‘I want you to eat me,’ the Swede replied simply.
‘All good things come to those who wait,’ said Sophia, moving lithely down the bed.
When Sophia’s tongue ran along her cleft, Petsi’s breathing became laboured. Her hands covering her breasts, she lay there quite still, as if not quite believing that what she had wanted for so long was finally happening. Sophia drew on all her experience in an effort to prolong the process, but her efforts were in vain. Petsi’s orgasm was long and hard, and clearly emotional in the extreme, as she lay there shuddering as the aftershocks hit her. Sophia kissed the girl lightly on the lips and told her to get dressed. They both knew that there would be plenty of time for more encounters like this.
By the time Peter got home, Sophia had supplemented her sweatshirt with a bra and a T-shirt, so as not to arouse suspicion, and was busy in the study writing memos for the board on the clinching of the Berti contract. Peter congratulated his wife on the success of her ‘mission’, as he delighted in calling it, and listened patiently as she gushed about her visit to La Scala, so conveniently located a stone’s throw from her hotel. His razor sharp antennae picked up the possibilities for extracurricular activities provided by the presence of Luca’s as yet unnamed wife in the narrative – Sophia having casually mentioned that she had joined them for the opera on her last evening in Milan. She decided not to mention anything about a box, as she knew Peter’s imagination would go into overdrive at the possibilities provided by such a private and intimate setting. Thank goodness Peter’s network of spies didn’t extend to Italy, Sophia thought, reflecting on all the contacts he had in England who relayed information about her private life back to him.
As far as her husband was concerned, she had flown off on the morning after the opera, availing herself of the services of Alessandro, one of the bank’s employees, to drive her from the hotel to the airport. If Sophia thought that would make Peter turn his suspicions on Alessandro, she had misjudged him. A decade of married life had given him a very good understanding of his spouse, and Sophia had come to realise that when it came to intuition (about her, at any rate), Peter put most females to shame. When he left her in the study to go upstairs, Sophia was left with the feeling that he was keeping his powder dry and in particular that his interrogation would centre on the figure of Luca’s wife.
At dinner that night, Peter was very solicitous towards Sophia, which rankled with her, since she felt he was putting it on for Petsi, who, it had been agreed, would eat with them. Like every woman before her, Petsi was already under Peter’s spell, laughing at his jokes and showing an animation that she hadn’t evinced with his wife. Sophia knew it was a matter of when, not if, he would seduce her. The problem was he was so fucking laid back that, if he delayed too long, it was the au pair who would start coming on to him. Sophia began seriously to regret having chosen this impressionable girl ahead of the more worldly wise Moldavan. Why hadn’t she put a probationary clause in her contract? She was loathe to take any more foreign travel assignments in the next year, so nervous she was about the possibility that he would have his wicked way with her before she could do so herself.
In bed later that evening, Sophia tried to wrest back the initiative from Peter by teasing him about his obvious hots for the au pair. As usual, Peter deflected the comment, saying that she was a foreigner in a strange culture, who had been suddenly separated from her boyfriend, and needed empathy and understanding. Knowing that to call bullshit on him would redound to his credit and not hers, Sophia contented herself by saying that she was a totally different proposition from little Myška, who had always been so needy and desperate for love and affirmation. Ignoring this simplification, Peter said that his time with Petsi (he didn’t say ‘alone with Petsi’, though Sophia knew that was what he meant) had shown him that behind the confident exterior lay a person who was crying out for love like everyone else.
Sophia didn’t know whether to gag or scream. Instead, she bit her tongue and told Peter through gritted teeth that his compassion was an example to every member of his gender. Peter took the sarcasm at face value, saying that he was particularly sensitive to the plight of minorities, before changing the subject to Sophia’s Italian trip and, in particular, her interaction with Luca’s wife.
‘I don’t think you mentioned her name,’ he said with obvious relish at the opportunity to snipe away on the this subject again.
‘That’s because I couldn’t remember it,’ replied his wife, demonstrating the capacity for thinking on her feet that had served her so well in her career.
‘Has it come back to you yet?’ asked Peter, his voice dripping with irony.
‘As a matter of fact it has; her name is Elena. They have no children and live in a nice place in the suburbs above the city.’
‘So you visited them, did you?’ Peter asked, sharp as a tack.
‘No, she told me about the place when we were chatting during the interval of Tancredi. That was the name of the opera, you know.’
Sophia considered talking a bit more about the opera and its composer but decided against this, on the grounds that her husband would definitely smell a rat. Instead, as Peter sat there in bed checking a message that he’d just received, she decided on a change of subject, mentioning that she’d been asked to join the Parent Teacher Association of the school both their children now attended. Peter was very supportive of the idea, saying she had all the qualification and skills, while noting that this would give her the chance to spend more time with her friend Carrie.
‘”My friend Carrie!”‘ Sophia was struck by the wording.
‘One would like to ask, my dear,’ she pondered, ‘just how much of a friend she is to you.’
‘Right,’ she said, ‘that’s settled then. I’ll start after Christmas. It doesn’t involve a lot of work, Carrie says, though they want to run a bunch of legal documents past me ASAP.’
Pleased with the way she’d deflected Peter’s incipient interrogation about Elena, Sophia leant across to give him a kiss, told him she needed to sleep and switched off the lamp on her bedside table. Suddenly it struck her that he hadn’t shown any interest in Luca. Did he just assume she would sleep with him to obtain the contract? She felt outraged, Just what sort of person did he think she was? With such thoughts swirling in her mind, it was a good half hour before Sophia was able to fall asleep that night.
The following day, while she was at work, Sophia received a call from Peter checking about details of the outing they had planned with the children at the weekend. While they were on the phone, Sophia remembered something she had meant to speak with him about the previous evening, but which had got lost among all the talk about Elena. While she had been working in the study at home, she’d noticed the growing number of books that were piled up on the floor and thought that they ought to get someone in to put up some shelves. Peter, not an avid reader himself nor a DIY type, thought it was a splendid idea and asked Sophia if she wanted him to check out local carpenters online. Sophia told him that Petsi had mentioned to her that Ulf worked in the building trade as a carpenter and perhaps they could ask her to see if he was interested in doing the job. So, it was settled that Sophia would have a word with the au pair about it when she got home.