An Affair to Forget

We were standing in the entryway of my townhouse.

"Don't you have anything to say Tom?"

What was the right thing to say to the married woman that I had been carrying on an affair with for the last 4 years as she was breaking it off. Don't go back to your wife and kids?

"I guess not Em."

Emily sighed and looked down at the small roll-aboard suitcase that held her few things she had kept at my place. Toiletries, a nightgown, a pair of jeans, a few t-shirts, underwear, socks and a pair of running shoes. I had sat on the bed and watched her pack it.

"I'm sorry. For what I said earlier. It was mean and unfair to you." she said in an uncharacteristically small voice.

"Me too. For everything."

She looked up at me, a question on her face. "What do you have to be sorry for?"

I scrubbed my hands over my face. "Shit Em, I don't know. What am I supposed to say? 'Gee Em, I sure wish we could go on fucking you when you're in town'? Or how about 'Hey, thanks for all the blowjobs. Hope you have a nice life.'?"

The hurt look that flashed across her normally stoic face broke my heart, but I was hurt, angry and confused myself.

She shook her head. "I guess I had that coming." She reached into the pocket of her trousers and pulled out my house key, holding it out to me. It had a greater sense of finality than anything else that had happened that day. I took it without a word.

She pulled up the handle of the suitcase, turned and opened the door. She stepped out onto the landing, paused, looked back over her shoulder and said "For what it's worth, I do still care for you."

I pushed the door closed; my face expressionless.

I didn't ever intend to have an affair or be a homewrecker. When Emily and I had met 6 years ago our relationship was friendly and professional. We both worked for a mid-sized telecom firm specializing in corporate accounts. She was in outside sales handling the southwest region, based out of Phoenix, and I was in program management at the corporate office in Los Angeles. We communicated almost daily via Zoom, phone, email and text and met face-to-face at quarterly reviews and the occasional customer meeting.

I was five years out of college, single, my career prospects at the company were very bright and I made more than a decent living. Emily was about 10 years my senior but looked much younger than her late-30s. Her 5'8" frame was fit and lithe, which she attributed to good genes, her military training and a vegetarian diet. Her angular face with its high cheekbones, strong brow and sharp but feminine jawline was softened by waves of light brown hair that she wore shoulder length when not pulled into a severe bun for work.

Emily was married to Cara, who by all accounts was a wonderful woman. She and Emily had adopted their first child, Sierra. They had a second child, Devon, a couple of years later. Emily had given birth to Devon. I didn't learn of the circumstances around Devon's conception until after Emily and I had begun our affair.

Despite all the tropes and cliches, I'm not sure any affair starts off "innocently", and Emily and I were no exception. It started in Albuquerque.

It was late in the evening, and I was at home in my townhouse in the San Fernando Valley when my company cell phone started vibrating on the sofa table behind my couch. I craned my neck around and saw it was Emily. I muted the sound on Monday Night Football and answered "Hey Em. How's Albuquerque?"

For the few years I had been working with Emily I had never seen or heard her sound anything but confident and self-possessed. She was everything you could want in someone in outside sales. She was always poised and personable and had an encyclopedic knowledge of all of her clients and our products. So, the slight note of anxiety in her voice was surprising.

"It's a mess out here Tom. The customer is demanding that we accelerate deliveries on the first three lots. They're threatening to second source us on the next contract if we don't deliver."

I shot up off the sofa "WHAT?!?! They can't .... Jesus .... This is bullshit."

"I know it is, you know it is, and they probably do too. But Tom, going after this customer was my idea. Shit ... we spent most of this year's selling budget on capturing this contract and we bought in for barely above cost. If this goes Tango Uniform, it's my ass."

Tango uniform ... military code for "Tits Up"... meaning dead. Emily had served two tours in the Army and was still a reservist, which is where she met Cara.

"Okay ... okay. What do you need me to do?"

"How fast can you get to Albuquerque?"

I looked at my watch. No chance of a flight tonight. "I can catch the first flight I can get out in the morning. I'll need to clear it with the old man."

"Already got it. I'll forward the email."

I laughed, "You knew I'd say yes."

"What can I say? I'm good. Tom?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks. I owe you. Text me your flight info as soon as you have it. I'll pick you up at the airport."

The meetings the next four days with the customer were brutal. People think government contracting is easy. It's not. We had to get most of the program team out to Albuquerque, but in the end, we negotiated a reasonable delivery acceleration and the customer agreed to pay for most of our costs to expedite. But not the travel costs for the team. So Emily and I sent the rest of the team home on Friday, but she and I had to stay the weekend to finalize everything on Monday morning.

"Emily, you handled that brilliantly." I said over dinner in the hotel restaurant that night. "I don't think I've ever seen the Major smile."

Emily and I clinked our glasses, hers a house chardonnay and mine just tonic water with a couple of limes. We were staying at a moderately priced hotel chain, which is all the old man would approve for us for the weekend and the following Monday.

She smiled. Emily had a great smile but only from the nose down. Her lips weren't overly generous, but her mouth was wide, and her teeth were sparklingly white. However, her smile rarely reached her eyes which always seemed guarded and observant.

"The bastard should have smiled. Even with the consideration they agreed to, this is still going to cut into what little margin we have."

I shrugged. "We knew this contract was going to have thin margins. But there's a lot of promise for a long-term payoff on future contracts. You let me worry about the margin on this contract."

She looked at me for a long time, studying me. Finally, she said "How are you so poised and confident at your age?"

I laughed and took another drink. "I guess I put on a good show if I fooled you. I almost wet myself when the Colonel walked in and started yelling and accusing us of not wanting to support the warfighter."

"Harker? The guy is a fucking blowhard. Warfighters my ass. That pencil pushing REMF hasn't seen a day of combat in his life."

"REMF?" Sometimes Emily's military slang got past me. She had done two combat tours and sounded like it.

"R ... E ... M ... F. Stands for Rear Echelon Mother Fucker."

I laughed again. Emily swore like the soldier she had been, and in many ways still was.

"Seriously Tom. You're ... what ... late 20's? And a program manager already? There are people at the company twice your age but only half as accomplished."

Emily's frank assessment of my situation was a little embarrassing, but she wasn't wrong. I lost my dad to a drunk driver at a fairly young age, which is one reason I don't drink, and my mom was never the same after that. I had to grow up fast and balanced school, part time jobs and high school athletics so that I had a chance at getting into a decent college and affording it. Which I did. Not a prestigious one, but a good enough engineering program to get me on with our company. So, I guess I am pretty disciplined.

"I just do what I have to do." I said.

She nodded. "Well, all I can say is that if you were an officer, I wouldn't have any problem serving under you."

Her turn of phrase exploded in my head. "Serving under you." I had a flash vision of Emily naked underneath me, her legs wrapped around my hips, looking up at me from between my arms which were pillared on either side of her head.

Full disclosure here. I found Emily unbelievably attractive from the day we first met. It went way past her physical attractiveness. Her mind was incredible. She absorbed facts like a sponge, to be retrieved instantaneously on demand. Her tactical and strategic comprehension of almost any situation was very well respected not only at our company but in our market. She was well read, had a dry rapier-like wit and used it effectively.

But Emily was older than me and married with a couple of kids. And despite my attraction to her, I had to admit she was also a little intimidating. She was a decorated combat veteran and didn't suffer fools gladly. So, it wasn't impossible to set my feelings aside. Difficult, but not impossible.

Emily snapped her fingers in front of my eyes "Earth to Tom."

"Huh?"

"Where did you go for a minute there?"

"Oh." I hadn't realized I had retreated so far into my erotic thoughts. "Nowhere, just thinking about Monday and what's waiting for me next week back home."

She rolled her eyes. "Sufficient unto the day buddy. I am going to try to forget all that shit tonight, at least for a couple of hours. Speaking of which, do you mind if I ... " she gestured at her empty wine glass.

"No, not at all. We aren't on expense tonight, so what we spend is up to us."

Emily had three more fairly large glasses of wine, bringing her total on the night up to five. I had traveled with her enough to know she had a fairly high tolerance for alcohol, so I didn't think anything of it. We sat in the restaurant talking shop, small talk and sports. Eventually I noticed that we were the last ones in the restaurant, and I could see the waitress and a busboy were giving us looks and looking at their watches.

I nodded towards them and said to Emily "I think the staff would like us to leave."

Emily glanced at her watch. "Shit, this early? It's Friday night and I'm not ready to call it." She looked thoughtful and said "The bars are still open. You want to go get a drink?"

"Uhm, sure. Why not? Nothing waiting for me in my hotel room except bad TV."

Emily gave me a sly look. "Still no girlfriend or main squeeze to call?"

My status as a single guy didn't come up a lot but was the subject of some office gossip. A few of the women had tried to set me up with single friends which I politely declined. A couple of admins had made plays for me which I deflected. I don't think I am the best looking single guy in the office but I'm 6'4" and have retained most of my fitness from my high school and college track and field days, so I do get a little attention.

I shook my head, maybe a little ruefully, as I signed the check that the waitress had brought over at our signal. "Nope." My girlfriend from college and I had split up after attempting a long-distance relationship for about a year. It was a mutual and relatively amicable breakup, until I found out a year later that she had been cheating on me within a month of moving to Huntsville. I haven't returned any of her birthday wishes text messages since.

The country bar was noisy but not raucous, and in our business casual clothes we stood out a little from the jeans and boots crowd. But the bartender was friendly and from what I could tell she poured generous cocktails and shots, which Emily appreciated, in retrospect a little too much. We had continued our small talk from the hotel restaurant until Emily abruptly took the conversation in a very personal direction.

"So, what was her name?" Emily said over the country music playing.

"Who?" I responded.

"The girl who damaged you?"

I was a little taken aback but answered. "Ilyanna. And what do you mean damaged?"

Emily rolled her eyes, which were a little booze hazy. "Oh, c'mon man. Half the women at work would do you in the ladies' room given the chance. And the other half are trying to hook you up with their single friends. But you won't rise to the bait." She sipped at her drink, then sucked in some ice. She chewed the ice and said around it "Ilyanna huh? Russian?"

"Ukranian."

She nodded. "Well, that puts that rumor to rest."

"What rumor?"

Emily chuckled "That you're gay."

I laughed "Seriously?"

"Uh huh. Kathy in Finance was planning on introducing you to her cousin Michael."

"Well. I'm sorry to disappoint both Kathy and Michael. But no, I am decidedly straight." As soon as I said it I knew I had made a mistake.

Emily winced a little and barked a laugh. "Ouch." she said.

"Oh shit Em. That came out bad. I didn't mean to ..."

Emily shook her head. "Relax. You can't possibly offend me. My WIFE might have given you the side eye, but not me. Besides, I was pretty sure they were wrong. I have pretty good gay-dar."

I was getting a little uncomfortable with the conversation, and Emily was getting steadily drunker. I looked at my watch "Well, I don't know about you, but I'm bushed. Settle up and call it a night?"

Emily nodded. "Yeah, good idea." I reached for my wallet, but she shook her head. "No, this is on me. Besides, all you drank was tonic water." She waved over the bartender and closed out her tab and mine.

The drive back to the hotel was quiet. I got the sense Emily knew she had made me a little uncomfortable. When I parked and started to get out she said "Wait, Tom."

I sat back down and waited.

"I'm sorry." Emily said. "I'm a little drunk and got too personal."

"It's okay Em. Seriously. No offense taken."

She laughed. "And that's what everyone finds so attractive about you. You're so open, poised and mature, way beyond your years. And you are so damned easy to talk to. That girl.. Ilyanna? Shit, she really tossed away a treasure."

"Thanks." I said.

"Tom?"

"Yeah?"

Emily pivoted in her seat with incredible speed, put one hand behind my head, one hand on my inner thigh, pulled me around and kissed me. Her kiss was savage and deep, her tongue plunging into my mouth. I could taste the booze on her breath, but it wasn't unpleasant. The rapidity with which it happened stunned me into paralysis. I couldn't respond or pull away and wasn't sure which was the right thing to do anyway.

She broke the kiss and pivoted back into her seat just as quickly. She seemed as stunned as I was. "Oh fuck ... fuck fuck fuck." she said, shaking her head. "Jesus Tom, I'm so fucking sorry. That was way the hell out of line."

I took a deep breath, trying to gather myself. "No, it's okay Em. No harm done."

She gave me a sidelong glance. "I don't suppose you'd consider NOT reporting this to HR?"

I laughed, still a little shaky from what had just happened. "Hadn't even considered it."

She nodded, still not looking at me. "Thanks." She opened her door and hopped out. "I'll.. uhm ... hit you up for breakfast?"

"Sure."

Emily all but sprinted across the lot towards the lobby.

I waited to hear from Emily until around 9:30 the next morning and then went down for breakfast myself. The complimentary hotel buffet was the usual collection of rubbery scrambled eggs, undercooked bacon and miniature pastries. But the coffee was decent, so I settled for toast and a couple of the hard-boiled eggs that didn't look too questionable.

About 30 minutes after I sat down the lobby doors slid open and Emily trotted in. She was in running shorts and a sports bra. Her tan skin had a sheen of sweat and her hair, pulled into a loose ponytail, was damp. She looked around, spotted me, waved and walked over with her hands on her hips, still breathing a little heavy from her run. The muscles in her thighs and stomach flexed and unflexed as she walked, and her tattooed right bicep rippled. With the memory of her kiss still with me, I was a little overpowered by her sexuality. I had barely gathered my wits when she got to my table.

"Sorry I didn't join you for breakfast, but I needed to sweat out last night's drinking." she said as she sat across from me. She looked back at the buffet, but the lobby staff was already shutting it down. "Shit." she mumbled. She looked at my almost untouched glass of juice and nodded at it "You going to drink that?"

I shook my head and gave a 'help yourself' gesture to the glass, which she took up and finished quickly.

We sat in silence for a minute before she broke it. "Listen, no hard feelings about ... you know."

"None." I said.

She nodded. "Look, I need to catch up on some work this morning, and I should call home and spend some quality Facetime with Cara and the kids." She looked at her watch. "What do you say about 1400 for a late lunch? My treat."

"Would that be 2 pm for us civilians?"

She laughed. "Sorry, old habits. So, you good for that? I asked the desk clerk this morning about where to get the best green chili cheeseburgers in town. Sounds good to you?"

I gave her a quizzical look. "I thought you were a vegetarian?"

She stood up. "Sure, but I'm not religious about it. Jesus, loosen up." She turned and headed for the elevators. Her ass and legs in her running shorts were devastating.

I went up to my room, caught up on some emails and watched some TV. I was distracted by what had happened the night before and confused by my lustful feelings towards Emily. She was a co-worker, married with kids and older than me. The fact that she was married to a woman was no big deal to me. She was probably bi, which honestly was even more of a turn on. It had gotten too hot for a run outside, so I decided to go down to the hotel gym and get in a run on the treadmill to burn off some energy. It didn't help. I'm not proud of this, but when I got back to my room and into the shower, I jerked off fantasizing about Emily.

The green chili cheeseburgers lived up the recommendation from the hotel, and our conversation over lunch was relaxed and mostly work related. The awkwardness between us from the night before had dissipated a little, but the white low-cut V-neck white t-shirt she was wearing wasn't helping me. Her breasts were on the small side so there wasn't any cleavage to speak of, but her small nipples had hardened a little from the restaurant's air conditioning and she wasn't wearing a bra. I hoped I only glanced while we ate and talked and wasn't staring, but honestly couldn't be sure.

Emily drove us back to the hotel. The Sandia mountains around Albuquerque were picture postcard beautiful and we rolled the windows down, enjoying the warm high desert air and smells.

"Tom?"

"Yeah?"

"About the thing that happened."

"Em, I'd really rather not discuss it."

"I think we need to."

"Well, I don't." My tone was sharper than I intended.

There was a long pause. Finally, she said "Okay."

The rest of the drive was silent, as was our walk from the car to the hotel lobby and into the elevator. She pushed 3 and I pushed 5 and we retreated to neutral corners. The doors opened at 3 but she didn't get out. Instead, she pushed the "Close Doors" button, pushed 5 and then closed the distance between us in less than a heartbeat.

We broke our kiss just as the chime rang for the fifth floor. Emily's whisper was husky "Take me to your room."

The first time was frantic. We were kissing and tearing at each other's clothes almost before the door to my room swung shut. Emily grabbed me by the shirt and pulled me backwards to the bed. She sat and tugged at my belt and pants, almost hurting me as she freed my cock which was rock hard. She flopped back on the bed, kicking out of her shoes and wriggling out of her hip hugging jeans. She laid back and didn't bother to take off her panties, she just pulled them aside and whispered, "Fuck me."