Hunter
The car ride to the rental from the club is quiet. Isabel is next to me in the passenger seat with her hands folded in her lap, and her eyes are glued to the passing city through the window. Behind us, Drake is brooding. Every time I glance in the rearview mirror, I catch his eye contact for only a second, before he looks away in a rush.
I find their strange sense of shame amusing. They look as if they’ve both been caught with their hands in the cookie jar, and maybe if I was an insecure man, or thought for one moment that these two would ever even think about betraying me, I would be more worried. But I’m not.
What happened on stage was just a demonstration, and the presenter, Maxwell, clearly misjudged them as a couple. The little show they put on was entertaining, more so to me than anyone else, since I was the only one in the audience who knew just how uncomfortable that was for them.
Seeing them up there, my half-naked wife in the hands of my best friend…didn’t quite have the effect on me I expected. When I walked back into the main showroom, I paused at the door when I recognized the two people under the pink light. And while my mind echoed a cadence of what the fuck, my body didn’t react the same way.
Maybe I should have wanted to charge the stage and tear my woman out of Drake’s arms. I probably should have been boiling with anger at the sight of his fingers running the length of her spine, brushing over her barely covered breasts, and tickling the underside of her rib cage. But I didn’t hate it.
I didn’t hate it at all.
Isabel looked so small next to Drake’s six-three frame. Her warm copper hair shone even brighter under the rose-colored lights. And I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through his head during their little rope-tying exploration. I didn’t have to wonder long because the moment Isabel moved to the side, everyone in the room, including me, got a view of his impressive reaction.
He was hard. Very hard, if I was judging correctly from my vantage point.
My best friend was visibly aroused while touching my rope-bound and scantily-clad wife.
I should be fucking furious…but I’m not.
“What did you and Mirabel talk about?” Isabel asks in a meek voice as we pull up to the rental.
“Cross-promotion. She told me a little about how they handle their contracts and freelancers.”
“Oh. Good,” she replies, and then goes quiet again. She’s acting strange.
“Did you like that demonstrator? We can talk to him about coming to Salacious.”
“He was too formal and stuffy,” Drake grumbles from the back seat.
“Never mind then,” I joke.
“I don’t know… I sort of liked him,” Isabel adds with a sweet smile. My wife likes everybody, making her judgment a little hard to trust sometimes. But it makes me love her that much more. She doesn’t have a vicious or cruel bone in her body. Reaching across the console, I squeeze her hand.
Once we get back to the rental, it’s after midnight, and we should probably be exhausted, but the three of us have spent the last year adjusting our schedules to accommodate the late hours of the club. Isabel even hired staff to open her studio and switched to teaching the sunset classes instead of the sunrise ones.
So when we enter the small living space, none of us move toward the bedrooms. Instead, Drake pulls out the bottle of tequila he bought at a local shop today and pops it open with a determined look on his face.
“I’m going to get in my pajamas. Maybe take a bubble bath,” Isabel says, eyeing Drake’s sour mood at the kitchen counter.
“Sounds good, babe,” I say, kissing the back of her hand before she disappears into the bedroom.
Returning to the living room, I watch Drake skeptically as he pours himself a glass.
“Better make that two,” I say, and he does so without a response.
After handing me the glass, he throws back his shot, then lets out a weighted exhale and slams his empty glass on the counter. “Can we talk, please?”
“You okay?” I ask, swirling the golden liquid in the glass.
“No, I’m not okay. I tied up my best friend’s wife in her underwear, and I feel like an asshole for it.”
For the first time tonight, he finally looks me in the eye, and his expression is shrouded in remorse.
“Drake, it’s fine. Relax. It was just a demonstration.”
His brow furrows as he glares at me. “Stop it,” he mutters.
A chuckle erupts out of my chest. “Stop what?”
“Being too fucking nice to me. Treating me like a fucking kid. You should want to wring my neck right now. You want to punch me? Fine. Just do it.”
I’m laughing even harder now. “You’re being fucking stupid. I’m not being too nice to you because I’m not fucking mad at you. What? Do you think I’m really worried you tried to grope my wife on stage with me in the room? Jesus, Drake. I’ve known you my whole goddamn life. If I thought for one second you were ever out to take Isabel from me, do you think I would have kept you around as long as I have?”
“If that were my woman up there, being touched by another man…gawked at by a whole room full of people…I’d lose my shit,” he mutters over another glass of tequila. “I never should have let her get up there like that.”
“You’re beating yourself up over nothing.”
His eyes find mine over the rim of the glass and he watches me for a long time before he slips the drink into his mouth. When he speaks again, he does it a little more quietly. “Everything okay with you guys?”
I flinch before glaring back at him. “Of course. Why would you say that?”
“Because you’re strangely calm about all of this.”
“Because it wasn’t a big deal!” I argue. When he doesn’t relax or say anything for a minute, I grab the bottle from his hand and set it on the counter. “Listen, I’m as surprised as you are, but seeing you with Isabel didn’t make me mad. Maybe it’s because the three of us practically grew up together, so I’ve seen you with her so long that it doesn’t have any kind of effect on me. You can’t get all worked up over one little mix-up and an accidental brush of a tit. It’s not like you fucked her.”
“Hunter!” he bellows, his head snapping up to stare at me in horror. “I would never. You know that.”
“I do know that. Hence why I’m not even a little worried. Now will you just chill the fuck out?”
“Fine,” he mutters. “It was just weird. That’s all.”
“Couldn’t have been that weird. I mean…everyone saw how much you were enjoying it,” I reply with a slight chuckle.
“Jesus Christ!” Drake snaps, pulling away from the counter like I punched him. “You saw that?”
Maybe the tequila’s starting to set in, because I probably shouldn’t have admitted that to him since he looks slightly mortified.
“She’s hot,” I reply. “You think I’m going to fault your dick for noticing?”
“You’re so fucking sick,” he replies, this time actually cracking a smile.
And I’m relieved by that. I hate to see my best friend so upset, which might explain why I’m not as upset as I should be.
“I’m going to go check on her,” I say, leaving Drake in the kitchen. He starts browsing through his phone, and I can tell by the softness of his expression and the slight loss of focus in his eyes that the tequila has set in. Which tells me he’s not going to be upset about it anymore.
“Yeah, okay,” he mumbles as I leave the room.
When I enter our bedroom with an attached en suite bathroom, I instantly pick up the smell of lavender, a scent that immediately has my cock stirring because it means she’s near. These lavender baths are almost a daily ritual for her. Each night she escapes into her warm bubble bath, soaking in the calming scent, which she then brings to bed with her so our sex and my dreams are laced with the familiar smell. It’s calmly infiltrated itself into my life, and I’m so not complaining.
“Hello, beautiful,” I whisper, peeking my head into the foggy bathroom to find her with a book in her hands and bubbles up to her chin.
“Hey,” she says sweetly, drunk on the heat of the water.
With a laugh, I sit on the side of her tub and brush a hand over her head. “Red, it’s like a hundred degrees outside. How can you take a hot bath right now?”
“You know I love my nightly soaks. Besides, I wanted to give you a few minutes to talk to him. Is he okay?”
“He’s fine. Why are you two making a big deal out of this?” I ask.
She sits up a little taller. “You’re not mad?”
I shake my head. “Not at all. If anything…” I say, letting my hand skate over her cheek and down the moist skin of her neck. She hums in response. “That whole thing got me a little turned on.”
“Seeing me being touched by your best friend turned you on?” she asks in a teasing tone.
And I know she’s joking because that is ridiculous. I wouldn’t be in my right mind if that turned me on, but she voices the exact thought in my head, except in my head…I’m not kidding.
Seeing Drake with my wife did turn me on. The sight of his hands on her body had my blood racing more than I’d like to admit. It’s not exactly something I want to unpack right now. Or ever.
Because, deep down, the arousal that swept over me at that moment makes me feel like less of a man. Like Drake said, I should have been raging. I should have claimed her, punched him, and turned into a feral, territorial caveman. But I didn’t. Instead, I watched with intrigue and excitement.
And when he slammed his stiff erection against my wife, the gasp that came out of her mouth made my already hard cock leak from the tip. I didn’t want them to stop. I wanted him to do it again.
Even now, I can’t deny the visions that keep flashing through my mind. Imagining him up there, instead of hiding his arousal in his pants, letting it out, so he could slam it into her for real. The more I think about her face and the sounds she would make as he fucked her, the harder and more excited I get.
Before I get lost in the erotic spiral of those visions, I pull my hand out of the tub and say, “Seeing you all tied up in that rope turned me on.”
“Oh yeah? So, what are you going to do about it?” Isabel asks seductively as she sets her book to the side and rests her head against the back of the tub.
I bring my focus back to her, this goddess of a woman lying naked in front of me, waiting for me to pleasure her. And I want nothing more than to indulge her.
“Well, let me think…” I say as I unbutton the sleeve of my right wrist. She bites her lip as she watches me roll it up to my elbow. Once it’s pushed out of the way, I touch her neck again, taking my time to graze every perfect inch, from her collarbone down to her right breast, squeezing it in a delicate pinch. She whimpers as I skate my touch over her belly, and she begins to squirm when I find the tiny triangular tuft of hair between her legs.
As I slide my finger through her folds, she arches her back and lets out a hungry moan. Slipping my finger back, I find her clit and massage it in teasing circles as she begins to writhe in the water, causing some of the bubbles to spill over.
“Tell me what you want, Red. Tell me how you like it.”
“Yes,” she moans, her fingers gripping the sides of the tub. “Keep doing that.”
“This?” I ask as I increase the pressure on her sensitive nub.
“Yes,” she says again.
Keeping my touch on her clit for a while, I try to memorize the look and sound of her pleasure as I take her as close to her climax as I can get before I slow my massaging.
“I want to be inside you, pretty girl. Can I be inside you?”
Biting her lip, she lets her head hang back as she nods. “Mh-hm.”
With that, I ease my middle finger down to her entrance, pressing into her in one slow intrusion.
“Oh God, Hunter…” she cries out, and I quickly use my other hand to cover her mouth. With one hand on her face and the other buried deep in her warm pussy, I thrust inside her, bringing her close to climax again.
“Remember the first time, Red? Your eighteenth birthday. When I made you come with my hand in your bedroom while your parents were downstairs? Remember that? It was just like this, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” she replies, her voice muffled by my hand.
“I had my hand up your skirt, and you soaked my fingers. Remember that, baby?”
“Oh, Hunter, yes,” she cries, and I can tell by the way her thighs hug my hand tightly that she’s at the height of her orgasm.
“That was the best day of my life, Red. The first time I felt you come. That was the day my life began. You know that, right?”
“Yes, yes, yes,” she says with a long hum as I pull my hand away, so she can cry out loudly this time.
Unable to control myself, I slam my mouth against hers, tasting the warmth of her tongue against mine, a familiar friction. This woman has had a hold on me ever since I met her ten years ago.
And somewhere in the back of my mind, I know the reason I let her cry out is because I want him to hear it. Not because I’m showing off but because, in some way, I feel like he should be involved too.
He always is, where she and I are concerned.
