This is rather a long story and contains no graphic descriptions of sexual activity. The main theme is of reluctantly condoned extramarital sex but does end somewhat differently from my usual fare.
*
My boss waved me to the chair in front of his desk and, with a relaxed smile on his handsome face, invited, "You don't often ask to see me Doug, so this is an unexpected pleasure. What can I do for you?"
This was possibly the most important moment of my life. Taking a deep breath, I laid out my case, "I need a pay rise badly. Salaries have been frozen for three years now and during that period everything has gone up in price, especially petrol and energy. Only electronics have got cheaper and I neither need nor can afford any of that."
Even before I had finished my speech, Dominic was slowly shaking his head. "I've been expecting you. All three of the other department heads have already been to me with the same request, although one was asking for his staff rather than himself. I'm sorry Doug but I'm afraid that I have to give you the same answer that I gave them, it's out of the question."
"But I think I'm a special case. If you listen to my situation you're bound to see it too." I insisted, a feeling of panic swelling up inside me.
"Doug, over the past three years, although we haven't replaced natural wastage there have been no compulsory redundancies and the company wants to keep it that way. It's a simple equation; more money for some means no job for others. Do you want to see someone sacked?
For over forty years, house prices had risen almost constantly and so had salaries. This meant that couples could over extend themselves when buying a property in the knowledge that, within three or four years, increased wages would reduce mortgage costs to manageable proportions. My misfortune was to buy just before this benevolent period came to a sudden end.
"I'm really desperate Dom," I told him, "If I don't earn more money I'm going to lose everything. I'm already two months in arrears on my house payments and if I slip behind one more time I'm going to lose it. What makes it worse is that at the moment I've got massive negative equity."
"About forty grand?"
Dom had nailed the amount so exactly that I immediately became suspicious and, stepping outside my supplicant role, I said sharply, "Have you been investigating me, I don't see how you could possibly know the deficit so exactly?"
My boss wasn't fazed by my switch in attitude. Smiling disarmingly, he explained, "Just an inspired guess, Doug. I know what houses in that area were selling for at the time you bought yours and I know what they are on offer for now, so depending on how good a deal you got, your loss has to be somewhere between thirty and fifty thousand."
For a moment I considered apologising for my outburst but decided instead to press my case by saying, "So you see what a desperate position I'm in. Within the next three months I won't be able to meet my mortgage and then I'll be in a really in the shit. I need some sort of help, Dom."
Dominic sat for a while without responding, a speculative look on his face and when he did speak it took me by surprise when he asked, "Your lovely wife Carol doesn't work does she?"
I shook my head. "With two children under five she doesn't have much chance."
"Not even part time?"
"Carol has tried looking but the only stuff available around us is either cleaning or shop work and that doesn't pay much more than the baby sitting fees we would need to lay out. Any job has to be within walking distance because we had to let her car go over a year ago."
"That's the root of your problem," my employer advised, (stating the bleeding obvious), "In the current economic climate very few can maintain a household on the basis of only one income."
"I know exactly what the problem is," I managed to say calmly, "I don't know how to get out of the situation, that is why I've had to come to you as a last resort."
Dominic again went into prolonged pensive mode before saying, "I may have a solution but you won't like it, in fact I very much doubt if you will accept."
His words were like a bright beacon shining through dark cloud laden skies. Interrupting whatever he was going to say, I assured him, "Any thing, I'll do anything to get out of this mess."
There was a certain glint in my employer's eye as he warned. "Don't be too sure. What I am about to say is for discussion and nothing we say today will be committing on either side."
"Yes, yes," I urged him on, eager to know what formula he had that might make my financial problems magically go away.
"For the past two years I've been entitled to employ a personal assistant but as yet I haven't availed myself of the opportunity, primarily because I didn't want to put further burden on the company in these stringent times," he explained slowly. "My idea is that your wife could work for me. When chatting to her last Xmas, I gathered that she used to work in Human Resources, so she should have all the necessary skills."
"That would me fantastic," I started to enthuse but Dom held up a hand to stop me.
"Don't get too excited until you hear the whole deal," he cautioned. "When I say 'personal assistant' the stress is very much on the 'personal'. As you know I travel abroad the last weekend of every month, I will expect her to accompany me and we are likely to get very close on those occasions."
It took me a moment to grasp what he was saying but then the anger surged up in my head, "Are you saying that as part of this deal you expect to fuck my wife?" I shouted.
Dom remained undisturbed by my rage flushed face. "That effectively is the deal but I wouldn't have phrased it quite so crudely."
"So how the hell would you say it?"
"While we are away, there might be occasions when Carol and I will have to share the same room. It is what's referred to a 'plausible deniability', depending on the needs of your peace of mind; you might prefer to believe that such occasions will never arise."
"But you do intend to have sex with her at every chance you get?" I said coldly.
Dom smiled, "As I just pointed out it wouldn't be fair to answer that question, you must think whatever you want."
Speaking through gritted teeth, I told him, "My thinking in that situation doesn't arise because I'm rejecting your 'kind' offer out of hand."
My boss seemed completely unbothered by my angry reply as he said, "That's a great pity because I think we could both had got a lot of benefit from such a deal, although I can understand why you feel bound to refuse."
We at in silence looking at each other as if both realised there was more to be said. When he didn't seem inclined to be the first one to speak I said, "Over the past eight years we have got on well, I regarded you as almost a friend and thought you had the same regard for me. I don't understand why, if this PA job was available, you didn't help me out by offering it to Carol without the sex conditions?"
"What you say is very true but the simple fact is that I didn't get to where I am in the world by looking gift horses in the mouth," Dom said affably, "Throw in the fact that I've never desired a woman as much as I do your wife. She's truly exceptional and you are a very lucky man."
"Haven't you got any conscience at all?" I asked scathingly.
"Of course I have," Dom said smugly, "I think of myself as a pretty decent guy but in this case the pangs of conscience were completely smothered by thoughts of the pleasure I hoped to enjoy." "You can stick your fucking offer," I told him bluntly.
My employer took the rejection philosophically, saying, "I didn't expect any other answer but I had to try." While speaking, Dom rose to his feet and walked to the door with me following. Once there he stuck out his hand and said, "I hope this won't adversely affect our working relationship?"
My inclination was to punch him on the nose but instead I shook the proffered hand. I quickly grabbed hold of the door handle, now eager to escape the scene of my humiliation, but before I could turn it Dom reached forward to stop me saying, "You never know, you might change your mind after talking it over with your delectable wife. Tell you what, why don't you take the rest of the week off as free holiday, that should give you plenty time to discuss all the pros and cons. The offer remains open until Saturday. If Carol wants the job, she should meet me that night for dinner at The Peacock hotel. That's eight o'clock sharp. Tell her that we will have a quiet dinner and then I will take her up to the room I've booked for a formal interview. "
I have a knack for maths and logic so it was natural for me to go into programming and systems analysis as a career. I progressed quickly and six years ago I took up my current position as head of a computer department, moving area to do so. The downside is that now I am mainly engaged with administration with little opportunity to write the clever code that used to give me so much pleasure.
I'm aged thirty-four with my wife Carol two years younger. Most men believe that their wives are beautiful but I think I can objectively claim that mine truly is. She is slightly too rounded to be a classical model and her exceptional beauty probably rules her out for media work so she settled for an occupation that depended more on brains that beauty. We both worked for my previous employer in different departments but had to frequently liaise on a project I was engaged on. She was so far out of my league that I had no pretensions and was more than happy to settle for a platonic friendship but fortunately, the fact that I didn't present a threat, somehow endeared me to her. Later she told me that compared to other men, she found my company 'relaxing' and it was her who set the ball rolling by hinting, "If you want to ask me out for a drink, I will accept you know." We never discussed our previous histories but I always assumed that her early experience were roughly equivalent to my only average number of successes. From when were married up to the start of the events related here, we enjoyed eight very happy years.
I suppose that I should also include a description of my immediate boss Dominic. I consider myself reasonably tall at six foot but he has at least three inches on me. He is also more heavily built and has more of an athletic bent than I, with his main two leisure pastimes being squash and golf. His other assets are that he is good looking, confident and I reluctantly have to admit charismatic. From the start I admired his laid back style and I thought we had an easygoing, friendly, working relationship.
