Our Downfall

Chapter One

Caleb

This was it. Just like every year for Dom’s birthday, I picked him out a special treat. Was it maybe a little fucked up that I was perfectly okay with giving my husband to someone else? Probably, but it kept our marriage happy and healthy.

There was always one stipulation involved—his present was always a woman.

Dom had been open about being bisexual from the moment we’d met. I was secure enough in myself to know that he wouldn’t have a problem with being with me. Just because he ended up in a relationship with a man, it didn’t make him any less bi. I still let him explore that other side of his sexuality.

It worked for us.

“Hey, Caleb, did you hear about the new hire?”

I looked up from my computer as Adam leaned over the side of my cubicle. My eyebrow raised at him. “There’s always a new hire. We go through people so often here it’s amazing that you and I still have a job.”

Adam laughed. “No shit, man. With the way Tiff hires and fires people...”

Dom was one of those people. The second my boss found out that my husband also worked in the department, one of us had to go. Since I had more seniority, I stayed while Dom looked for a job elsewhere.

As if on cue, the head woman in charge breezed past while Adam ducked back to his desk and tried to act like he was working.

A woman, who must have been the new employee, followed Tiff.

She had long, silky blonde hair that streamed down the back of her dark blazer.

The position called for business casual, but maybe this lady would have an edge if she was sucking up on day one by being completely dressed to the nines.

Once they were out of sight, Adam popped his head over the edge of my workspace again.

“She’s hot, right?”

I laughed. “Adam, you know that I’m gay, right? Married, at that. You’ve met my husband.”

He chuckled and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still appreciate a beautiful person.”

This was true. I could admit that she was very pretty, but I didn’t have the urge to pursue her like Adam apparently did.

Instead of continuing to entertain the conversation and risk my job further, because Tiff had been a little pissed that Dom and I had tried to pull one over on her, I turned back to my computer.

The whole thing with her letting my husband go was such bullshit.

Married couples worked in the same workspaces all the time.

It didn’t mean we were less productive. Having Dom there actually made my workdays more enjoyable, and my productivity skyrocketed.

Tell that to the boss from hell, though.

I would have quit long ago had the pay not been amazing.

“Are you Caleb Marshal?”

I jumped because I’d been paying way too much attention to my computer.

When I spun in my chair around, I sucked in a breath to see the new hire standing there behind me.

When she’d walked by earlier, I hadn’t been able to take her in properly.

Adam hadn’t been joking—the woman was downright stunning.

What was unusual was that I couldn’t stop staring at her.

If I thought she was so attractive, what would Dom think of her?

Of course, there was no guarantee that she’d even be into that, and even proposing the idea could land me with a giant sexual harassment case, but damn, this lady seemed worth it.

“Uh, yeah. That’s me.” I gave her a half-smile, holding out my hand for her to shake. She took it with her dainty hand, and I noticed her manicured French-tipped nails.

The weirdest part of it was the zap that shot through my arm at the contact. I’d never experienced that before, not with a woman anyway. Her head tilted to the side to study me, as if she’d noticed something different herself. Could she tell that I was panicking a little?

She smiled, finally dropping my hand before looking around my cubicle. “I’m Katia Petrov. I was told that if I wanted to be trained by the best, I needed to find you.”

At least my boss wasn’t a total bitch and had some sort of faith in me. But if she knew what was going through my head and how I intended to proposition this woman to sleep with my husband, she might not think so highly of me.

Easy does it, Caleb. Let’s ease her into things. We can scare her off with your big idea later.

“So I got fired from my last job when I got caught sleeping with one of my coworker’s husbands. She was furious and told the boss that I was out to destroy her marriage.”

I nearly spat out my beer as Adam leaned in, listening to every word Katia was saying. My eyes bugged out of my head because, if that was the case, this woman had no scruples when it came to sleeping with people. Maybe it wouldn’t be so hard to proposition her after all.

Adam leaned closer to her, and if I wasn’t careful, he’d swoop in and claim her before I ever got the chance. My hand landed on his shoulder, pulling him back before he could do something stupid like hit on her. He looked up at me, eyes shrouded in confusion.

“But were you trying to destroy her marriage?” I don’t know why I asked it. I didn’t really care.

She laughed, taking a sip of her dirty martini, setting it on the bar top before looking back at me. “I wasn’t, no, but her husband sure was. He wasn’t happy and wanted her gone. I don’t like to brag, but I know how to keep someone happy.”

Something weird swirled in my gut, and when I realized that the statement had aroused me, my eyes widened.

I wasn’t against men and women. Hell, sex was sex.

Love was love and all of that. Before I had completely come out of the closet, I’d fooled around with a woman or two.

It’s how I knew they just didn’t do it for me.

But when Katia unbuttoned her jacket, her breasts spilling out to fill her blouse, my mouth watered. That was new. What was happening to me?

Adam noticed. He nudged my shoulder as I picked up my beer and took another sip. I shot him a glare before I worked up the balls to ask Katia what I really wanted to ask her.

“How do you feel about sharing?”

It was a bold question, but the woman didn’t flinch. She took another drink of her martini before her piercing gaze met mine. “I’ve never been against it. Some people love to have a good time, and if that means bringing in an extra partner, I’m game.”

It was as if she sensed what I was getting at, meeting my dare for what it was.

Her eyebrows lifted in question, as if begging me to take the leap and utter the words that wanted to slip past my lips.

Adam knew about my and Dom’s deal, so it wouldn’t be weird to go there in front of him, but I’d clearly just cock-blocked the man.

“So if someone propositioned you and said that they liked gifting a special playmate to their spouse, you wouldn’t be offended by that?”

She laughed, downing the rest of her drink.

When she rose from her seat and stood in front of me, my skin tingled.

All I wanted to do was reach out and grab her waist, to pull her to me and feel what her soft body would feel like against mine.

My breath quickened, and I needed to get myself under control because this wasn’t about me.

This was about Dom and his desires, but I couldn’t deny that Katia was doing something to me.

Something completely unexpected. Something that I didn’t exactly hate.

“What are you asking me, Mr. Marshal?”

Adam snorted, picking up his beer and taking a drink. He stole our attention for just a moment before we focused on each other again.

“My husband, Ms. Petrov. Every year on his birthday, I give him a special gift. What do you say to being this year’s present?”

She bit her bottom lip and my eyes trailed to the motion, glued to the red lipstick as she worked the flesh between her teeth. Her eyes sparkled with mischief as she leaned in closer to me. “And what about you, Mr. Marshal? What role do you play in all of this?”

The air rushed from my lungs because in the last eight years of marriage, I’d never had a woman ask me that question. None of them seemed to care that I was throwing them at my husband or that I wasn’t involved, but Katia? She was so different.

“I’m just a bystander. I don’t participate. This is all for Dom.”

She raised one perfectly arched eyebrow at me as if challenging that notion. And maybe she would win. She was already playing my body like a well-oiled machine, and I’d never had that response to a woman before.