Tango on the Razor's Edge Ch. 15

Without conscious thought, I stood up and collected my coat.

Juanita asked, "Where are you going?"

"Chicago," I replied.

"Now?"

"Yes. Now."

"She's going to want to keep you."

"Fuck that. I'm going to find someone new."

She scoffed at me. "It won't make any difference. You'll find another woman just like her, and you'll be worse off than you are now."

I shook my head. "No. It'll be different next time."

Juanita smiled her knowing smile and said, "That's what we say every time. But things never change, do they?"

We held each other in an unspoken exchange for what seemed like an eternity as I considered her words. Was I doomed to the resentful life of a cuckold? Could life in Chicago possibly be worse than what I was living now? It didn't matter. I'd made up my mind, so I turned and left.

***

I was packing the last of the stuff I needed from the kitchen when Holly came through the garage door. "What's going on?" she cooed in her most disarming voice.

"I'm gone," I replied as I wrapped a couple of plates in newspaper and placed them in a cardboard box.

"What do you mean, you're gone?" She looked genuinely confused.

"Come on, don't play dumb with me."

"No, tell me where you're going."

"I'm moving to Chicago."

"In the middle of the night?"

"Yeah, I've got a new job and a place to live lined up."

"But it's dark outside. Why don't you wait until morning? You'll be thinking clearer then."

"I'm thinking clearly enough right now."

In a voice as soothing as warm butter, she said, "Come on, Baby. You're just a little upset right now. Everything will be alright in the morning."

I replied, "I'm not going to fall for that again," as I loaded some silverware and some coffee cups into the box, padded the box out with newspaper, and sealed it with tape.

She protested, "Come on, Baby. Everything will be better in the light of day."

I walked past her, carrying the box. I said, "You're damned right. I'll be in Chicago." I loaded the box into the van and then came back into the house to see if there was anything I'd forgotten.

Holly followed me halfway into the garage and then turned back to follow me back into the house. As I passed her a second time, she put her hand on my shoulder and said, "This isn't fair."

"What are you talking about?"

Her hands secured themselves on my shoulders as she looked me in the eyes. In a tone that was more sultry than soothing, she said, "You're teasing me, and you're doing it on purpose."

"The only thing I'm doing on purpose is packing, just like I was doing before you got here." I made a half-hearted attempt to escape, but she held me in place.

She shook her head. "You know how hot I get when you're like this." I looked from one of her eyes to the other while I considered what she said. "You're working me up on purpose, and you have no intention of satisfying me. That's not fair, and you know it."

In a burst of clarity, I realized she was right. I did know she was turned on. To some extent, I was acting out to wind her up even more. Rather than stop, I asked, "Do you want me to tell you how I feel?" I'd intended to be sarcastic, but it had come out the way it always did when she wanted me to wind her up.

She licked her deep-red-lipstick-coated lips and said, "You know that I do."

"Should we talk about how I felt when you came to talk to me in front of everyone on the floor this afternoon? Or should I talk about when Dan proposed to you in front of everyone at the hoedown this evening?"

With a dead-serious stare, Holly said, "I want you to tell me what you and Juanita talked about."

"Why? What did Juanita tell you?"

"She said you asked about what she knew and when she knew it."

This wasn't the direction I expected our conversation to take. Rather than titillate her, I answered her question. "We just talked about the old days."

"What about them?"

"I was surprised she set me up with someone that she knew would eventually betray me." I paused for a moment before I continued, "I'd thought we were better friends than that."

"Does it make you sad that everyone has betrayed you?" The shift in Holly's demeanor reminded me of a fisherman switching lures.

I hadn't intended to play this game with her again, but I couldn't help myself from asking, "What do you mean?"

Holly's hand slid from my shoulder down to gently stroke my chest. "Everyone you've trusted has betrayed you." I shook my head to protest, but she continued, "I betrayed you with Dan in the most public way possible. Chris will have nothing to do with you. Cathryn treats you like you're pathetic. Juanita set you up with a woman that she knew would cheat on you, and even your best friend, Raul, didn't tell you the truth when we started dating."

"Raul tried to warn me," I protested.

"Maybe, but he didn't tell you everything he knew."

"Why are you doing this?" I asked. I was beginning to feel like the idiot that always falls for the same trick.

Her hand descended to my cock, rock hard under my pants. "Come on, Baby. Be honest with yourself. You know why I do it."

The arc of our conversation was all too familiar. The next step was for me to talk her through another orgasm, but this time my cock was cage-free, and I was tired of being manipulated. I grabbed a fistful of her hair, pulled her head back so that she was looking into my eyes, and said, "You've taken what you want for long enough. I'm going to do what I want for a change."

I'd intended to push her out of my way, get into the van, and leave, but before I could, she sneered, "You're not man enough to take what you want." It was like she was daring me to break out of character.

I should have shouted, 'Good riddance,' as I slammed the door from the outside. Instead, a spark stirring inside of me burst into flames. I was a man, and I desperately wanted to prove it to her. With one hand holding her head, I used the other to force her blouse open, ripping the buttons off in rapid-fire.

"That's silk, you asshole," she snarled.

I didn't give a shit. I pulled the blouse off her shoulders and yanked it free. I undid her bra's fasteners and dropped it to the floor, then I pulled down her panties and pushed them off with my foot. I led her backward to the sofa by the hair and then flopped her down.

She looked up at me from the sofa with breasts exposed, her skirt hiked up, and her legs spread. She laughed. "Do you even remember what to do with a woman?"

Rather than respond, I went into the kitchen and poured myself a Scotch, dropped in a few ice cubes, and took a long slow sip without looking at her. I knew I should have walked out the door without making a fuss, but I just couldn't help it. I needed to prove to myself that I was a man. When I returned to the living room, she was right where I'd left her, waiting to see what I'd do next. I stood over her and said, "I remember what to do with a woman, but you're not a woman anymore. You've morphed into something else."

She spread her legs wide as she scoffed at me. "Like what?"

"I don't know its name, but it's a creature so self-absorbed that it thrives on other people's pain."

With a sensuous thrust of her hips, she said, "No, I'm still a woman. You're the one that's changed. You used to be a man, but now you're my bitch. My crossdressing, sissy, cuckold bitch, and everyone knows it."

I put the glass of melting ice on the coffee table, slowly unbuttoned my shirt, and hung it neatly on the back of a chair. I pushed off my shoes and took off my pants. In my stocking feet with a throbbing erection, I asked, "Is that what you think?"

She rolled from side to side on the couch, daring me to watch her pussy flex. "Yeah, you're a submissive, wimp. Your cage is in my purse. Why don't you go put it on, pussy? It will slide right over your tiny little erection."

I considered slapping her, but I'd never hit her before, and I didn't want to start then.

Holly laughed. "Come on, you coward, admit you're my pussy bitch. Go get the cage, pussy. Put it on, and we'll forget this ever happened."

"You think I'm a coward?"

"Of course, you're afraid of everything."

"What is it you think I'm afraid of now?"

She tipped her head to clear the long, dark locks of hair from her eyes and said, "You're afraid I'm going to hurt you."

"I think we're past that. What else am I afraid of?"

"You're afraid I'll embarrass you."

"We're past that too."

"And you're afraid I'll take away the things you love."

I shook my head. "I've already lost the girls, my friends, and my job. The list of things I'm no longer afraid of losing just goes on and on. You're going to have to be pretty damned creative to scare me."

"If you're so fearless, why are you moving to Chicago?"

It was a good question. Rather than let her maneuver me into another lopsided conversation, I grabbed her ankles and twisted to turn her face down on the couch. I slipped her panties off her ankles and hiked her skirt way up. Then I positioned her body with her knees on the floor and ass sticking out. I knelt down with my knees between hers, so I could take her pussy doggy-style. I slid my rigid cock's tip up and down the length of her slit, which was much wetter than I'd expected. I asked, "You want it bad, don't you bitch?"

Holly scoffed at me. "This pathetic seduction doesn't do anything for me. I'm wet right now because I'm thinking about walking the streets of Paris with Dan."

"We both know that's not true. You're never satisfied after you've been with him. That's why you come home to me."

"Don't be silly. Dan's a stud."

"Maybe, but he never really satisfies you, does he?"

"Of course he does. I'm thinking about him right now."

I aligned my stiff shaft with her slot and slowly pushed it in. "Yeah, right. Once again, your pussy's drenched, and Dan's not here."

"He's the one on my mind."

"Maybe, but my dick is the one in your pussy."

"It sure as hell isn't Dan's dick. I can actually feel his dick when it's inside me."

Her sloppy pussy effortlessly engulfed my erect penis. Once my cock was deep inside of her warm wetness, I held there motionless to calm myself down. It had been so long since I'd had actual PIV sex that I had to concentrate to make it last.

Holly must have sensed my vulnerability. She began to slowly cycle her hips forward and back, forcing me to fuck her even as I tried to restrain myself. "Do you really think a woman like me could want a pathetic sissy like you?"

I wanted to defend myself, but I was so focused on not cumming that I didn't manage to say a single word. Holly smelled blood in the water. She continued, "Dan really knows how to fuck a woman. He knows what he wants, and he can stay hard forever. He's one hundred times the lover you are." She laughed, checked herself, and asked, "But you already know that, don't you, Pussy?"

My hips froze, and my hands clenched her shoulders in my last desperate attempt to not cum.

"You're about to cum, aren't you?" she laughed. "You haven't even started to fuck me, and you're already done." She pulled away, flipped over, and watched my face as she re-inserted my cock. "I've got to see this."

The second transit through her accepting vagina was too much. My shoulders shook as my cock surged, and my body collapsed on top of her.

She asked, "You came, already?"

I wasn't proud of my short hang-time, but anyone denied for as long as I had would have cum as quickly.

I extracted my softening penis and was about to stand up when she asked, "What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm leaving."

"Not before cleaning me up, you aren't. Start licking, Pussy-boi."

At one time, that phrase would have been an enormous turn-on for me. I would have gladly planted my face on her cunt and sucked up every drop of cum. But, instead, I said, "Those days have passed."

Her mood hardened again. "You're so fucking pathetic. They'll eat you alive in Chicago." Before I could catch my breath, she continued, "Besides, they already know all about you there."

"What?" I asked.

"Everyone in town knows your little secrets. Did you really think you could go to work for our biggest customer without someone gossiping?" She was like a grifter who had just played a long con that left their mark with no good options. There was nowhere in the small world of specialized automotive manufacturing that I could go to escape the trap she'd ensnared me in. Once she'd made my predicament clear, she let me unwind the implications.

"Is this what you did to your first three husbands?" I asked.

She shook her head. "Why are you asking about them?"

"Did you set out to ruin the lives of all of us from the beginning?"

"No, it's not about that."

As I stood to get dressed, I asked, "What's it like to be such a vile, heartless bitch?" Before she could answer, I turned and went upstairs to make one final pass through the bedroom and the bathroom. I briskly descended the stairs, scanned the living room, and toured the kitchen.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"I'm leaving."

"But you can't go. They know all about you in Chicago."

"Well, I can't stay here. That's for damned sure."

She snagged her blouse from the floor, slipped it on as she chased me around the house. "Don't you see that leaving isn't going to solve your problems?"

"Yeah, well, maybe, but staying here doesn't solve them either."

"What about the girls?"

"It's like you said, the girls don't give a fuck about me."

"Who's going to take care of them?"

"Maybe their mother could step in for a change."

She clutched the blouse closed as she followed me out of the garage and then watched as I leveled the contents of the minivan. "Are you leaving tonight?"

"I sure as shit can't stay here."

"It's almost midnight. Get a night's sleep and leave in the morning."

I paused for a moment, then asked, "What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean?"

"You were leaving with Dan on his world tour. Why did you come here instead?"

"I live here."

"You haven't slept here in weeks. Why did you come home tonight?"

"Come back inside, and I'll tell you." Her voice was back to its soft coo as she tugged at my arm.

"Fuck that. I've got to get the hell out of here."

While I fumbled through my pocket for the keys, she said, "I lied about the girls not caring about you."

I was taken entirely off guard. She had never admitted to a single fault the whole time we'd been married. She must have sensed a change in my mood because she continued, "I know you have to leave, but if you ever want to come back, the front door will always be open to you."

I smiled bleakly. As much as Holly might have wanted me to believe her, the probability of her waiting chastely for my return was too low to calculate. "I appreciate you saying that, but even if the door's open, you won't be home."

"I'll be here waiting. I promise."

"You may believe what you're saying right now, but, despite your good intentions, you'll be with someone else."

She must have realized I was right because she changed tack again. "You promised me a second chance, remember?"

I fished the keys from my pocket. "Aren't we past that now?"

"No, Baby, it's coming up."

I couldn't help but laugh. "Who are you kidding? You'll be with Dan in some remote part of the world, remember?"

She looked me deeply in the eyes as she touched my cheek with her fingertip in the softest way imaginable and said, "No, Baby. You're the one who's leaving."

"Does that surprise you?"

"You promised to try it my way."

"I did, for two months, and look what it got me."

"But Baby, we're not done yet."

"What? Do you need to write me postcards from Madagascar before we're finished, or is it the girl's grades you're worried about?"

Holly took my hand in hers and softly caressed it. "I just need a little more time."

Rather than succumb to her seductive voice and gentle touch, like I'd done so many times, I extracted my hand from hers and said, "I'm sorry. I've done all I can do." Then, I turned and got into the minivan.

Before I could close the car door, Holly grabbed it and said, "Thank you for trying it my way. I know it was hard for you."

It was surreal to hear she appreciated what I'd done, or at least tried to do. Still, I couldn't help but flinch in anticipation of the curveball that followed anything nice she'd ever said to me. "Yeah, um, you're welcome."

"Call if you ever feel like talking." Even though she seemed sincere, I was set to reply with a skeptical barb when she continued, "Don't assume I won't be here for you. At least give me a chance."

I just shook my head.

"Don't forget about my second chance."

Rather than spend the rest of the night arguing, I said, "Okay, I'll call if I ever feel like it."

"You promise?"

It seemed innocuous enough, so I said, "I promise."

At that, she released her grip on the door. I closed it and drove away.