“I think they know we’re here,” Brandt said.
“Yes, we do.” I unwound myself from Jim, pulled my leggings up, and turned to them. Jim wasn’t the only one I’d missed these past three days. When had our neighbors become so important to me? “I would apologize for the indecent exposure, but something tells me you enjoyed the show.”
“Guilty.” Grinning, they came in and smothered me with hugs and kisses on my cheeks.
“I heard you all had yourself quite the time yesterday,” he said.
“We did,” Brandt said. “I hope you don’t mind what we did without you.”
“Why would I?” I wrapped an arm around Jim. “I’m glad he had you two while I was away, so I didn’t have to feel as guilty as I usually do for leaving him alone.”
“Darling, I know it’s your work. I don’t mind being alone for a few days.”
“I know you think that means it’s all okay, but it shows me what an incredible man you are, and I feel even more guilty. I don’t deserve you, but I’m glad you chose me.”
We bumped foreheads and smiled at each other in an intimate moment we rarely shared with others. Until Cairo and Brandt.
“Maybe we should come back?” Cairo asked.
“Not at all. You’re a part of our family now.” My heart skipped a beat. We’d referred to them as our close friends but never family. Would they reject us?
Brandt smiled. “Okay, but we made dinner and wanted to invite you both, so if you want to come over—”
“Oh god, yes, I haven’t had a proper meal in days. Why don’t you three go ahead without me? I’ll freshen up, change, and then head over.”
“All right.”
When the three left, I walked to our bedroom and took a quick shower. This evening was special. After talking about it last night, Jim and I planned to break it to Brandt and Cairo that we would discontinue our surrogacy with them. We wanted to make this relationship work with them—if they wanted the same things we did.
Please make them want it too.
But I suspected we were going to have a long discussion ahead of us. If I thought too much about it, I might change my mind, so I had asked them to come over once I returned home. The biggest hurdle we might face was how they would react to us still wanting to do our surrogate partner therapy with others and our orgies.
Were they willing to share us that way? We hadn’t been with others since we started sleeping with them, so we had no idea.
Dressed in a cropped tank top and my favorite hot pink velour pants, I went to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of wine from the fridge. We rarely drank, and the bottle would remain closeduntil we’d talked, but I had high hopes we would have something to celebrate tonight.
10
BRANDT
Dinner was amazing. Having Merry back brought a distinct feeling—a sense of completion. We’d enjoyed our time spent together with the three of us, but Merry was one side of our square. His laughter filled gaps in the conversation, although he seemed quieter tonight. He watched me and Cairo an awful lot too, like he was assessing us. But when I asked him to tell us about his flight, he became animated, so I must have been imagining things.
“The most interesting thing on this flight was a sweet elderly lady who insisted she recognized me from a soap opera. I corrected her twice, but she just kept pressing. Well, you know me. I couldn’t resist. For the rest of the flight, I became this suave and charming television star, gave her an autograph and everything. She was overjoyed.”
“Aww, that was sweet of you,” Cairo said. “You made her day.”
Merry took a sip of his iced tea. “Hey, she made my day too. For a few hours, I had a fan.”
“But you have three fans here,” I said.
“I’ll drink to that.” Jim clinked his glass with mine.
Merry’s face turned red, but I could tell he was pleased. I caught Cairo’s eyes, and my stomach clenched. We should do it soon, tell them we wanted to date them. We were pretty much in love with them, but we would go slow in case they freaked out about it.
“Cairo, help me bring out dessert, will you?”
“Sure, babe.”