Kirsty and Alan’s response reached Jake quickly. She had spoken to her mum as soon as she arrived home. “I think he’s okay,” she had said.

Her mum stifled a laugh and asked her was Alan okay with it too. “Well, he’s happy with me making the choice.”

“A reluctant cuckold?” Jake said to Jenny as she relayed the response.

She laughed. “Maybe, but he is getting used to the idea. Kirsty was also asking if the holiday cottage was available soon.”

Jake had spent many a time at their holiday cottage in the Lakes. Sometimes with Jenny on her own and other times with Derek staying in the spare bedroom. “Will it be with her on her own?”

“She is trying to sort that out with Alan. He wants to be around when you two do it, but she does not want him around.”

“I’ll leave them to sort it between themselves, but it would be better if she came on her own,” Jake said.

“I agree.”

Jake thought about fucking Kirsty in that bed. It was quite spacious – room to manoeuvre. “You’ll be okay about me and Kirsty in that bed together?”

“I think so,” Jenny mused. “I’m happy that she is going to get pregnant, and happy that she’s going to get a good lover to do the job.”

“But?”

Jenny laughed. “There is always a but, hey? Yes, I will be a bit jealous. She is a rival getting your best and I know that you will enjoy yourself with her.”

“But I won’t love her the same way I do you.”

“Probably not,” Jenny said. “But you might want to see her again after she gets pregnant, won’t you?”

Jake hesitated.

“It is okay, you do not need to answer that. Kirsty’s is young and sexy, and you are a single man.”

“Anyway, there’s no saying that the chance will come along,” he responded.

“Yes, we will cross that bridge when we come to it. In the meantime, she is going to be ringing you to go for a coffee. She wants to get some ground rules sorted first.”

“That’s okay.”

“Alan won’t be there.”

“Good. Probably better he is not.”

“One thing though,” Jenny finally said. “She is inquisitive about how you and I know each other. She will no doubt question you on that.”

“Well, you know discretion is my middle name!”

*****

Kirsty rang him the next evening. From the sound of it, Alan was out. He did not let on that he had already spoken to her mum. She wanted to know if he was free for coffee the next day. “How about lunch?” he responded.

Kirsty hesitated.

“I know some places where we can be discrete.”

“I bet you do,” she responded.

“Well, obviously a girl wants to go somewhere where there is little chance of her being seen by friends, family or neighbours.”

“Where do you suggest?”

“Ma cuisine?”

She laughed. “Your place!”

“I can do a spot of lunch and we can chat over a glass or two of wine.”

Kirsty was silent for a few moments.

“You will be able to see my home and get an idea of the kind of guy I am.”

“I think I can guess that already. Okay then, but nothing else. Alan has still to come fully on board with the whole thing.”

“That’s understandable,” Jake responded. “His ego is going to be bruised for a start.”

Jake gave her his address and got an idea of what she would like to eat.

She arrived just after 1 pm the next day. It was late April and the days had been warmer than usual. She wore a flowery summer dress that modestly reached to just above the knee. Jake poured her a glass of white wine in the kitchen. He had prepared a chicken salad. Kirsty looked around. His kitchen was spotless.

“I’ll plate up,” he told her. “Go and take a look round, if you want.”

She did and returned five minutes later. “You must have been up all night, cleaning,” she said with a smile.

He shook his head. “It’s always this clean,” he told her. “My cleaner gets well paid.”

Kirsty laughed.

“So, what did you think of the four-poster?”

“Mmmmm very… “

“Sexy?”

She did not respond. “Maybe, if you’re a good girl I might let you sleep in it one night!”

“I bet you have had a few girls in there.”

Jake tapped his nose. “A gentleman never tells,” he responded as he began to take the dishes through to the dining room.

They sat down to eat and within a few minutes, she asked him about her mum. “How come you know my mum?”

“I know both your mum and dad,” he told her before telling her that they used to work at the same place. “We worked on a few projects together at Taylor's and I got to know your dad through golf. He dropped her off at work one morning on the way to the golf course and we got chatting. I had bought some new clubs and had not got round to using them yet. He ended up buying them off me. I had always wanted to play but just could not find the time.”

“They must know you very well to recommend you for the job of…. well… you know!”

He smiled. “Well, they see me as someone of good character. Anyway, why do you ask?”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It must matter if you are asking a question.”

Kirsty took a sip of wine and then told him about something that had happened when she was sixteen. Kirsty had come home from school early – her teacher had gone off sick. She came home, her dad was in the garden mowing the lawn. She went upstairs and she heard her mum in bed with another man.

“Are you sure?” he asked her.

“I may have just been sixteen, but I know what the sound of people having sex sounds like.”

“What did you do?”

“I just slipped out of the house and went and had coffee with a friend.”

“Did you ask them about it?”

She shook her head. “How do you approach a subject like that with your parents? But it did all fit in with some strange things going on. Mum having nights away with friends. I thought that they had one of these open marriages you hear about. Mum even once spent a week at the cottage on her own. Dad was too busy to go but he just spent the week playing golf.”

“Did it bother you?”

“After a while, no. They seemed happy enough. Anyway, it gave me the freedom to have nights away without feeling guilty or making excuses.”

“Well, there you are then!”

“Did you know about their private life?”

He shook his head. “None of business anyway. What two people get up to is their business, as long as it is legal.”

She turned and looked him in the eye. “It wasn’t you was it?”

Jake met her gaze. “I will not even lower myself to answer that, Kirsty. For one thing, my relationships with other women are private and no one else’s business. Anyway, supposing that somewhere down the line someone asked me a similar question about us, and our child. How would you want me to react?”

She looked away. “Yes, I suppose you are right. “It is just I… “

“You want to be nosy?”

She smiled. “That, and the fact that you might be shagging my mother.”

“And I might not be!”

“It is okay, it would not put me off having a baby with you. “It’s just that I would like to know.”

“Have you asked her?”

“No, of course not.”

“Well let’s leave it at that then, and let’s not discuss this subject again, please.”

“Okay,” she responded giving him the once over again.

“Anyway, you and I?” he asked. “When do we get started  and what’s the ground rules?”