Wrong Number [EXCERPT]

Chapter Five

Jolie stared at her phone for a full five minutes. No dots to show he was typing a reply. Nothing. She dropped her phone and pulled the covers up over her face.

I just hit on a married man, she thought, groaning into the comforter. What the fuck am I doing? I'm married too, for fuck's sake!

Not that it felt like it, most of the time. She flopped over onto John's side with a huff. The cold side of the bed. So often cold. She didn't know where he was. Working? At the gym? Passed out in a hotel somewhere? She didn't know.

And the worst part was that at this point, she couldn't even bring herself to care. She starfished on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. A sad, lonely wife, drinking alone on Valentine's Day only to return home and drunk text a stranger that she's fantasizing about him, she thought, brain sluggish.

A nice, married doctor. Well, she still wasn't one hundred percent sure that he was actually nice, or even if he was really a doctor. There still hadn't been any dick pics though. And she had enjoyed the company over her shitshow of a dinner.

At least Alicia had finally messaged her, full of apologies for forgetting to give her a ride home the night before. Her new number, as it turned out, was one digit off from the good doctor's.

Jolie ran her tongue over her teeth and let out a deep sigh. She imagined a studious man, with a serious face and deep-set eyes, wearing a crisp lab coat. He sat behind a big oak desk, staring down at his phone, fiddling with a wedding ring on his finger as he read her text messages, shaking his head and not knowing what to say.

He'd stuck with her through ass-talk, f-bombs, and asking too many questions about his patients, but she had to go and take it the extra mile. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

But she couldn't stop picturing him. Salt-and-pepper hair maybe, with some scruff on a chiseled jaw.

She groaned and picked up her phone again. Of course there were no new messages. She hadn't felt it buzz. Her thumbs quivered over the touch screen, but she didn't know what to say.

Sorry for kind of hitting on you, lol it was a joke? No, that was a conversation killer. Or at least, it wouldn't save her from the conversation killer. He'd said his wife was cheating on him, but that didn't magically make it okay for her to cross that line.

Jolie's stomach sank and flipped. She pressed her thighs together.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" she asked herself, voice swallowed by the darkness around her. She didn't know if it was the wine or the attention or the topics of their conversation, but she was turned on. For the first time in a long time.

No, it wasn't the thoughts of foreign objects or disastrous dates, it was this vision in her head of a sexy older doctor sitting behind his fancy, sturdy oak desk. Her imagination took over, betraying her will to be good.

The doctor stood from his office chair, broad shoulders straining against the bright white fabric of the lab coat. He shrugged out of it, revealing a tight black beater beneath, and jeans that cupped his thighs and ass like a set of hands. A stethoscope hung around his neck, and he pulled it off slowly, his steel gaze locked on hers.

She was in the vision now too, sitting on his desk, wearing nothing. He didn't say anything—she hadn't imagined his voice yet—and simply stepped towards her, reaching out to lock the stethoscope behind her neck with both hands like a scarf.

She gasped as he leaned towards her, lips looking satiny soft, plush pink clouds coming in for what was sure to be a mind-melting kiss.

The click of the front door unlatching echoed like a battering ram.

Jolie dove under the covers of her bed and closed her eyes, steadying her breathing. She realized she was still clutching her phone and quickly darted her hand out from beneath the blankets, setting it quietly on her nightstand before returning to playing possum.

John shuffled in, shedding his clothes along the floor as he made his way to the bathroom. After the longest piss in human history, he returned and slid into bed, snoring within minutes.

She stayed stock still through all of it, relaxing only once he'd fallen asleep.

Forgetting your Valentine's Day date with your wife must be so exhausting, she thought bitterly as she listened to him. This was a ritual for her, when he came home late. She was always awake, and she always pretended to be asleep to avoid talking to him.

How stupid, to be so lonely but avoid all confrontation with the person you live with. She swallowed hard. This was about the time that the guilt set in. Guilt that she wasn't doing more to try to salvage their relationship. Guilt that she'd just been fantasizing about another man. Granted, she'd fabricated the man, but the idea behind the fabrication was a real person that she'd been talking to. Flirting with.

She wondered what John would say if she woke him up to tell him. Hey honey, I've been flirting with this hot doctor and you interrupted me about to rub one out thinking about him. Can you throw me a pity fuck so I can release this energy, please? She stifled a hysterical laugh that threatened to bubble up from her throat.

What the fuck is wrong with me? She clenched her jaw and rolled over to peek at her phone on the nightstand. Still no response from Dr. Tweedledick.

Her stomach twinged again, with a different kind of guilt. She broke out into a cold sweat at the stark reality that she felt more guilty for possibly offending her new friend than any of the guilt she had pertaining to her husband.

It's best if he blocked my number, she thought, trying to ignore the sudden thick feeling in her throat. This is not a good situation, for either of us.

She assured herself that he was a smart man, a studious, faithful man, and that he for sure had blocked her number to avoid any further inappropriate remarks.

As she burrowed herself into the blankets, willing herself to go to sleep, she couldn't help but hope that she was wrong.