Chapter 7 — The Morning After Math #5
“Truck bed,” I said, and my voice sounded normal. Miraculously, impossibly normal. “I’ll get them.”
“Thanks, man. You’re a lifesaver.” He dumped the chairs by the tailgate and bounded back toward the house, and the moment he was gone, Shay collapsed against the truck door in silent, shaking laughter, her hand over her mouth, her blue eyes bright with triumph.
“Did you see his face?” she whispered. “He saw nothing. Absolutely nothing. We could have been fucking against this door and he would have asked about chair storage.” She high-fived Kiki, who high-fived her back with a grin that matched Shay’s for wickedness, and the casual coordination of it, the way they’d covered, shifted, become instantly ordinary, left me standing by the truck with my cock hard in my shorts and my brain trying to catch up with what had just happened.
They’d done that before. Not with me, but the practiced ease of the transition, the way they’d moved into cover positions without discussion, said this was a language they’d been speaking with each other for years.
Protecting each other’s secrets. Building covers together.
Loving each other in the older, deeper way that made this whole impossible arrangement feel like it might actually work.
Kiki squeezed my hand as she passed, her fingers warm against mine. “We’re good at this,” she said, quiet enough that only I could hear. “All of us. You don’t have to worry.”
Shay winked at me over Kiki’s shoulder, that dirty, delighted wink that contained absolutely zero regret, and followed Kiki back toward the house with the easy synchronization of two women who had just shared a man in broad daylight and were walking away happier for it.
I stood by my truck with folding-chair imprints on my palms and the distinct feeling that I had just witnessed something I wasn’t supposed to understand yet: that Kiki and Shay loving each other wasn't separate from them loving me. It was the foundation the whole thing was built on, and the fact that I was only now catching up to what they’d known for years should have been embarrassing.
It wasn’t. It was warmth, clear and quiet, and when I finally managed to load the chairs into the truck bed with hands that weren’t entirely steady, the queue suddenly felt less like a problem and more like the only answer that had ever made sense.
***
The cleanup hit that sweet, ragged edge where the worst was done and the finishing touches felt optional.
Coolers stacked. Chairs folded. Trash bags tied and waiting by the road for pickup.
The families had started drifting toward departure, cars loading, goodbyes happening in clusters by the porch, the familiar rhythm of a lake party dissolving into the quiet that would follow.
The girls clustered by the water one last time, and I knew it was the last time because Eden was there, and Eden didn’t cluster without purpose.
She stood at the center of them, dark hair lifting in the breeze, hazel eyes sharp behind her sunglasses, and the smile on her face was the bright Eden Archer smile that meant something was about to happen that everyone would pretend they hadn’t planned.
I was hauling the last trash bag to the road when she called my name, bright and carrying, and five heads turned toward me with a synchronization that should have been terrifying and instead felt like coming home.
“Luke! Over here. Family meeting. Very important. Very urgent. Absolutely can't wait.” She waved me over with the cheerful authority of someone announcing the next round of drinks, and when I reached them, six women arrayed on dock chairs and cooler lids, sun on their skin, lake behind them like a painting, the look on Eden’s face was pure, unholy delight.
“So,” she said, like she was calling bingo.
“Kiki and Shay. Together. Your place. First chance after the Bishop-Hollis lunch.” She shrugged, the motion casual, as if she’d suggested nothing more controversial than pizza toppings.
“That’s the plan. Any objections? Speak now or forever hold your peace, though honestly, the peace-holding ship has sailed, crashed, and been rebuilt as a very sexy houseboat, so. ”
The silence that followed wasn't silence. It was five women processing a proposition that, based on the grins spreading across their faces, was about as surprising as sunrise.
Kiki spoke first, because of course Kiki spoke first. She was sitting cross-legged on a cooler lid, golden hair loose around her shoulders, and the smile she gave me was so warm, so certain, it made my chest ache.
“I’m in,” she said, simple and clear. “One hundred percent in. No questions, no hesitations, no weirdness.” Her blue eyes found Shay’s, held, and the warmth that passed between them was genuine and easy.
“We’ve talked about it. A lot. Longer than you’d think.
And the thing is—” She laughed, low and real.
“The thing is, I want to watch. I want to see her with you. I want to be part of it, not separate from it, and the idea of sharing you with her instead of taking turns?” Her smile turned shy, which on Kiki Bishop meant wicked.
“Let’s just say I’ve had thoughts. Many, many thoughts.
Very detailed thoughts. Eden has notes.”
Shay’s laugh was loud and delighted, her dark hair flying as she turned to Kiki with a grin that could have powered the eastern seaboard. “She does have the notes! It’s color-coded! There’s a tab for positions! I’m not kidding!”
“I'm mostly kidding,” Eden said, not sounding like she was kidding at all.
“I’m in,” Shay said, turning back to me, her blue eyes bright with a hunger that made my cock throb against my zipper.
“So fucking in. Kiki and me, your bed, after lunch, and I have plans, Luke. Plans that involve my mouth on her pussy while your cock is in mine, or maybe her mouth on your cock while I ride your face, or possibly all three at once if we can figure out the logistics, which shouldn’t be hard because Kiki is bendy.
Surprisingly bendy. Yoga girl. Very flexible.
Very, very eager to be flexible with both of us. ”
Kiki blushed, actually blushed, golden cheeks flushing pink, and the sight of it, Kiki Bishop, who had fucked me twice before breakfast and told me it was okay that I wanted Shay too, blushing at the idea of Shay’s mouth on her pussy, nearly short-circuited my nervous system on the spot.
“That’s my vote,” Shay said, grinning. “Aye. Very aye. Extremely aye. Possibly the most aye vote in the history of democratic process.”
The remaining three didn't take it quietly.
“Hold on,” Tatum said, bouncing to her feet, copper-red hair escaping its ponytail, freckles dark against her fair skin.
“Hold on hold on hold on. Kiki goes first, fine, she broke the line, respect. Shay goes second, also fine, bonfire magic, very romantic, very them. But both of them? Together? Before any of the rest of us get a solo turn?” She planted her hands on her hips, her blue eyes wide with mock outrage that contained absolutely no actual outrage.
“I call foul. I call very loud, very persistent foul. I demand compensation. Extra compensation. Like, maybe a preview. A teaser. Something to tide me over while these two are having their very bendy, very geometric threesome without me.”