As his eyes move to mine in silent invitation to continue, I pull in a breath.
“Are you bi, too?” I blurt. “I just— you didn’t seem like you were out of your element last night.”
“I’m not really anything, I don’t think,” he says with a shrug. “I never have been.”
“You’ve never told me that.”
“Did I need to?” He challenges as my fingers run through his hair. “You’re the only person I’d ever had sex with or brought home to my parents. I figured everything else was kind of a moot point.”
Squeezing Drumstick’s cheeks, he pulls him close to give the cat a big smooch, earning a loud, trilling meow in response before tiny teeth clamp down on the tip of his nose.
My eyes are on my husband, but behind them, last night replays for me like a movie. Tripp and Connor’s hips grinding against each other, the way that they kissed each other, the way that they pulsed in my hand as they came for each other.
My clit hammers between my legs at the memory.
“Would you do it again?” I probe.
His eyes flick to mine again.
“With Connor?” I nod, using my teeth to tug at the corner of my lower lip. Tripp pulls in a thoughtful, loaded breath. “I’m still pissed at him.” His brow lowers, his eyes narrowing at meas he studies me, his tongue offering a flick to the jewelry in his lip. “Would you? With someone who wasn’t Connor?”
“No,” I answer without a moment of hesitation. “I don’t want that. I only want the two of you.”
As Drumstick finally leaps from his chest in search of something to play with, Tripp pulls himself to a sitting position. His eyes hold mine, and I feel pinned in place as the afternoon sun shines on them from our living room window to give them a caramel glow.
Wings flutter through my stomach as a swarm of butterflies take flight there. They rise to my throat as he stands, towering over me with a hand extended to help me off of the floor, and I think my insides might burst when he pulls my body against his.
“I haven’t felt that close to you in a long time,” I tell him. “Am I alone in that? Am I crazy?”
“You’re not crazy,” he says with a soft shake of his head.
“I regret hurting you. That’s something I’ll always live with,” I admit, cupping his face in my hands, “but I don’t regret what the three of us did together in that hotel room.”
The tip of his tongue meets the smooth ball of the jewelry in his lip again as my thumbs stroke the length of his jaw. I want to know what he’s thinking. I want to ask him how he’s feeling.
But I know my husband, and I know that he doesn’t process things that way. He can’t talk this out – he has to feel it out. He has to go back and forth, up and down, side to side until he lands in a place that feels comfortable and makes sense for him.
The thing I find funny about that is that I was the same way, before he was part of my life.
Lock it away. Feel it in small doses. Get scared. Get angry. Accept it, but neverfaceit.
Bringing myself to the tips of my toes, I press my lips to his in a quick peck. His thumb tugs at my lower lip and I stare upat him through my lashes, waiting with my breath locked in my chest and my heart pounding.
“You’remywife.” Reaching behind me to carefully pull the ribbon from my hair, he says, “I’ll share you with him from time to time, if that’s really what you need from me, but you’re my wife, Jules.”
“I’m your wife,” I echo breathlessly with an affirmative dip of my chin.
The pulse between my legs is raging. Demanding. My nipples peak, straining against the cushion of my bra as he cups my face in his hand, and I slide mine beneath the hem of his shirt to feel the warmth of his skin against my palm.
The tip of his nose presses against mine and his lips sit mere millimeters away, their very presence teasing me in a way that makes me whine.
“Did you like it?” He asks with a voice only just higher than a whisper, thick with gravel. His lips brush against mine, and I melt in his grip. “Did it feel good to be fought over and stretched out? Did you like the way it felt to have both of us inside you?”
“Yes.” The word practically dances on nothing but air.
His lips tease mine again, and as they make contact, his toes push against mine to guide me backward toward the kitchen. Only when we reach the point where carpet meets tile does his mouth properly crash into me. We tangle together into a mess of tongues, teeth nipping at flesh, and shed clothing, until I find myself being helped onto the dining table.
Tripp breaks our kiss only to bring two fingers into his mouth, sliding them past his lips. As his mouth meets mine again, he swirls the pads of those fingers against my hammering clit to send a shockwave through my body. When he finally slips them inside of me, I moan against his mouth, tangling my hand into the back of his hair.
