CHAPTER FIVE
Thatcher
I rubbed the back of my neck. I was starting to sweat a little. I was watching Madison again as she worked. I was well on my way to being as obsessed with her as I’d been before.
Or maybe I was already there.
It seemed that if I wasn’t actively working on something for Caldwell Financial, my mind wandered directly to Mads. I needed to be around her. I needed to see her. I needed to text her.
And it was worse than that.
I wanted to kiss her, to hold her… to fuck her.
I closed my eyes and blew out a deep breath, trying to talk myself down from those thoughts. I tried to remind myself of how much I loved Carrie.
And how much I loved sex with Carrie. She was more responsive and wilder than anyone I’d ever been with. Including Madison.
So why the hell couldn’t I get my mind off Mads?
When the shoot was over, Madison approached me. “Thatcher, take me to lunch.”
I smiled. “Where do you want to go?”
“La Maison. It’s this new French place in Buckhead I’ve been dying to try.”
A wave of guilt passed over me. How long ago had Carrie asked me to take her there? It had been months now. I’d forgotten all about it. I should tell Madison no. I should take my wife there, not Madison.
But what I actually said? “Sure.”
Before long we were seated in the airy, pleasant restaurant.
“You did what?” Madison looked both horrified and amused.
“I went tubing down a river,” I repeated.
She cocked an eyebrow at me as she lifted the glass of champagne to her ruby red lips. “That’s… something I would never think you would do.”
I shrugged feeling slightly defensive. “When I met Carrie and we started dating, I tried a lot of things that I’d never done before.”
I didn’t want to admit it, but Carrie and the entire town of Indigo Falls had started to feel…
gauche to me. My mother had always acted disgusted that I’d settled in such a place, but I’d ignored her.
But now I was seeing everything through Madison’s eyes.
She reminded me of how worldly and sophisticated we used to be. She had made me want that again.
“You look nicer lately. More… yourself,” Madison commented after she’d ordered a salad from the waitress.
After I’d moved to Indigo Falls with Carrie, I’d started using a local tailor and salon. Over the past months since Madison had returned to Atlanta, I’d gone back to the upscale places I’d frequented before. I’d started getting manicures and facials again.
And when I looked in the mirror I was seeing who I used to be. The man I’d been with Madison.
“I’ll have the stuffed salmon with asparagus, please.”
“I’ll be honest with you.” Madison leaned in, providing a nice view down the front of her dress.
Her breasts were small, but perfect. Did I prefer Carrie’s much larger breasts?
Yes, I did. But I was also realizing I preferred Madison’s sophistication.
She fit into my world as a Caldwell so perfectly.
She always had. As much as I’d pushed back against that, I was starting to see the benefits of having a wife that fit in so seamlessly.
Carrie was wonderful. But she’d never quite fit in the social circles the Caldwells traveled in.
It was starting to bother me. “You’re wasted living in that horrid, little town.
You need to move back to Atlanta, Thatch. Everyone thinks so.”
I sighed. “I don’t think I could get Carrie to agree to that.”
She smirked at me and whispered, “Who said anything about Carrie coming with you?”
I stared at her for a moment. We’d been dancing around this topic for months, but she’d never come right out and said that I needed to leave Carrie. “What do you mean?”
She rolled her eyes and finished her champagne before answering.
“Divorce her, silly. She’s cute and sweet, but the world you live in will eat her alive.
According to your mother, it already has.
She told me Carrie is an embarrassment to you at events.
A divorce was bound to happen eventually.
You have to realize she’s just not up to par with your usual standards. ”
She meant herself. I studied her perfect face, her luminous skin, her designer dress, and compared it all to Carrie. My heart sank a little. Madison was right. Carrie didn’t fit. Not really. Maybe I’d been trying to force something that wasn’t meant to be. I’d thought I was happy.
Then Madison came back and opened my eyes to what I was missing.
I sat back and looked away. I wasn’t ready to commit to a divorce yet. Carrie was a good person, and I truly cared about her. And the sex was phenomenal. But I had to wonder… had I ever really loved her?
Or had she just been a replacement for someone I couldn’t have?
My mother had always said that I liked Carrie so much because she was the exact opposite of Madison. That it was a rebellion of sorts to be with her.
I was starting to agree with her.
Madison suddenly snapped her fingers at a waitress who wasn’t ours.
“Can I help you, ma’am?” the flustered woman asked.
I gave her a quick smile, embarrassed by the way Madison had ushered her over.
“Yes. I need more champagne.” She tapped her long, manicured nail on her empty glass. She barely looked at the waitress.
“Of course. I’ll let your server know that she…”
Madison laughed, but it wasn’t an amused laugh. It was a derisive one. “Are you serious? I need to be served right now. I’m not going to wait.”
The woman’s face flushed. “I understand.” She turned to head to the bar, but Madison stopped her.
“Excuse me,” she called. “You forgot this.” She gestured to the empty bottle.
The server gave a tight smile and removed the bottle from the table.
“I think she was going to get it when she came back with the new bottle,” I said quietly. I had noticed several diners staring at us.
Madison shrugged. “We shouldn’t have to eat with trash on our table.”
“An empty champagne bottle is hardly trash…”
“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” she interrupted.
“Your champagne, ma’am,” the server said as she arrived at our table. She uncorked the bottle and poured a glass for Madison. Madison acted as if she wasn’t even there. She didn’t say thank you or acknowledge the woman in any way.
The server turned to me. “Would you care for any?”
“No, thank you.” I smiled at her. She nodded and walked away.
“You’d think they’d have better help at a restaurant like this one,” Madison complained.
I started to defend the woman, but she interrupted me. “Don’t you want some more?”
“No. I’m good.” I didn’t drink at lunch at all. But I rarely ever drank champagne. I preferred whiskey or wine, but Madison would drink nothing else.
I looked at Madison for a moment and couldn’t help comparing her to Carrie again. This time, Carrie was the clear winner between the two of them. Yes, Madison was more sophisticated and fit into my world better than my wife did. But there were parts of my world that I hated.
I had to be careful not to forget that.
There’d been a reason why I’d loved being in Carrie’s world in Indigo Falls. At first, anyway. I’d been able to relax. I hadn’t felt constantly on alert, constantly being judged.
And the way those in my world treated people in customer service or staff around the home was abysmal. I hated it. Madison’s attitude made me uneasy. I couldn’t keep up the illusion that she was perfect yet watch her treat people in the way she just had.
Carrie would never have treated a server the way Madison did.
She was always kind and polite. She listened to people, always making them feel comfortable and at home around her.
Carrie had been raised by a mother who was fairly snobby, but none of that had rubbed off on her.
Even if it had, Carrie’s mother on her worst day was infinitely more tolerable than my mother on her best.
Carrie would never embarrass me by treating a server in a restaurant as if they were somehow less than human. On the other hand, Madison knew the exact right things to say to my mother’s high society friends. Carrie… didn’t.
So, which was better? Fitting in with the people I was likely to do business with and be around for the rest of my life? Or being kind to everyone?
The fact of the matter was that I shouldn’t be comparing them at all. I was married to Carrie. Technically, I’d made my choice. I should be happy with it and move on. I should quit seeing Madison outside of work hours and try to focus on my neglected marriage.
That’s what I should do.
But a little voice in the back of my head kept reminding me that when I chose Carrie, Madison hadn’t been an option.
Once we got back to the car, Madison put her hand over mine. “Please, Thatch. Let me make you feel good.”
I knew she was offering to suck me off. I raised the partition between us and the driver. I didn’t want him to hear what was going on. He often drove Carrie and me, and I felt like he was looking at me with disapproving eyes.
I turned to her. “Mads, I’ve told you. I’m not going to cheat on Carrie.
Not like that.” Had I cheated on her by taking Madison to lunch and dinner more time than I could remember?
Yes. Had I cheated by texting and emailing her countless times over the past few months?
Yes. But I hadn’t physically cheated with her.
Not even a kiss. I refused to be like my father.
She smiled seductively and leaned towards me, making sure I could see down her low-cut dress. “Come on, Thatch. I’ll just go down on you. That’s not even really sex.”
I was tempted, and she could tell. I was rock hard and there was no hiding it.
She grinned as she saw how she affected me.
I was also going through an internal struggle I’m sure she could see on my face.
She moved closer and ran her hand up and down my thigh before squeezing it. I had to bite back a groan.
I wanted to give in. I wanted to let her suck me off. I gritted my teeth, clenched my jaw, and reminded myself that I was married. And my wife deserved better than this.
I considered oral to be ‘real’ sex, and I sure as hell knew Carrie would. I couldn’t do that to her. I wasn’t going to be that man. I wasn’t going to follow in my father’s footsteps.
I finally took a deep breath and moved away from her. “No. That’s not going to happen Madison.”
She looked angry briefly, before she shrugged. “Your loss.” She sat back and smoothed her dress as she looked out the window. “You know I hate to be disappointed, Thatcher. And that really disappointed me.”
I couldn’t stand hearing her say that, and I realized that I was willing to do almost anything to get her to stay with me. Except cheat on Carrie. “Can I make it up to you? Maybe we could go away for a weekend somewhere.”
“I don’t know that I want to have a romantic weekend where I don’t get to have sex, Thatch.”
I rubbed a hand over my face. I didn’t know the best way to handle this. I wasn’t going to tell Carrie I wanted a divorce. Not until I was sure that Madison was mine, and not while Carrie was trying to work on the Orchid Ball. That would be cruel.
So, I kept my resolve strong. “Okay, no trips away then.” I noticed the flicker of surprise on her face. She’d thought I’d cave under pressure from her.
There were a couple of beats of silence. It seemed as if she was waiting on me to change my mind. When I didn’t, she said, “Actually, I almost forgot to tell you.” She bit her lip as if she was nervous to say anything.
I looked at her questioningly. “What?”
“The director said my jewelry wasn’t quite right for the commercial we’re shooting now.”
“Doesn’t the wardrobe department handle that sort of thing?”
“Not always,” she said. “I really need to have some better pieces before the shoot tomorrow.”
“Do you not have something you could bring from home?” I knew Madison’s parents had gone bankrupt and left town, but surely she still had some of her own personal jewelry. She’d been working as a model for years.
“You don’t want to buy me any, is that it?”
I frowned. How had this turned into me personally buying her jewelry? “Is that what you need? For me to buy it for you?” Maybe that was one of the ‘miscellaneous expenses’ the director had warned me to prepare for.
She nodded.
I reached in my wallet and pulled out a black AmEx to hand to her.
“This is one of my corporate cards. Just keep it until we’re done with the campaign.
If you need jewelry and other things for the shoots…
just use this. Remind the director I’ll need an itemized receipt of what they needed you to get when the campaign is over. ”
She took it and gave me a quick kiss before getting out of the car. “Thanks,” she said happily, tucking her clutch under her arm and walking off.
God. I could watch her all day. She really was a work of art.