Seduce Me Tonight (16 page)

Not that a threesome was particularly dangerous, but it did have my adrenalin up. I took another long sip of my drink and tried to breathe.

‘Are you nervous?’

I stared at him over the rim of my glass. ‘What do you think?’

He laughed and leaned into me, our shoulders brushing. Bolstering me. ‘We don’t have to do this.’

My lips twitched. ‘Want to back out, huh?’

His expression turned serious, his brown eyes searching my face. ‘Seriously, Nina. I know I kind of ambushed you with this idea, I just thought –’

I bumped him with my shoulder. ‘Hey, I’m here because I want to be here.’ I shifted on my bar stool. ‘The idea kind of turns me on.’

A hand rubbed up my arm, along my shoulder and settled on the back of my neck. ‘Just “kind of”, huh? I hope that changes before the night is over.’

Joe had arrived and, just like that, my nervousness was gone. I was ready for whatever would happen.

* * *

My threesome conversation with Eric had ended abruptly with our orgasms, but continued the next morning when I decided to revisit the idea. ‘So you really want to have a threesome?’ was how I phrased it. Not exactly delicate.

We were sitting in the kitchen, digging into Eric’s egg and potato casserole and swapping sections of the Sunday
Times
, and the topic of sex with another person seemed a little more incongruous – and therefore less intimidating – by the light of day.

Eric shrugged. His bare shoulders carried just a hint of sunburn. He spent so much time outside that he had a perpetual tan, but it varied in degree depending on the season. It was still early in the rafting season and I knew by September he’d be bronzed and beautiful. I felt such a tug of desire for this man I loved, I wanted to walk around the table and straddle him like I had the night before.

‘It might be fun,’ he said. ‘But not if you’re not comfortable.’

‘I wouldn’t know if I was comfortable unless I did it.’

He looked up at me. ‘So you want to?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe. Yes. Maybe.’

He shook his head and smiled. ‘I know that answer. It means you want to, but you’re scared. Don’t be scared, baby. It can be anything you want it to be.’

Eric was forever saying things like that. ‘Life can be anything you want it to be.’ ‘You make the rules.’ ‘Be your truest self.’ It was all very Zen and beautiful and most of the time I liked it, liked what it represented. Other times, I resented his cavalier attitude. Not all of us could run around playing games all day. Of course, whenever I said something to that effect, Eric would grin and ask, ‘Why not?’

I didn’t know why I was seriously considering his suggestion. Or question. Whatever it had been. Something brought up in the middle of sex was just fantasy, right? Yet I found myself watching the sunlight stream across the kitchen table and wondering what it would be like to be with someone else. To share Eric with another woman, to explore another woman’s body. I wondered if I could go through with it, if Eric would be disappointed if I didn’t, or what it would do to our relationship if we did. Eric is the one who throws caution to the wind while I analyse everything in excruciating detail. For whatever reason, or for no reason at all except I wanted to do this strange and exciting thing, I decided to stop thinking.

‘Let’s do it,’ I said.

He looked up, fork halfway to his mouth. ‘Yeah?’

I nodded. ‘Yeah.’

‘Cool.’

Of course, having decided to have a threesome, I now had a million questions. I didn’t even know the logistics of finding someone to have sex with us. Did we just ask a friend? Put an ad on an adult website? Hit on someone at a bar?

‘Why don’t you ask Joe?

I blinked at Eric. ‘Joe? My friend, Joe?’

‘Sure, why not? You’re always saying what a player he is and how open-minded he is and that you’re pretty sure he’s done everything, so this won’t faze him in the least. Why
not
Joe?’

It had never even crossed my mind that Eric meant a threesome with a man. I had visions of a leggy blonde prancing through our bedroom or a redheaded vixen doing wicked things to me or a raven-haired beauty doing kinky things to both of us … but a guy? And Joe, at that?

‘Wow. Joe. Huh.’ I considered it.

I’d known Joe since I was a freshman and he had been working three jobs to put himself through college. He tutored me in Spanish. He’d been cute and funny and the most open person I’d ever met when it came to talking about politics, religion and sex. But we’d never slept together. He’d been out of my league, or so I thought. We’d stayed friends though and gotten closer over the years. He was single and, according to him, kinky, with a high sex drive. I felt something like excitement stirring at the thought. Arousal? Over Joe? Maybe. Or over the idea that Eric had thought about me having sex with Joe. In either case, it didn’t seem all that strange any more to consider my friend in that particular light.

‘Why not Joe?’ I said, marvelling at Eric’s suggestion. ‘But I figured you had a girl in mind.’

Eric smiled. ‘Would you prefer another woman?’

Despite a little making out at college parties and a couple of really serious girl crushes, I had never been with another woman. And while I technically didn’t
have
to do anything with another woman in a threesome, I figured that was the only reason men ever suggested it – to watch the two women together.

I tried to look as casual as he did. ‘The threesome was your idea. What do you want?’

‘I want to do something we’ve never done before and I want to do it together. Doesn’t matter who’s there or what parts they have, it’s about you and me doing something new,’ he said. ‘I figured you’d be more comfortable with another guy, but if you’d prefer finding a woman I might know a couple.’

Something I hadn’t felt in a very long time stabbed me in the heart. Jealousy. Pure, cold, irrational jealousy. ‘No, I think a guy would be fine.’

He laughed. ‘OK.’

Curious, I asked, ‘You won’t be jealous? I mean, there will be … things going on, right?’

‘You mean you’ll be having sex with Joe.’

I cringed at the way it sounded. ‘It was your idea!’

‘Oh, baby, you’re so cute,’ he said. ‘Yes, it was my idea. And I’ve thought about it a lot. There might be some jealousy, but I think it will be outweighed by happiness to watch you being pleasured by two men and one of them will be me.’

Eric was good at making things sound more enticing than they really were. I was trying to sort the fantasy from the reality. ‘So you admit you’ll be jealous but not so much you won’t be able to enjoy it.’

He shook his head. ‘Nope.’

‘OK. This whole thing is blowing my mind, but I think I’m in,’ I said.

Knowing I would be the centre of attention made me incredibly nervous, but I wasn’t sure why. Performance anxiety? I had seen enough porn to know that a woman in a threesome doesn’t get to just lie back and enjoy – she has twice the men to pleasure. But I reminded myself that we could make the rules up as we went along. Maybe I would just lie back and enjoy. Maybe that’s all that Eric expected of me and Joe wouldn’t mind. My tension eased a little. This was my husband and one of my best friends. It would be OK. But I was getting ahead of myself and the situation at hand.

‘Now how to I bring it up to Joe?’

‘Just ask him,’ was Eric’s ever-simple response.

And so I did.

* * *

Joe dropped a brotherly kiss on the top of my head. ‘What’s up, lovers?’

I laughed, not nearly as uncomfortable as I might have been before my drink. ‘Just waiting for you. Late as always.’

Joe checked his watch. ‘I’m two minutes late, love. Anxious to see me? Or anxious to see me naked?’

I blushed and Eric laughed. Nothing was different about this exchange than it ever had been. Joe had always been touchy and flirty, even in front of Eric. I didn’t know why I hadn’t noticed it before, but this easy camaraderie had always been there. Maybe it was the vodka, but this whole threesome idea was making more and more sense to me. Why
not
Joe, I had been asking myself since I sent that two-line email asking him if he wanted to have drinks and maybe go to bed with us. Ha ha. Joe’s response, ‘Yes and definitely,’ had been so quick and easy, I wondered if the two of them hadn’t been plotting this behind my back. But I watched them now, shaking hands, joking about Joe’s cerebral legal career and Eric’s death-defying hobbies, and realised no, this was new to both of them, too. They were just that comfortable with each other. And with me.

‘Are you in there?’ Eric asked, as he left a twenty on the bar to cover our drinks. ‘Joe asked if we were ready to take the party elsewhere.’

‘Oh, yeah, let’s,’ I said, sounding as enthusiastic as both my husband and my friend. And I guess I was. I felt as if a door had opened inside me, brought on by their enthusiasm and how comfortable we all seemed together.

It had been Joe’s idea to get a room at the hotel downtown. ‘Neutral territory,’ he called it. ‘Keeps the marital bed sacred. My house is off limits because I don’t want you having any weird association when you come over for my dinner parties.’

Apparently, Joe had been the third party in a lot of threesomes. I was fine with letting him take the lead and Eric, having put the idea out into the ether and gotten the ball rolling, was content with whatever made me happy. Could it be this easy? I wondered as I took Eric’s arm on my right and Joe’s arm on my left and let them lead me to the bank of elevators in the lobby. Joe’s longer, leaner body was an interesting contrast to Eric’s muscular, stocky frame. I felt like I was getting the best of all possible worlds. I giggled.

‘Why the hell not?’ I asked out loud.

They both laughed, as if knowing exactly what I was thinking. Joe had chosen the hotel and booked the room, and it was gorgeous. There was a bottle of champagne and three glasses chilling on the bar and the bed was already turned down. I felt like a princess who didn’t have to choose between her princes, for tonight at least.

I’d spent about two hours getting ready for tonight, choosing my outfit with the kind of careful attention I usually reserved for formal events. Even more. Eric had laughed as he watched me go from closet to bathroom mirror, back to closet, rejecting each outfit as too revealing (I didn’t want to look like a hooker in the hotel bar), too tight (unsightly lines from clothing would be a turnoff), too frumpy (I had two men to arouse) or because it just didn’t feel like
me
. I wanted everything to be perfect, whatever that meant, since I wasn’t sure this would ever happen again.

‘You’re just going to end up naked, anyway,’ Eric had called to me as I made wardrobe change number three.

I’d ended up in a slinky black wrap dress that was cut to flatter my curves without showing too much skin. I might end up naked, but I wanted to start with a good foundation. To that end, my underwear was new and sexy as hell. I was actually looking forward to revealing it to the two most important men in my life. My lovers. The words sent a shiver up my spine.

Joe rested his hands on my shoulders as he semi-steered me toward the bed. ‘Are you cold? I think we can warm you up.’

The cliché made me laugh, but his big hands on my shoulders were doing funny things to my insides. ‘I think we’ll all be warm before the night is over, right?’

‘Indeed.’ Serious Joe, a lusty libertine in an attorney’s body. ‘Warm, hot, sweaty, flushed …’

He left me to sit on the edge of the bed while he popped the cork on the champagne. Eric had been quiet since we got to the room and I watched him move around, closing curtains and adjusting lights. He was more serious than I thought he’d be under the circumstances – I’d expected a lot of levity from him. Despite the alcohol and my newfound sexy persona, I felt my nervousness return.

‘Everything OK?’ I murmured, as Eric moved past me to the bathroom.

He flashed me his biggest grin. ‘Oh, yeah, baby. I just want to make sure once we hit the sheets we don’t have to get up for anything.’

I shook my head. I should have known. Eric is an adrenalin junkie, but he isn’t reckless. He is prepared for anything he does, whether it’s cave diving or mountain biking – or a threesome, apparently. I smiled to myself. This was going to be OK.

Of course, there are no books about the etiquette of a threesome. Or, if there are, I haven’t read them. Somebody had to break the ice and Joe was busy pouring champagne and Eric was pulling a strip of condoms and a bottle of lube out of our overnight bag, so I figured it was up to me.

Neither man was looking at me as I stood up and unfastened the buttons on my dress. I slipped it from my shoulders and felt the silky fabric slide down my body to puddle on the floor. The move had been silent, but it caught the attention of my two men. They both pivoted to look at me standing there in my underwear and heels – a lacy pushup bra to accent my full breasts and a hip-riding lacy thong. I’d forgone stockings – too many porn movies featured actresses whose stockings had rolled down or gotten runs – because I didn’t want to attempt to remove them gracefully.

I took a deep breath, which served to push my breasts even more up and out over the cups of my bra. And that was the last breath I really remember taking. Both of them were on me before I could exhale, Eric pushing me down on the bed and Joe kissing the side of my neck. Joe had never touched me intimately before, but my body didn’t seem to resent the new guy. My nipples tightened and I arched my neck to give him better access while Eric parted my thighs.

I was hazily aware of my already damp thong being stripped away by one set of hands while my bra clasp was released and the cups of my bra peeled from my sensitive breasts by another pair of hands. I had the sudden urge to giggle because I was, in fact, lying back and being pleasured, in-between them stripping off their own clothes. I thought I’d enjoy being the recipient of their attentions a bit longer before I took a more active role.

Joe eased me back on the bed, his long, graceful fingers cupping and stroking my breasts while Eric knelt between my thighs. The clash of familiar and foreign touches, the combination of so many hands on my body and the sheer decadence of being the centre of attention had me writhing on the bed before Eric even put his mouth on me. He anchored my hips to the bed with his hands, rougher and bigger than Joe’s, and dipped his head between my spread thighs. The first feather-light touch of his tongue on my engorged clit was enough to have me clawing at the pillow above my head, a banshee wail rising up from deep within me.