shoes crunch into the gravel.
There was still a chance for him to escape, he told himself. Gradually, he vowed he would learn how to break away completely from his present life. It might take time, but he would do it. It wasn't too late to start again — perhaps in another country…
The craving in him for excitement and novelty was too acute now to ever be suppressed again. Somehow, he would find the determination to free himself of these shackles.
Meanwhile, there was Jean — waiting in the house for him, her recriminations unspoken but slowly widening the gap which existed between them. Michael put his key in the lock and pushed the door open. Another hour or two of silent reproach… followed by his usual, halfhearted attempts to treat her sympathetically and kindly. Followed in turn by a quick, equally unrewarding session of love-making.
The knowledge that he would again repeat this stupid, meaningless ritual made him angry: both with himself and with Jean for not seeing through it. He slammed the door harshly behind him, the sudden noise resounding through the strangely quiet house…
2
He took his coat off and threw it untidily onto the chair in the hall. As he moved into the kitchen he was struck again by the unusual silence. Jean and Monique should be busily preparing the evening meal at this time of the day. The house ought to be echoing with the clatter of pans, the smell of food cooking.
Michael frowned as his eyes took in the complete absence of activity in the kitchen. He turned back into the hall, then stopped suddenly as a faint giggling reached his ears. It seemed to come from upstairs…
He listened intently. There it was again! He paused at the foot of the stairs, one hand on the bannister.
“Oh, stop it! Please — you mustn't!”
A girl's voice, protesting half-heartedly, the words broken up with excited laughter. Michael recognised it was Monique's, heard the trace of a French accent in the muffled, indistinct phrase.
He started up the stairs, deliberately making as little noise as possible. There was something that struck him as being rather odd about the cry, something intriguing…
He turned the bend in the stairs and saw that their bedroom door was ajar. A rustling sound came from within the room, and the faint whisper of girl's voices. Michael, impelled by some mysterious instinct, moved to the wall which ran alongside the door. He flattened himself against it, feeling at once guilty and excited by the prospect of spying on his wife and their au pair girl.
Through the crack in the door he could see scarcely nothing: a vague blurring of outlines which merely increased his curiosity without satisfying it. He put his face up to it and fastened his eye close to the long hinged opening, using it as peephole.
He was now able to see quite distinctly into the room. And he blinked rapidly, unable to believe that his eye wasn't deceiving him!
Jean and Monique were standing in front of their dressing table mirror, wearing only their panties and stockings, Jean stood behind the French girl, running her hands slowly up and down the backs of Monique's thighs and crouching slightly so that her fingers were able to reach the tautly fastened stocking tops.
Monique's legs were astride, her own hands planted firmly on her hips; She stared appreciatively into the big mirror, her head on one side, her breasts thrust out provocatively.
Jean's breasts were pushing intimately into the white flesh of Monique's back — the nipples rubbing into the girl's skin just above the black band of her brassiere.
They were both giggling conspiratorially and as Michael watched, his mouth opening in sheer surprise, Jean slipped her fingers up the smoothness of Monique's thighs and ran them boldly over the girl's bottom. She raised the panties delicately, drawing them into the arse-crease and exposing the firm plump cheeks more completely.
Spellbound, Michael stared at the sexiness of the scene, his throat suddenly dry. Unconsciously, he passed his tongue slowly over his parched lips. This wasn't really happening, he thought wildly. It could not be! Jean wasn't like that…
But the evidence before him clearly indicated that the girls were engaged in something rather more intimate than a mere feminine admiration of their bodies. Having made Monique's panties practically disappear into the girl's ripe divide, Jean was now pinching the bare globes between her forefingers and thumbs — holding a generous portion of the white flesh and jiggling it: making the rest of the cheeks wobble saucily.
Again, he heard Monique's half-hearted protest: “Jean — don't! Oh, cheri, what do you think you're doing? Please!”
Even if he had been unable to see her face (and the mirror clearly reflected Monique's expression) Michael could tell from the tone of her voice that the girl didn't object in the slightest to Jean's pinching. She had formed her mouth into a pert pouting oh — at the same time wiggling her buttocks slightly and making no attempt to free her bottom from the woman's fingers.
Jean now went down behind Monique, dropping onto her knees and staring from a distance of no more than a few inches into the French girl's buttocks. Her hands remained on the cheeks, continuing their not-too-rough nipping of the curvy flesh.
“There now!” she whispered softly. “Did I hurt your pretty little bum, darling? Here — let me kiss it better!”
And Michael's wife pursed her lips, brought them into contact with Monique's bottom and began to plant wet, noisy little kisses on the jutting hemispheres. Far from resenting this greater intimacy with her body, Monique deliberately thrust her buttocks backwards, silently encouraging Jean to continue her mouth-petting.
She also took the waistband of her panties in the fingers of both hands and drew it up firmly; making the creamy-white briefs stretch even more tightly into her crotch.
Jean put her arms around Monique's thighs, her hands slipping beneath the long white elastic of the girl's suspender fastenings so that the bands formed two securing straps on the back of her wrists. She held Monique tightly, caressing her shapely thighs and kissing her again and again on her sexy little bottom.
The audible smacks of her lips on Monique's flesh reached Michael's ears clearly. He was more amazed than shocked by the revelation that Jean could do such things to another girl; his surprise outweighing any sense of outrage which he might have felt if the news had been broken to him less dramatically.
His eye was beginning to smart — a draught from the open window inside the room causing him to blink away the moisture which was obscuring his vision. And as he pressed it once more against the crack, he inadvertently leaned forward…
The door creaked open, and he drew back from it immediately — a tic starting at the corner of his mouth. The girls gave a sudden gasp and he heard them moving in the room.
Michael almost panicked, nearly ran as quickly as possible back down the stairs in terrible confusion. Then he angrily reminded himself that he had done absolutely nothing to feel ashamed of. It was his wife and Monique — they were the ones to blush and hide themselves. He stepped forward again, pushed the door wide open and walked into the bedroom.
“Michael!” Jean was coming towards him almost before he had entered the room. He looked beyond her to Monique. The girl had snatched up a dressing gown and was still trying to pull it on — her arms twisting behind her back and forcing her naked breasts to thrust themselves out. He saw that the nipples were stiff and red and wondered if Jean had held them and rubbed them…
“Darling, I didn't hear you come in!” She was smiling at him, making not the slightest attempt to cover her practically nude body.
“Monique and I were just seeing if we take the same sizes in underwear. She's running a bit low and since I've got so many bras and pants that I haven't even worn yet, I thought I could let her have some…”
Michael stared at her, disbelief written all over his face. Jean appeared either not to notice or to ignore the look of incredulity in her husband's eyes. Calmly she went on:
“Isn't it lucky? Although our breasts are different sizes, my pants and stockings seem to fit her perfectly. Don't they, Monique?” She turned, looking over her shoulder at the au pair girl.
“Y-yes, Jean', Monique stammered. She had finally managed to draw the robe around her and was now
