SEDUCING THE BILLIONAIRE

Chapter 18

Forbidden affairs really do have that little bit of extra spice which makes them irresistible, falling for someone you know you shouldn’t be with and having to risk it all just to have them in your arms even if it’s just for a couple of minutes.
Jerome had been away on a work trip for just two weeks and yet she felt like she hadn’t seen him in months, staying up all night texting or whispering under the covers made Audrey feel like a teenager again and she really was just happy.

Duke seemed to be in a world of his own with Connie as well, but he always came home early enough for them to have dinner as a family.
Jerome was returning to Lusaka that Friday, and she was thrilled to see him again, to have his arms around her and his lips on hers. Of course, they couldn’t just be out there in the open hanging out, not when everyone knew him as Duke’s best friend and lawyer, and they knew her as Duke’s wife. Sure, the adoption had gone through, but she still did not want to cause a scandal.

On Friday morning she had gone to the house, now boarding house to check on her tenants, the interior decorator was done and the girls who had moved on had not even complained about the k2000 per month per bedspace, for those who were in the three self-contained bedrooms, the rent was k2500. All the bedrooms were very big and fit two queen sized beds, having six bedrooms, she had twelve girls living there in total.
She had vetted all of them to make sure she wasn’t housing some crazy careless students who wouldn’t take good care of the house.

The rentals were inclusive of the water, electricity, Netflix, paying the cabbage collectors, a guard, and a maid to be cleaning the common areas. There were four fridges in the kitchen, two big deep freezers and two upright fridges with four, four plate cookers. The house had a swimming pool and a laundry room with a washing machine.
The girls had started moving in on Monday and the last one had arrived on Thursday so that Friday morning she went to welcome them, go over the terms and conditions again and just introduce them to each other because they had come separately and were not all from the same university.
Audrey even treated them to lunch, ordering platters and drinks to be delivered to the house as they interacted.
After lunch she drove back home and took yet another shower, Jerome was likely to be back in Lusaka around 18:00hrs and she wanted him to find her at his place, maybe have something nice for dinner. Sure, there was no label on their relationship and so far, it had been slow and a bit casual, but she had this great urge to do something for him, to go over there and prepare a nice meal for him. Before leaving, he had left a spare key to her and that touched her a lot, sure, some people would think it wasn’t a big deal, but Jerome had trusted her with the key to his home, that meant a lot.

Audrey was laying down outfits on the bed, trying to decide on which one to wear when Duke walked into her bedroom.
“Hey, are you going somewhere?” he asked.
Audrey didn’t even realize that he was home.
“Yeah.”
“Where?” he asked as he looked at the laid-out outfits.
“Just dinner with a friend,” Audrey responded, averting her eyes.
“Can you reschedule?”
Audrey stopped what she had been doing and stood straight to look at him.
“Why? What’s going on?”
“Well, I thought we could have dinner, maybe spend the weekend away…” he told her. He had talked to the worker who supervised everyone, and she had agreed to stay with Lindsey throughout the weekend.
“Why?” she asked with a raised eyebrow and saw a flash of disappointment through his eyes, but he quickly covered it up with a smile.
“Well, we didn’t have any honeymoon, and I kinda feel like I owe you, so I thought we could do this for our wedding anniversary.”
“Oh my gosh.” It finally hit her “I can’t believe I forgot, wow, it’s been a year?”
To be honest with all the drama that had happened, it felt so much longer. Had she really forgotten about their wedding anniversary? Was this how much she had stopped caring about it all?
“Yep, one year since we signed that paper.” He put his hands in his pockets, a little bit nervous as he wondered if she would say no. He felt like they hadn’t really hung out or talked in a while. What had she been up to?
“And you’ve planned something?” Audrey was really shocked by that. When they got married, he wasn’t seeing anyone but still refused to go on a honeymoon with her, now that he was seeing Connie the last thing, she expected was for him to plan a weekend getaway for their anniversary.
“Well, kinda… but… if you don’t want that’s okay” he added on, even though he really wanted them to do this, the last thing he wanted was to have her just go without being happy about it.
“No, it’s not that I don’t want to. It’s just…. I didn’t know you were planning something, so I already have this other thing lined up and….” Even as she spoke, she could see his face deflating and she did feel bad, so bad that she almost promised to cancel her plans but then she remembered just how selfish he had been, doing things for himself without thinking about how he was hurting her feelings.
“Am sorry Duke, can we do something tomorrow?” she suggested “I really can’t cancel.”
“of course.” He swallowed hard “I understand.”

An hour later, Duke watched Audrey strut out of the house wearing a red bodycon dress, black heels, and a black coat. Her hair perfectly styles and subtle make-up. He took a sip of his whiskey as he watched her get into the car and drive away.
He knew for sure it wasn’t just some friend she was meeting, who dresses up like that to meet a friend? Who blows off a weekend getaway to celebrate their one-year anniversary with just some friend? Had she found someone? Who was this guy?
He kept on thinking about who it could be and what they were possibly doing out there, which was better than being with him? All these thoughts kept on running wild in his mind and disturbing his peace as he took one sip after the other.
For the first time since they got married, Audrey got home late that day. She had missed dinner and arrived just a few minutes before 22:00hrs.

“Where were you?” he questioned the momen. Shee walked in.
Lindsey was already in bed.
“Sorry, I lost track of time” she said as she took off her heels and started heading upstairs, he followed.
“Lost track of time doing what?” he questioned as she entered, going through his room to hers.
“I told you I was meeting a friend.” Why was he even questioning her when she had never questioned him before?
“What friend?”
“Excuse me?”
“Who is this friend you went to see in that skimpy dress showing off your body?”
Even after dinner, he had had another glass of whiskey.
“I am not getting into this with you,” Audrey refused upon realizing that he was a bit drunk and perhaps angry.
“I just wanna know who this guy is, he must be such a great fuck for you to skip out on our anniversary celebrations!”
Audrey could see that he was looking for a fight, but she was not going to give him that satisfaction. She pushed him back to his side of the room and locked the door, ignoring his mumblings from the other side.