Addendum to Phoebe's Sex Manual

by Lee Scarlet

"Never underestimate the potential of ex-wives and ex-husbands to provide endless erotic entertainment. Their shared sexual history brings huge emotional momentum to everything they do, positive or negative."

Page 17, Phoebe's Manual of Practical Sex

Cory wanted to build a birdhouse. That's all. Just a little box with a peaked roof and a hole in the front. He didn't want to change anybody's life. He just wanted to give a wayward sparrow shelter for the summer.

He never made it.

He was hunched over the table saw, about to start ripping into a quarter sheet of plywood when a weirdly familiar voice whispered in his ear, "What the hell are you doing here, Cory?

He almost cut his damned hand off when he jerked upright in shock. Fortunately, the growling blade caught only plywood and chewed down the middle of the piece, loud, fast, and rough, missing his outstretched fingers by a good inch. A very good inch.

"Phoebe!" The shock of seeing his ex-wife, piled on top of the realization that he'd almost lost most of his left hand made him shout at her. It wasn't the first time that he had shouted at Phoebe, but it was the first time since their divorce, ten years ago.

The other students turned to stare.

"God damn it," he said, trying to moderate his voice and failing, "you almost made me cut off my hand."

"You don't have to yell," she replied, her voice still whispering. That was her specialty – a breathy whisper that dropped from a man's ear straight to his crotch like a slug of molten lead.

She leaned close to reach past him and hit the red button. He'd swear that she brushed the back of her wrist against his dick on purpose.

The table saw clattered and rattled to a halt.

"It's been ten years and you're still yelling at me," she said. Her face was painted with hurt.

"Has it been that long?" he replied. "It seems like only yesterday that your lawyer was stripping the flesh from my bones while you clapped and cheered him on."

"What a mean thing to say. I didn't clap. I was as demure as an ingénue while that nice judge gave me everything that I wanted."

"You wanted everything I had."

"Not everything." She brushed her hand across his crotch again. This time there was no doubt that it was deliberate. "He let you keep your most essential little thing."

"You would have chopped that off, too, if he'd let you."

She laughed brightly. "I would have, wouldn't I? Do you blame me? You didn't treat me very well that last year, you know. Surely you remember what you were like back then."

"You do bring out the worst in men."

"Are you still that mean?"

"I was never mean. I was only trying to defend myself."

"From moi?" she asked, giving him her most wide-eyed innocent look and stepping in close.

"From toi, for sure." He tried to regain his personal space by stepping back but found his butt pressed against the steel edge of the table saw. It was bolted to the floor and didn't budge a mil.

She rested her fingers lightly against his chest. "Have you ever thought about giving us a try again? I'm sure that when you wake up in the middle of the night and it's pitch dark and quiet as a grave, you think about me and remember the good times. We did have some good times, you know. Some really, really good times." She began trailing her fingers downward over his tee shirt. The cotton was so thin that He could feel each individual cherry-red fingernail scribing a line in his skin.

He caught her wrist before she reached his waist and lifted her hand back up to a safe zone. He was keenly aware that the other students kept glancing in their direction. "We're in public, you know," he said quietly.

"You didn't mind being in public when we were dating," she whispered. "I remember one Sunday afternoon when you almost gave that old couple heart attacks in Point Pleasant Park."

"That wasn't all my doing, you know. Besides, who told them to start pushing into those bushes?"

"Who told you to push into my bush?" She grinned.

"As I recall, you did."

"I was naughty that day, wasn't I?" She leaned up to whisper in his ear, "You know something? I'm more experienced now. That means that I know how to be even naughtier."

Lord save him, she was making him as hard as steel. The goddamn bitch could still grab him by the balls just by whispering in his ear.

He looked over his shoulder at the table saw. His project was ruined. "Why are you here?" he asked.

"I thought that it would be fun to learn how to work with wood," she said. "Every woman should be skilled at working with wood."

"I think you already know everything a woman needs to know about that."

"I thought that there'd be more raw material here." She looked around the room. "What's with this, anyway? There're only two men in this class, you and that guy who came with his wife. Why aren't all these women taking cooking classes like they're supposed to?"

"I guess they all came here for the same reason that you did. Which kind of spoils their strategy, doesn't it?" Sometimes there is justice in the world and women like Phoebe get exactly what they deserve. Not always, maybe not often, but sometimes. "I bet all the single men are in a cooking class right now, wondering where the women went."

"Are you married?" she asked, looking at his ringless finger.

"Nope. I got kind of discouraged by the whole marriage thing ten years ago. You?"

"I got married again," she said. "but it didn't last."

"Just one more time?"

She had the grace, or guile, to blush. "Twice, actually. One lasted for four years and one for less than two."

"You take those saps to the cleaner, too?"

"I kept the same lawyer that I used in our divorce. I can be loyal that way."

"I'm sure that it pays to be faithful."

"I'm always faithful."

"Now you've come to a night class to look for husband number four?"

"Not necessarily," she said with a small smile. "Maybe I should be happy that I found husband number one for a second time."

He laughed out loud at that.

People turned to look again.

She hit him on the chest. Hard. "That's not funny. I'm serious. We're older now. We won't make the same mistakes again."

"I won't make the same mistake again."

She looked at him for a long time.

He returned her stare. He could see the wheels turning behind her eyes. Forget the mills of the gods, he was watching the mill of the devil, herself. That mill grinds fast and course and spits out rubble by the ton.

Finally she said, "There's a wine bar in the Holiday Inn over on Robie. If I ask nice, do you think you could buy me a glass of chardonnay? For old times' sake?"

He'll never know why, but, Lord save him, instead of a flat,No, he said, "I would but I'm not dressed for a wine bar."

"I'd like to change, too," she replied. "It's a good thing the night's still young. I'll meet you there at nine."

"Many women are afraid of their man's sexuality. These women are not afraid of being abused or degraded. They are simply afraid that their men will want to have sex with them too often. Instead of being thrilled that their men desire them above all others, an amazing number of women try to moderate their lovers' ardor by actively discouraging them from wanting sex. When these women are not refusing sex outright, they are sighing, rolling their eyes, lying impassively in bed waiting for their man to finish, generally doing whatever they can to demonstrate that their lover's affection is an unwelcome imposition.

Nothing could be more destructive to a relationship than the resulting vicious cycle. The harder the man tries to please his woman, the harder she works to discourage him, making him work even harder to please her. And, when the man finally gives up and finds a more accommodating lover, the foolish woman will accuse the selfish bastard of psychological abuse. But she will be complaining only to the empty space where her man used to be.

This manual tells you how to nurture your man's lust for you until it has grown so strong that he is powerless in its grip. When you have your man by his balls, you will own his soul forever. What more could any woman want?"

Page 1,Phoebe's Manual of Practical Sex

She came dressed in what Cory called herbig-game hunting gear.He had begun using that phrase ten years ago when they had agreed that their marriage was doomed and they should lead independent lives. Phoebe had dressed like this to go to clubs and date other men.

For a while, many other men.

Cory had not minded. Or counted. By the time she began clubbing, he was so done with her that his only wish was that she find another man to take her off his hands as soon as possible.

Not having seen her in a decade, he could appreciate her seductive appearance as sincerely as when he first began dating her. When she had been twenty years old, he had been twenty-five and they had been as horny for each other as any young man and woman could be.

At least he had been horny for her. Later events had made him doubt that her horniness had been as sincere as his.

Tonight, though, she looked as ripe for a tumble in the sack as ever.

Soft white pulchritude overflowed her low-cut décolleté. Crimson silk hugged her heart-shaped rear. Nude-colored stockings were so sheer that he would have thought that he was looking at tanned legs if he didn't know better. Black pumps matched the wide black belt that caressed her waist.

Phoebe knew how to buy clothes better than any woman he ever known. That was no surprise considering how much time she devoted to pouring over fashion magazines and sorting through racks of designer rags in high-end boutiques.

It was an expensive vocation, but he was only one of the many men who had paid for her self-acquired education in the art of fashion.

Despite having sailed past her thirty-fourth birthday recently, she was a joy for any male eye. When he considered how much the view had cost him, he felt free to ogle her openly as she crossed the room.

She grinned and said, "Like what you see, Cory?" leaning close so that he could hear her quiet, breathy voice.

"You're still a world-class beauty," he replied.

"You're a handsome fellow, yourself," she said as she sat in the overstuffed chair next to his.

She never hesitated to lie to a man's face. That hadn't changed in the last ten years.

He smiled at her. "Am I your big game tonight?"

"Every time I dress up, I always remember that you called my best outfitsbig game hunting gear.It still makes me smile." But she looked serious. "Do you want to be my big game tonight?"

"I've never known you to give a man a choice before."

"I told you that I've changed. I respect men more now."

"Does a cat show its respect for a mouse by playing with it before it eats it?"

"You're so cynical."

"I used to be young and innocent. Then I married you. Now I'm old and cynical."

"I like cynicism in a man. Young and innocent is boring. I don't want you to be boring."

He considered that for a while. "You still want that glass of wine?" he asked.

"Yes. I'd like that."

He continued to ponder his cynicism while he fetched a glass of Blomindon Estate Chardonnay for her and a pint of Garrison Nut Brown Ale for himself.

When he handed her the glass, he said, "I'm not so cynical with other women, you know. You bring out the worst in me."

"Worst? Best? Who's to judge what's bad and what's good? I told you, I've come to like cynical. Besides, I doubt that you're as cynical as you think."

"Why?"

"You know what a cynical man would do right now?"

"What?"

"A cynical man would pretend to be interested in me. He'd tell me that he's never stopped thinking about me. He'd whisper in my ear that he still loves me. He'd tell me that our marriage never ended in his heart. He'd ask me to remember how much I was in love with him when I married him. He'd tell me that he wishes that our honeymoon had never ended. He'd say that he'd like to forget everything that happened after we came back from Cancun. He'd ask me if we could erase the bad years from our memory and go back to that joyful time. He'd suggest that we get a room in this motel, go upstairs, and start our honeymoon all over again. And you know what would happen?"

"What?"

"I'd be so charmed with the idea that I'd go up to that room with him and we'd spend a glorious night making love. And, in the morning, that cynical man wouldn't even thank me for giving him a night of pleasure. He'd say that I owed him that for all the grief that I'd caused him. Then he'd walk out the door and leave me crying, feeling used and dumped. That's what a cynical man would do."

"I'm not that cynical." But Cory wondered if he was. Spending the night with the beautiful woman in the red silk dress would be wonderful even if she was his ex-wife. He could easily convince himself that she did deserve to be used and dumped for all the grief that she'd give him. Even she admitted as much.

"Are you sure that you couldn't be that cynical?" she asked. "You could try. Because, if you ask me to spend the night with you in this hotel, I will. I'll go upstairs with you right now and make love to you all night even though I already know that you're going to use me and dump me in the morning. You wouldn't even have to lie to me about liking me. All you have to say is, 'Let's go get a room,' and I'll say, 'Yes,' and we'll go upstairs. Will you say that? Will you say, 'Let's go get a room?'"

He looked at her generous breasts pushing half out of her dress and wanted desperately to feel their weight in his hands. He thought about how hot and wet her sex had been on their honeymoon. His gaze wandered down to her knees and imagined them naked, spread wide, pressing against his rib cage as he pushed slowly in and out of her. All that was his for the asking.

It had been almost two months since he last made love to a women and that woman had been only a pale shadow of Phoebe.

Lord knows where he found the strength to say, "Thank you, but I think I'll pass on your offer."

She pouted.

God, he wanted to kiss those perfect pouting lips.

"Why?" she asked. "Don't you think I mean it? Believe me, it you say the word, you'll be making love to me before that beer gets warm. You remember me being good in bed when I was twenty? Well I guarantee that I'm better now. I'll give you a night that you'll never forget."

"Why are you doing this?"

"On impulse. I had no idea that you were going to be in that woodworking class tonight. But when I saw you, I remembered how much I wanted you once upon a time and I realized that I still want you. Even if I can't get your heart, even if the only part of you that I can get is your cock and even if that's only for a few hours, I'll take it. That part of you for that amount of time is better than nothing at all. Please give me that much of yourself. Let's make one more happy memory together."

"You are the most tempting woman that I've ever met. But the answer is stillno. I am cynical. I can see what you are doing and I won't play your game."

"What am I doing?"

"You're doing what you always do. You're bullying me. Again."

"Bullying you?" she laughed her throaty, sexy laugh. "I'm offering myself to you for the night with no strings attached. In the morning, you're going to walk back out of my life, leaving me crying my eyes out in an empty hotel room. And you think you're the one who's being bullied?"

"No question about it. You bully men with your sexuality. You always have and you always will. I don't blame you for it. You can't help it. It's your nature. You're the scorpion who has to sting the frog, no matter the cost to him or you. The thing is, I know you now. I paid heavy dues to be a member of a small and exclusive club of men who know what's in your heart. If I were any other man, I'd be riding up that elevator with you right now, throwing myself into your trap. But I'm not any other man. I'm your cynical ex."

"What trap? What can I possibly have to gain by giving you my body tonight and watching you walk away tomorrow? What could you possibly lose?"

"What could a man lose by taking just one small step into quicksand? His life."

"You think I'm quicksand?"

"I know you're quicksand. You drown your men. You say, 'one night and then I can leave.' But you know damned well that I'm not going to be able to walk away in the morning. By morning, I'm going to be up to my knees and sinking fast. Before I leave, you're going to offer me a second night next weekend. Something more exotic. Something that I've never tried before. Something that I can't even imagine right now. And I'm going to agree because you're not asking for a commitment. You're going to keep telling me that I can walk away any time. I won't be able to stop myself from taking another step into the quicksand. I'll be in it up to my waist in a couple of weeks. By Christmas, I'll be up to my eyeballs and you'll be sucking the air from my lungs. I know because I lived through that nightmare when I was young and naive. But I'm too old and cynical to make that mistake again."

She rose from her chair, took him by the hand and pulled him to his feet, wrapped her arms around him and kissed him in the middle of the lounge. Her lips were soft and warm, her kiss gentle and inviting. It was long and slow and sweet. It might have been the best kiss that he would ever experience.

"My poor boy," she whispered in his ear. "Please tell me that I didn't do this to you. That I didn't make you so cynical that you're afraid to enjoy my gift, freely given."

He didn't push her away. He loved the downy pressure of her breasts against his chest, the caress of her thigh against his leg, the weight of her cheek on his shoulder. He could handle that much pleasure without risk of being sucked back down into her life. He had a limit and he knew that he could stop before he crossed the point of no return.

"You don't have to make love to me," she whispered. "You can take me up to a room, undress me, and just look. Kiss and caress and hold me. You don't have to take your clothes off. We can enjoy being together without going any further than this. The night doesn't have to end just because you don't trust me enough to give yourself a full measure of pleasure. My gift is to give you as much as you want and no more."

The devil knows more about temptation than any man. That is her genius.

To have Phoebe in his bed, naked, for the night without being obligated to make love to her, to be able to enjoy hours of gentle affection was infinitely more attractive than sweaty, grunting, primal sex.

She knew how to hone the thin edge of her weapon to razor sharpness.

He forced himself to say, "Let's sit down and finish our drinks." Putting his hand into a blast furnace, walking into an inferno, climbing into the fieriest pit of Hell would have required less willpower than refusing her offer. But, to his eternal credit, he managed to force the words past his lips.

She released him and returned to her seat. "No oak," she said, after taking her first sip of the chardonnay. "It's so nice to taste the fruitiness without feeling like my tongue has been coated in sawdust. You have good taste in wine."

He ignored the compliment. He had ordered a glass of the house chardonnay. It was the sommelier who deserved the credit. Undoubtedly she knew that.

"You talk about giving me a gift but I know better. Everything you do comes with strings attached. I'm not taking the bait."

"This is getting tedious," she said. "You keep talking about me trapping you, but you're wrong. I've not asked you for a thing. I haven't even asked you what you're doing for a living. For all I know, you're broke and homeless. How can I be trying to trap you if you don't have anything that I want?"