Afterparty: The Complete Series: Open Relationships Aren't For Everyone... (6 page)

William presented the spaghetti. "Ta-daaa."

She sat up, pushing her thick dark hair out of her face, and William felt a sharp spike of desire at the sight of her, debauched and dressed in his shirt in his bed. To him, the hottest a woman could look was almost immediately after sex, makeup a mess, hair awry, skin sticky, satisfied once but ready for round two.

He sat on the edge of the bed and handed her a plate and fork. "Eat."

Catelyn dug in with surprising quickness. William heard her belly rumble. The two ate in silence for a moment, William finding he was also astonishingly hungry, even compared to his usual post-sex appetite.

She finished most of her plate, stifled a burp, then set the dish neatly on the tray on the nightstand. William cleared his and leaned across Catelyn to set his plate on the tray as well.

Still leaning across her, he kissed her, tasting the remains of tomato sauce on her lips.

Catelyn sighed against his mouth. "Thanks. That was delicious."

He smiled, pressing his nose against hers. "You're delicious."

Catelyn looked up at him under lowered lashes. "So are you."

William drew back a bit, remembering what she'd said about her husband. "Catelyn. You mentioned you and Aaron were fighting..."

Catelyn grasped his shoulder and pulled him closer, into another kiss, open-mouthed and slow. By the time she broke the kiss, William was panting. She tugged at his shirt, pulling it over his head, then tugged at the waistband of his flannel pants. William quickly kicked them off.

"Let's not talk about Aaron right now," she murmured, pulling his now-naked body down on the bed.

He hurriedly unbuttoned the shirt she'd pulled on, and she shrugged it away. William ran his enormous hands over her soft skin, reveling in her smoothly muscled body. "Listen, if things aren't solid between you two..."

Catelyn was stroking his chest hair, lightly scraping her nails over the skin, much to William's delight. "You mentioned he's seeing Olivia, right?"

William pulled her closer and she started scratching her nails lightly over his back, which felt even better. "Well... not SEEING her, specifically, I mean, he's..."

Catelyn snuggled into him, pressing her skin against his, shifting back and forth, then murmured, "Maybe that's just what he needs."

Her hands were on his cock, finding him already hard, and she grinned against his chest hair. "Round two?"

He rolled on top of her and she giggled, then moaned as he found her and slid into her, moving slowly against her on the bed, her hips rolling under his, and he shifted to grind his pubic bone against her clit and Catelyn gasped under him, arms wrapped around him and body writhing under him, legs rubbing against his, hips shifting against his, her arms pressing him against her, holding him tight, and he could feel how much she craved that touch, that connection...

She was flushed and gasping in moments and he kissed her as she climaxed under him, body quivering with each convulsion as pleasure washed through her, kept kissing her as he rode through his own orgasm, feeling her tongue flick at his lips as he stiffened.

Afterward they went to the kitchen, Catelyn in one of William's t-shirts that reached her mid-thigh, William in a robe, and they had more spaghetti.

"What are your plans for the week?"

"Aside from seeing you again?" Catelyn was twirling spaghetti on her fork and missed his look of surprised pleasure. "I need to cull and clean up my shots, and then it's back on the job next Saturday. The week's going to go fast. How about you? Are you joining Aaron in the editing room?"

"They've already got too many cooks in here." William swallowed a mouthful of spaghetti. "Actually, I was looking forward to getting to know both you and Aaron a little better this week."

Catelyn paused, put her fork down. "Oh. Both of us." She sipped her water, thinking. "Um, how so?"

"Well. I know Olivia would like to meet you. Alone."

"Um. Really."

"There's no pressure, of course."

"Is, um, is she angry?"

William laughed hard and Catelyn looked hurt. "What? I'm sleeping with her husband. Is she going to give me a talking to?"

"She's sleeping with your husband," William pointed out, smiling. "And I already told you, she and I have an arrangement. The question is, how far does that arrangement go?"

Catelyn looked thoughtful, picking up the last strands of pasta from her plate. "Is that kind of between you and Olivia?"

William rose and carried their empty plates to the sink. "Well. It's kind of between all four of us. At some point I wouldn't mind Olivia and I having a pleasant evening with the two of you."

Catelyn gulped a little. "All, um, all four of us? Together?"

He smiled gently. "That's why Olivia would like to get to know you better. If you're comfortable with that. She can text you to see when you'd like to meet."

Catelyn's first impulse was to refuse. She'd never been with a woman, though she'd always recognized a pretty woman when she saw one, and Olivia was gorgeous.

"You can always say no, Catelyn. There's no pressure."

"Does, um, does Aaron know about this?"

"Olivia talked it over with him. He'd prefer you met with her, then the four of us can meet."

"Oh." So Aaron was all for it but hadn't said a word to her about it.

William put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed, and Catelyn instinctively reached up and squeezed his hand back. "I should go. I've, um. I have work to do."

She went to the foyer, found her clothes scattered there, got dressed.

William followed her and leaned in the archway. "Hey. It's alright. You don't have to..."

Catelyn had tugged her t-shirt and sweater back on and was shrugging into her jacket. "William, I... Look. Let me think about it, OK?"

"Alright."

She opened the door, then glanced at him. "I feel like I should kiss you goodbye or something."

He leaned in and kissed her, sweetly, on the mouth. "There."

When he drew back, her eyes were closed. They fluttered open, glanced at him, looked away. "Um. Bye."

Catelyn trotted down the walk and to her car, glancing back at him once. William stayed in the doorway until her car was at the end of the block.

He shut the door, leaned against it, sighed.

On her drive home, Catelyn weighed her options.

If she said no, she'd wind up with Aaron pissed at her. She was fine with Aaron continuing things with Olivia as long as Catelyn could keep seeing William, but if she refused to make a foursome of it, would that upset William? Or Olivia? Or Aaron? Any one of them being upset would probably put an end to things and inevitably that meant that Aaron would be angry with her, and he already seemed so bored with her...

If she said yes, she would wind up with... with what?

Catelyn sighed, tapping the steering wheel, wondering what she was so scared of. Lots of women experimented with other women. Olivia was beautiful, she couldn't ask for a prettier partner to start with. And perhaps there was the problem: Olivia was so beautiful that she made Catelyn feel plain, and that wasn't such a good thing...

Catelyn was home before she realized it. She checked the time as she rolled into the driveway. Four PM. She'd been at William's for about four hours, having sex and eating and having sex and eating again. She wasn't hungry for supper.

As she entered the house her phone buzzed with a text. She checked it.

Aaron: Won't be home for dinner. Don't wait up.

Catelyn stared at the message, wondering if that meant he was meeting Olivia.

She stood in the empty house, feeling the stillness. They had no pets. Their madcap schedules made it impossible to keep animals alive, let alone happy.

The fridge kicked on in the silence and made Catelyn jump.

She took a deep breath, then went to her office to boot her computer. No need to fix supper for her and Aaron, plenty of time to work on the photos.

"All the time in the world to work," Catelyn muttered, opening Photoshop. "Hooray."

MONDAY

Catelyn woke to find Aaron already up, dressed, and about to head out the door.

"Hey." She rubbed her eyes.

"Hey yourself." Aaron was checking his outfit in the full length bedroom mirror. "What's on for today?"

"More editing."
"Have you got through your whole reel yet?"

"Nope." Catelyn yawned and rubbed her eyes. "Starting color correction. What time did you come in?"

"Oh, late. You were in bed."

"Mm hm." Catelyn remembered giving up on editing around one in the morning, feeling cross-eyed, crawling into bed still dressed. She hadn't heard Aaron come in.

"Well, I gotta go. I won't be home for dinner again. Sorry babe."

He didn't sound very sorry.
"Back to the studio?" Catelyn sat up and pushed a hand through her tangled black hair.

"Yeah. We're going through more rough cuts." Aaron tucked in his shirt and leaned over to kiss Catelyn's cheek.

"Are you seeing Olivia today?"

Aaron still had his lips on Catelyn's cheek. He paused.

"I'm... no. I'm working." He drew back, looked at her. "Why? Are you seeing William today?"

Catelyn resisted the urge to drop her eyes from his hard gaze. "No. But I think Olivia's going to be calling me."

The coolness in Aaron's gaze changed to curiosity. "Really? Why?"

"Because..." She couldn't take it anymore and broke eye contact, playing with the edge of the blanket. "Because I think... they want to see if, um, it'd work if all of us were, you know..."

She looked at him. He was smiling. 
"Well, good. Great. Let me know how it goes."

He stepped away from the bed with a bounce in his step. Catelyn kept staring at him.

Aaron frowned. "What?"

"Nothing," she said, studying his face. "Have a good day."

Aaron snorted and nodded. "Yeah, you too."

Then he was gone.

Sitting in bed, Catelyn felt the warmth of sleep dissipate from her skin, replaced with cold coiled anxiety in her belly.

She picked up her phone, checked her messages, and saw a single text from Olivia:
Coffee today?

Catelyn stared at the message, her anxiety heightening. She slowly got out of bed. The bedroom floor was chilling against her bare feet.

Catelyn texted back:
Sure. Where?

Olivia:
Your place?

Catelyn hesitated, looking around the house. She'd gotten through more of the laundry but there was still a lot of cleaning to be done...

She decided she didn't care. She wanted to get this over with. If it was awful and she hated it, at least she'd know and be able to tell Aaron truthfully that she'd tried but it just wasn't her thing and it was totally okay if he wanted to keep seeing Olivia, and couldn't they just go back to how things used to be?

Catelyn:
Sure. 1 o'clock?

Olivia:
See you then.

Catelyn considered cleaning versus her backlog of photos, did some time calculations, then got to work.

At five minutes to one, Catelyn opened the door to Olivia: tall, slender, blonde, intimidating Olivia.

Catelyn smiled with her mouth, feeling frumpy and short in her t-shirt and jeans.

She stepped back and gestured to the other woman to enter.

Catelyn had taken a quick shower at twelve thirty, after doing a crazy quick cleaning between working on the photos and getting to the halfway point. She'd actually been more productive in the few hours between the text to Olivia and Olivia's arrival than she'd expected. It was remarkable how a little pressure could push her meet her deadlines.

"Your home is lovely," Olivia said, looking around.

"You don't have to lie," Catelyn laughed. She'd cleared away most of the laundry and vacuumed some of the worst spots but the place still needed a thorough dusting.

"I'm not," Olivia said, surprised. "It really is. I see you don't get to spend a lot of time here, though."

"Well. You know how it is. I'm just happy to be working. And I've at least got the rest of the week to finish editing the photos."

Olivia was looking at Catelyn and Aaron's wedding pictures, raising her hand as she looked at each one, fingers not quite touching the frames. "How long have you been married?"

"Five years. How about you and William?"

"Two. But we'd been together for a long time before we married."

The kettle whistled and Catelyn moved to turn off the heat.

"What would you like?"

"Hm." Olivia turned from the photos to survey the various boxes of tea Catelyn had on the counter. "The chai stuff, please."

Catelyn grabbed two mugs from the cabinet and put a teabag in each.

As she poured hot water into the mugs, she felt Olivia come up behind her, looking over her shoulder, not quite touching her. She could feel the heat of Olivia's body, feel her own skin tingling at the other woman's closeness, her anxiety ratcheting up.

Was she going to be able to do this?

"I've never been with a woman," Catelyn said abruptly, putting the kettle back on the stove.

"That's alright. A lot of women haven't." Olivia put her hands on Catelyn's shoulders, gently rubbing. Olivia's hands were slim and strong, thumbs gently pressing the muscles in Catelyn's back.

Catelyn took a deep breath, inhaling the hot steam coming off the tea. It smelled good, soothing. Olivia's hands felt good, soothing. Catelyn's heart kept thumping loudly in her ears.

"I'm not sure... I don't know how far I want to go."

"That's alright too. We'll go as far as you want, no farther," Olivia assured her.

Catelyn turned, eyes downcast. "William said you knew that we were going to... that you knew he planned to seduce me at the party, and that you were OK with it."

"William doesn't keep things from me," Olivia said. She reached past Catelyn, who flinched. Olivia frowned, having picked up one of the teacups. "Look, if this is making you really uncomfortable..."