no," I said quietly. "On Monday, remember? I said I didn't want this."

She raised an eyebrow. "And then you got hard. You don't remember that part?"

"I didn't mean--"

"You didn't mean to like it?" She walked toward me. "But you did."

Her fingers grazed my stomach, tracing the line where my t-shirt met my shorts.

"You think I didn't feel you twitch when I said his name? Ravi."

My breath hitched. That name, again but now dripping with power. Not a memory. Not a question.

A claim.

She stood in front of me now. Close enough to smell her jasmine and the faint warmth of sun-dried cotton. Her hands moved with unsettling precision: one cupping my balls, the other gripping the base of my cock through my shorts.

I froze.

She looked into my eyes. Calm. Focused.

"You're already his cuckold," she whispered.

The word struck deep. Not cruelly, not loudly, just... truthfully.

"You just haven't said it out loud yet."

I opened my mouth, but her hand moved.

She slipped inside my shorts, her palm warm against me. She stroked slowly -- not to give pleasure, but to own it. To remind me where I stood.

I stiffened instantly, cock pulsing in her grip. My knees nearly buckled.

"Still not over it?" she murmured. "Still hoping I'll cancel everything and stay home like a good little wife?"

She squeezed. Gently. Just enough to make me flinch.

Then she slapped it -- not hard, just enough to make a sound. My cock jumped. I gasped.

She did it again. Slap. A tease. My body rocked with the sensation, straddling the edge between pain and pleasure. Her grip returned -- firmer now, stroking with just enough rhythm to make me ache.

"Look at you," she breathed. "So easy to control when you're like this."

I felt the orgasm building, too fast, too sharp.

"Kavya--"

"No," she said, and pulled away.

Just like that. Her hand gone. Heat gone. The air between us cold again.

"I don't want this," I forced out. "You can't just decide without me. You can't treat me like--like some backup husband while you go and--"

She turned, looked at me fully now. Her expression didn't change -- but her posture did.

"Nirmal," she said quietly, "you've let me do worse for years. Tease you. Deny you. Hurt you, even."

She stepped close again, and without warning, gave my balls a firm squeeze -- the kind that made my knees lock and my throat close. A mixture of heat, shame, and yes, arousal.

"You've begged me to slap your cock. You've told me how it makes you feel. Don't lie to yourself now, just because it's more real this time."

I groaned, my body shaking slightly as she leaned in close.

"I know what you need. And right now, it's not a choice. It's a release."

She released me suddenly, only to deliver a light, stinging slap to my cock again -- just enough to make me step back, leaking and aching and utterly undone.

I staggered slightly, humiliated by how close I was to finishing without even being touched properly. She looked at me, then shook her head softly.

"You're not ready to say it yet. That's fine."

"You will."

She zipped her suitcase with one smooth pull. Then walked past me -- pausing just long enough to whisper:

"Don't forget to hydrate. I want you full when I come back."

And then she was gone -- out of the room, out of reach, out of my grip entirely.

I stood there, throbbing. My balls still tender. My chest hollow with resistance I could no longer hold.

And for the first time, I realized...

Saying no wasn't stopping her.

It was just making me fall deeper.

Scene 5: The Departure

The sky was beginning to dim when I heard the car pull up.

Not a loud engine. Just that low, efficient hum you only notice when you're expecting it -- like the sound of inevitability arriving at your front door.

Kavya stepped out of the bedroom fully dressed. Her kurti had been replaced by a sleeveless black blouse and fitted high-waisted jeans that curved around her hips with an effortless sensuality. She'd tied her hair up, but loosely -- like she didn't want to look too done-up, even though every inch of her said she had planned this down to the final detail.

Her lips were a muted cherry. Her eyes lined just enough. Simple earrings, nothing flashy.

She was beautiful. Uncomfortably so.

My heart pounded as I stood there, uselessly hovering by the hallway, pretending to scroll my phone. She picked up her small suitcase and handbag like she was going out for a weekend conference.

"You're really going," I said -- not as a question, just a quiet realization.

She turned and looked at me.

Not with guilt.

Not even with apology.

With something softer, stranger -- like she felt bad for me, but not in the way people do when they're wrong.

"I told you I would," she said gently. "You had all week."

There was no room left to argue. My resistance had already wilted. She'd crushed it earlier that day -- not through violence or anger, but through intimacy. Through knowing exactly how to reach into me and press on the part I couldn't control.

She adjusted the strap on her bag.

"You'll be okay."

I didn't answer.

Not because I wasn't -- but because I didn't know if I wanted to be.

She walked to the door, hand on the knob. Then paused. Looked back at me one last time.

"Don't hate me, okay?"

I swallowed. "I don't."

Her gaze lingered.

"Good."

She leaned in. Kissed me -- gently, on the cheek. Not rushed. Not hot. But intimate. The kind of kiss someone gives their constant before walking into chaos.

Then she opened the door. Cool evening air spilled in, along with the unmistakable silhouette of a man standing by a car -- arms crossed, phone in hand, sunglasses pushed up on his head.

Ravi.

He didn't look at me. Just nodded toward the backseat, like time was short.

Kavya rolled her suitcase out without hesitation.

No last glance. No wave.

The door shut with a soft click, and I was alone in the hallway. The house felt too quiet -- like the walls had been holding their breath all week and finally exhaled the moment she left.

I walked slowly to the window, parting the curtain with two fingers.

She got in.

The car pulled away smoothly.

And I watched it disappear around the bend of our street -- her world leaving mine behind in a trail of brake lights and calm.

Scene 6: The Wait

The house felt quieter after she left.

Not just empty -- quiet. As if her presence hadn't just filled the space, but somehow held the air together. Now, it felt like everything inside the house had loosened, become unanchored.

I made dinner out of habit and didn't finish it. The kitchen light felt too bright. The couch too large. I wandered between rooms, touching things I didn't need -- her water bottle, her charger, the edge of her pillow -- just to keep my hands moving.

Her scent lingered.

So did the feeling from earlier that afternoon -- her hand gripping me, her breath in my ear, the slap of her palm against my cock and balls. Not playfully. Not affectionately.

Claiming me.

I sat on the edge of the bed and felt the weight of it all hit me at once.

She was with him. Now. Right now.

Probably checking into the hotel.

Probably smiling at the front desk as he carried her bag.

Maybe already upstairs, the door closing, her jeans sliding off in front of a man who had touched her before I ever did -- who had seen the side of her I was only beginning to understand.

I told myself to stop imagining it.

But I couldn't.

Because some part of me -- the part she had awoken and bent to her will -- wanted to imagine it.

Saturday morning.

I woke up hard.

The sheets beside me were cool. The sun was bright, but the bedroom felt gray. I turned on my side, buried my face in her pillow. Her shampoo. Her skin. Still there.

My hand drifted under the covers. I tried not to. I did.

And the moment I touched myself, images came flooding in.

Her bare legs wrapped around Ravi's waist.

Her blouse on the floor.

His hands in her hair, pulling, guiding, owning.

The sound of her moaning -- not for me. For him.

I came quickly. Too quickly. Shamefully fast. It spilled across my belly, hot and sudden, and I lay there gasping, the guilt crawling in right behind the pleasure.

But it didn't stop there.

I did it again that night.

And again Sunday morning.

Every time I touched myself, it was the same loop -- Kavya moaning, arching, riding him, the way she had ridden me earlier that week. But this time, not out of manipulation. Not out of teasing control.

Out of pure pleasure.

And every orgasm left me emptier than the last.

Sunday afternoon.

By 3 p. m., I was pacing.

She hadn't texted.

Not a check-in. Not a casual "Hi." Not even a photo. She had always been this way when she wanted space -- and this time, I realized, I had no right to expect anything more.

She'd made that clear before she left.

I sat on the edge of the couch, phone in hand, screen blank.

A hundred thoughts circled:

Was she still with him? Had they done it once? Twice? All night?

Did she sleep wrapped in his arms? Did he kiss her forehead the way I used to?

Did she cry? Laugh? Fall asleep with him inside her?

My stomach turned.

But my cock stirred.

That was the worst part. The most helpless part.

Even in my resentment... I was aroused.

By 6:30 p. m., I was seated by the window again.

Waiting.

Every sound outside made me stand. Every pair of headlights made my heart knock against my ribs.

And then I saw it.

The car.

Not a dream. Not a fantasy. Ravi's car.

Pulling in slowly. Smoothly. Her silhouette visible in the passenger seat -- slumped a little, like she was tired. Or sore.

She didn't look back at him when she got out.

Didn't kiss him. Didn't linger.

Just stepped onto the sidewalk with her overnight bag and shut the door. The car pulled away.

She stood there for a moment, looking at the front door. Like she was bracing herself.

Then she walked toward the house.

Her gait was... different.

Subtle, but unmistakable.

She was walking like someone who'd been used. Thoroughly. Like her thighs were still carrying the ghost of his hands. His rhythm.

I didn't open the door. I let her do that part.

I wanted to watch her turn the key.

Let herself back in.

Scene 7: Her Return

The front door clicked open slowly.

Not hesitantly -- just quietly. Like someone slipping back into a space they didn't want to disturb too soon.

I was standing in the hallway, pretending not to wait. Pretending I hadn't been pacing. Pretending I wasn't hard twenty minutes ago from imagining what she had just done.

But the moment I saw her, every lie fell away.

Kavya stepped inside with her small bag slung over her shoulder. Her blouse -- loose, sleeveless, rust-colored -- clung to her faintly. Not enough to show skin. Just enough to hint at the curve of her collarbone, the outline of her bra strap.

Her hair was up. Not freshly done. Looser. A bit tangled. And her face was flushed in that unmistakable way -- not from sun, not from walking.

From being touched.

She looked at me, blinked once.

"Hey."

Her voice was soft. Flat. Not cold -- just tired. Or spent.

I nodded. Swallowed. My throat was dry.

"You're back."

"Yeah." She set the bag down beside the shoe rack. "Got in a little later than expected."

I noticed something strange. She wasn't walking normally.

It was subtle -- but there. A faint hesitance in each step. A stretch in her thighs. Like she'd been filled too long. Opened too wide.

Like something of him was still inside her.

And her scent...

It wasn't perfume.

It was sex.

Sweat. Alcohol. The faintest trace of something male. Not mine.

She leaned against the wall near the kitchen doorway, stretching one shoulder slightly. Her body language said relaxed, but I saw the tension in her core -- like her muscles were still recovering from a different rhythm.

A different man.

"Can I shower first?" she asked. "I just... I don't wanna think for a while. I just want to... linger in it."

I stared at her. "In what?"

She looked me in the eyes then -- for real.

"The night."

I felt something break open in me. Not in pain. Not even in anger.

Something like surrender.

She didn't wait for permission. She turned and walked toward the bathroom, pulling her hair tie loose as she went.

And I followed her with my eyes -- taking in everything:

• The curve of her hips.

• The way her jeans hugged her in places she probably hadn't been fully clothed in for 48 hours.

• The faint redness where her waistband had pressed into her skin.

The bathroom door closed.

The water started.

And I stood in the hallway, hard again, dizzy -- unsure if I should cry... or jerk off.

Because all I could think was:

He was inside her.

And she's still full of him.

Scene 8: The Evidence

She stayed in the shower for almost twenty-five minutes.

The sound of running water echoed softly through the flat. I sat on the edge of the bed in the dark, the dim hallway light casting a low gold glow across the floorboards. I wasn't tired. Not even close. My body was wired. Strung tight. My thoughts louder than anything else in the room.

I could still smell her in the air -- a mix of sex, sweat, and some lotion I didn't recognize.

When the water finally stopped, I stood -- unsure why.

I just needed to see her.

The door creaked open a few minutes later. The light from the bathroom spilled out before she stepped into the frame.

She wasn't expecting me to be standing there. She paused, towel wrapped high around her chest, hair wet and pushed back, a few loose strands clinging to her cheek.

"Hey..." she said quietly. "Didn't know you were still up."

I didn't answer.

I just looked.

She turned slightly toward the closet, giving me a side view -- and that's when I saw it.

Near her collarbone, just above the line of the towel: a faint reddish mark.

Not from a necklace.

Not from the water.

His mouth.

I stepped forward, slowly.

She watched me, unsure.

"What?"

I didn't speak. I just reached -- gently -- and moved the towel slightly aside, letting the edge slip lower along her shoulder.

That's when I saw the second one.

Lower. Deeper. More raw.

A love bite.

My fingers grazed it without thinking. My thumb traced it like it might vanish. But it didn't. It was real.

My wife -- my Kavya -- had been kissed, bitten, claimed by him. And she didn't pull away. She didn't flinch.

She just stood there and let me see.

"There are more," she whispered.

My eyes flicked up to hers.

"Back of my thighs. One on my hip. Maybe a few on my ass. He got... into it."

Her voice cracked slightly at the end -- not out of guilt, but memory. Like she could still feel his breath against her skin.

I felt a pressure in my chest -- and in my cock. The strangest dual sensation: heartbreak and arousal. Jealousy and reverence.

"Did you like it?" I asked, barely recognizing my own voice.

She didn't hesitate.

"Yes."

I exhaled slowly.

My hand dropped to my side.

"Can I see the rest?"

She looked at me for a long moment. Then gave a small nod.

She loosened the towel and let it fall to the floor.

And just like that, she was naked in front of me. Damp. Warm. Raw.

And covered in evidence.

There were faint red marks across her hips, barely faded fingerprints on her thighs, and on her left breast -- a bruise so perfectly mouth-shaped it made my legs weak.

She turned slowly, revealing the back of her -- and I had to steady myself.

A bite mark. High on her ass. Deep. Purpling at the edges.

And below it -- a smaller one, on the soft curve where her thigh met the back of her knee. Like he had worshipped her body one inch at a time.

She turned back.

Didn't speak.

Didn't hide.

She just stood there and let me look.

Scene 9: The Dusk

She fell asleep quickly.

After showing me her body -- after standing there, unapologetically marked, claimed, different -- she pulled on a loose t-shirt, no underwear, and slid into bed like it was any other night. She didn't ask if I was okay. She didn't hold me or kiss my forehead.

She just... rested.

Like she was full.

Satisfied.

Whole.

I stayed awake beside her, lying on my back, staring at the ceiling. The fan blades cast faint shadows across the walls, slicing slowly through the golden spill of our bedside lamp, still on. Her breathing was deep, steady. Every now and then she shifted -- thighs parting slightly under the blanket, like her body hadn't quite recovered from how much it had been taken.

I turned slowly.

Faced her.

She looked peaceful. Soft. Her lips slightly parted. Her hair spilled across the pillow in messy strands. And in that soft gap at her neckline, I could still see it:

That mark.

Faint. Deep. Intimate.

Not mine.

My hand moved under the blanket before I could even process the decision. I palmed myself through my shorts, already hard -- again. The pressure of it made my breath catch.

I should've felt humiliated. Or broken.

But what I felt... was closer to devotion.

I began to stroke myself slowly, quietly. My eyes on her the entire time.

Each pull of my hand brought back another memory:

• Her walking through the door, sore, sore in the right way.

• Her telling me: "I want to linger in it."

• Her towel falling. Her body, raw and bitten.

• Her not denying any of it.

She had let him do everything.

And she came home with the proof, unhidden -- not as a confession, but a gift.

My breathing grew heavier.

I imagined her thighs spread for him.

The creampie.

The ache in her walk.

The things she hadn't said... but would.

I came.

Silently. Pathetically. Gratefully.

My release soaked into the waistband of my shorts, and I lay there -- sweating, spent, still staring at her.

Because no matter what she did...

She had become more powerful.

More desirable.

More mine.

Even if I no longer owned her.

Especially because I no longer did.