I stood at the door of the club, watching my husband’s mouth pressing tightly against the blonde woman’s undressed bosom Novel – RUBY I feel the bed dip when Jenna gets up.Her alarm hasn’t gone off yet, nor have our children invaded, but she’s up, which means she will get the kids’ lunches made, breakfast ready, and then get dressed. Getting dressed, I decide I need a ride before work, so I make my way to the kitchen where I pause when Jenna looks up from the stove as she makes french toast, and I catch her glare.
The kids are at the table, waiting for their hot breakfast while she and I have a silent confrontation. The stare. The cold eyes, pinched lips, rise of the jaw, stare that says she is a woman bent on making me pay for the pain I caused her.
Yep, we have been together far too long; the glare doesn’t even make me want to fix it. I’m numb, dead to all this. Pecking my kids on the tops of each of their heads, I brush past Vida and leave.
It’s a terrible move, but I will not be led around by my manhood if that’s what she’s thinking. The glare, the stare, the power of a woman’s eyes is lost on me. Not today, not tomorrow, not anymore.
There was a time when her glare would have me stopping in my tracks to make it right. However, the divide between us is too great. I’m too frustrated with myself, with her, and with us to even try to fix this. Climbing on my bike, I turn the key and twist the throttle, making it rev.
The vibrations, the power, the sound, the beast beneath me is alive. The dragon inside me is ready to breathe fire. Pulling out, I take the back roads to work, hitting every curve wide open. “¿Dónde está el ardor?” I say to myself. “Where is the fire, the heat, the passion? I want to feel the burn again.” The air around me feels thick. The humidity has me wanting to yank off my helmet, my cut, and my shirt.
A storm is in the air, and it’s not the one in my house. There was a time when Jenna would have gone ballistic over me leaving without saying a word. Pulling up to our small single-wide, I find trash bags of stuff out front. What? I think as I park the car.
When I go to the back door we use, I find Jenna with a screwdriver and lock in her hand. She drops the package as she focuses on what she’s trying to do. The clang of her screwdriver hitting the wooden step sounds around us as I try to remain quiet.
“No mames,” she mutters in Spanish slang, picking up the tool. “Vida,” I say, causing her to jump. “Oh, he speaks,” she fires out at me, continuing to fight with the lock on our door. I laugh, and she stands from her squatting position to turn and glare at me. Eyes squinted, lips pinched together, chin raised in defiance, she stares, and my manhood gets hard.