Making the appointment was easier than she’d thought it would be. There’d been a cancellation. One was available in four days, on Friday. When she thanked the receptionist, Cora’s hands were shaking. They were still shaking thirty minutes later when she knocked on Frazer’s office door and opened it without waiting.

Frazer looked up from her desk, her eyes brightening when she saw Cora. Then they darkened when Cora shut the door behind her, hand falling to the lock. Three months. How had it been three months? It had been so long that Frazer knew what her shutting the door meant.

They had patterns.

Patterns like lunch. Coffee. Conversation. Texts that were never sexual, in case Alec saw; or when they bordered on it, were deleted: the biggest sign of guilt. Flirtations as they made eye contact. Friendship. Sex.

An affair. For three months.

Which had started because Cora needed a distraction from the fact that she’d uttered the word “divorce” to her husband. Because she was unhappy. Because she was selfish.

“Hey.”

Frazer leant back in her chair, grinning now. How had Cora found her arrogant? She was cocky, sure. But not arrogant.

“Hi.”

“What are you doing?” Cora asked.

“The weekly report on the programme.” Cora took a slow, sashaying step forward. Frazer’s eyes followed her movements. “You know, statistics, numbers…”

Cora’s fingers played at the buttons of her white dress shirt, undoing them one by one. She watched Frazer watch her doing it, something delicious in the way Frazer’s pupils blew wide. She’d been looking forward to watching that slow grin curl over Frazer’s lips all day.

It was easy, to walk around the desk, to kneel in front of her. To tug at her pants and pull them down and off along with her shoes. Easy to pull her up and turn her, to push her down on her desk. Wrapping her arms around her thighs and pressing her lips against Frazer to drive her crazy was even easier.

Because apparently Cora was the type of person that called a therapist to help sort her head out about her marriage and then went down on a woman thirty minutes later.

It was just nice to feel in control of something.

Frazer’s thighs were pressing against her ears, and when Cora opened her eyes and looked up, all she could see was Frazer’s arm across her mouth. Her head had dropped back and was hanging over the edge of the desk. For a second, Cora thought Frazer was going to come that quickly.

Until the door opened.

Her heart stopped. Literally, for a moment, it stopped. She’d locked the door; she was sure she had locked the door.