He stopped his efforts and gave me an exasperated look. “Really? Have I ever needed to take anything?”
“I’m just asking because of the last time.” The ‘last time’ was the one and only time he took a Cialis. A guy on the team had passed him the pill, one which had produced immediate and impressive results that lasted seven hours, despite him having three orgasms and a lot of concerned deflation efforts on our part. I’d wanted to call the ER, he had staunchly refused, and we’d had ice packs on and the team doctor on call by the time it finally started to wilt.
“Nope. This is all you.” He stretched out a white Hanes T-shirt and pulled it over his head. Bending over the bed, he gave me another kiss. “I love you.”
“Love you too.” I pulled the sheet back over me, and watched as he zipped up his pants. His gorgeous features winced as he fastened the button. “Are you sure that’s going to go down?”
“Any minute.” He came forward and sat on the edge of the bed and I tensed. Maybe this was it. The moment of the fight. A cumulation of the Vegas and mid-sex confessions.
Twisting toward me, he leaned across my stomach, his weight pulling the sheet tightly against my breasts. I shifted, and he put the bulk of his heft on his elbow. “You can tell me the truth, Elle. About what you want.”
I wanted to say the same thing to him, given that his dick was about to pierce a hole through the front of his jeans. Maybe the idea of me being with someone else did make him furious, but it also, most definitely, turned my husband on.
He was waiting, and I tried to figure out what I truly wanted. An open marriage? Hell no. A threesome? Maybe. Yes. Maybe. “I don’t know what I want,” I said finally. “I think the fertility drugs are knocking my hormones all out of whack. It isn’t just Aaron. I’ve been thinking about a lot of men.”
It felt wrong to blame the fertility drugs, yet they had been what had brought all of this on. Prior to those drugs, I had a perfectly normal, if not slightly over-active libido, one fully centered on my husband.
He didn’t react, his palm brushing over the top of the sheet and awakening one pert nipple. “What men?”
I winced. “A lot of different ones. Too many to list. Honestly, it’s embarrassing.”
He stilled. “Dr. Jenthric?”
A laugh burst unexpectedly out of me. “What?! No. He’s like ninety!”
“Your boss? Please don’t say so. I know that’s a common fantasy among women.” He looked almost serious enough to sell the question, if you missed the playful twinkle in his eye.
I grabbed a pillow and swung it at his head. “I hate you. Be serious for one moment. I’m not talking about bald gay men or old pediatricians.”
He dodged a second swing of the pillow, stole it from me, and tossed it to the side. Grabbing my wrists, he pinned them to the bed on either side of my head. “How worried should I be about these fantasies?”
“Not worried,” I said honestly. “They’ve been going on ever since we started trying to get pregnant, and I haven’t done anything with anyone.”
“But this is why you didn’t want Aaron to stay with us?” He studied me from his dominant position, then eased his weight off my wrists, freeing them.
I immediately reached for his hair, threading my hands through the thick strands. “All of my other fantasies were with people I have little to no contact with. It just seems too close, having him right here. What if I mess up?”
“Mess up? You won’t.” It was scary, how much my husband trusted me. The clear faith on his face, the absolute confidence that I would never step over the line with his friend. He leaned down and brushed his lips over mine. “You won’t. You’re too good for that and we’re too strong for that.”
It was quite possibly the most reckless thing any spouse could think, let alone say. I knew we were strong. I had no interest in actually attempting any of my fantasies, but I was still freaked out by the idea that Aaron was staying with us and Easton had engaged in a role-play that involved him.
Steps sounded down the long hall, then paused outside our door. There was a rap of knuckles. “E? Game’s back on.”
“Coming,” Easton called out, then pushed to his feet. “Talk about this later?”
“Sure.” Please, no. We needed to put this conversation and his last remaining Hawaiian shirt in a wooden box, bury it in a deep hole, then run like hell. These were not the talks that successful marriages were built on. These were the sort of talks that led to danger, the kind of confessions that later, when reviewing divorce paperwork, everyone regretted.