Summer Swap 4.3

Sully had come into the bathroom just as Scarlet prepared to deliver the dirty details to Cheyenne. While the revelation was shocking, Scarlet’s threesome had seemed inevitable, given all that had happened so far on their yacht vacation. It was probably all Chey’s fault. She’d been the one who’d succumbed to another man’s charm, after all. And her swinging experience had been positive. Positive bordering on cathartic. Not just for her, but for her relationship with her husband. The more she’d discussed it with Scarlet, the more it pushed Scarlet to taking her own first step into the dark side.

So, while Scarlet’s threesome with her husband and Philippe was an outrageous spectacle that would stupefy her a month ago—hell, even a few days ago—somehow she’d been inured to the surprise of Scarlet’s wild night of three-way sex.

“It’s so good to see you again, Cheyenne,” Paloma said, taking Chey’s hands and kissing the air next to both cheeks, the wide brim of the sunhat Paloma wore scooting across the top of Cheyenne’s head.

Cheyenne laughed. Not at the greeting, but how her reverie had swallowed her, taken her mind away from greeting Paloma in the second floor lounge. The magnetic attraction of these yacht-based sexual endeavors had stolen her brain.

“It’s such a surprise to have you here,” Cheyenne said.

Paloma said, “A pleasant one, I hope.”

“Of course,” Chey said, chuckling. There was more she wanted to say, but given the situation, she didn’t want to say the wrong thing. Philippe had told her secrets, and she didn’t want to say something that would reveal that to Paloma. Philippe missed Paloma, and Chey hoped they would get back together. She would hate to wreck it for Philippe by saying the wrong thing.

Byron joined her, putting his arm around the small of her back. Cody stood behind Paloma, carrying her bags. Byron had carried up the others, the suitcases on wheels. A brief pause of uncomfortable silence was broken at last as Arlo and Lily came down from the deck above and joined them, Lily following behind her husband with an unusual expression.

Arlo gestured with both palms held out, showing Paloma how happy he was to see her. The two of them had always got along. Paloma was more proper, more like Lily and Arlo—though, given all she knew about Paloma, maybe that wasn’t true. A polycule.

Arlo greeted Paloma with a warm hug and then Lily took her turn—still sporting an unusual expression—then shifted in behind Arlo as Arlo told Paloma how happy he was she could join them.

Paloma had always been a hard one to peg when they all got together. Quiet and reserved, yet after a cocktail or two she could be funny. Maybe even endearing. Scarlet thought Paloma could be haughty, but they’d always got along.

Lily and Arlo departed their conversation with Paloma, stepping away and opening up the group, turning so they faced the same direction Paloma faced. Chey turned to follow their gazes.

Past the lounge, beyond the glass partition wall, on the far side of the dining room, Philippe headed their way. None of them said a thing, only watched Philippe walk toward them, and the silence inflated to the point of bursting; Chey’s forearms bristled with goosebumps, wondering what Philippe and Paloma’s greeting would be like. Was Philippe as surprised as everyone else that Paloma was here? Was he happy Paloma was here?

Philippe had told her how he and Paloma and two other couples had lived in a commune, upstate, in the woods. Three couples, six people, all in open relationships. But only open amongst the six people of their commune. Paloma had strayed outside the commune, but Philippe still loved her. But, he’d said, as much as he loved Paloma, rules were rules, and the rules were all they had that could keep them together. It sounded harsh to Chey when Philippe had told her about it, but he’d said don’t think of it as a relationship, think of it as a society. He’d said he had a duty to their society, their community, to enforce the rules. If he didn’t enforce the rules, how would the others trust him?

It sounded terrible. It sounded like banishment.

Philippe now reached the partition and entered the lounge, close enough to hear the gum soles of his moccasins on the polished wood floor. One side of his mustache lifted in a slight smile. His dark eyes twinkled with magical compassion. The potential for witnessing a warm reunion set off a kaleidoscope of happy butterflies in Cheyenne’s tummy.

* * *

It was like they’d never been apart. The way Philippe took Paloma in his arms, the way Paloma melted against Philippe, it was like they weren’t divorced at all, it was like they’d been separated by distance, by travel, two lovers living on different continents now reunited after a long divide. It warmed Byron’s heart, and he took Cheyenne’s hand and squeezed it. It had no life. He turned to regard his wife. Chey was in deep focus, watching the reunion the way he did, but her eyes narrowed and burning like laser beams. He double-squeezed her hand, and she leaned close, leading with her ear but not taking her eyes off Philippe and Paloma.

He whispered, “That’s so nice, don’t you think?”

“I know,” she said, still watching them. Arlo and Lily beamed, though Lily looked a little sick, and Cody smiled wide too, nodding with some respect. A happy reunion indeed.

Byron said, “It’s a great surprise, eh, buddy?”

Philippe let Paloma go, Paloma going back down to her heels as her former husband released her. Her smile was big and beautiful. Her eyes happy, shining with wet.

“It’s a great surprise,” Philippe said, still holding one of Paloma’s hands.

Byron said to Paloma, “Where am I taking your bags?” Cheyenne elbowed him and he shot her an innocent look.

Paloma and Philippe looked at one another. Philippe said, “We’ll bring them down to my room.”

* * *

Cheyenne stayed alone in the lounge wishing Scarlet would show up—but didn’t blame her friend for hanging back, given she’d slept with Philippe last night. After about ten minutes, she texted Byron asking him where he was and waited for his reply. Cody and Byron had gone with Philippe and Paloma with Paloma’s bags and Lily and Arlo had returned upstairs where Arlo was preparing a meal for tonight, welcoming Paloma. Byron got back to her, saying he was headed to the kitchen, where was she, and did she want him to make her a cocktail. She told him she would love a cocktail and she would meet him in the kitchen in fifteen minutes. Then she went to the far end of the yacht, toward the bow or whatever you call it, to the second set of stairs that would take her to the level below.

She crept down the stairs on high alert, eyes darting, ears listening. When she was sure the coast was clear, and no one saw her sneaking, she made her way through the lower lounge to the archway that led to the center hall where the lower level suites were. Where Philippe’s suite was. Philippe’s and Paloma’s. She listened, heard nothing, chanced a look. The hall was empty.

She crept the hall, ready to assume a more nonchalant pose should someone catch her, going on quiet careful footsteps, hands in her pockets, slowing as she neared the end of the hall, close top the last door on her right, Philippe’s room. Where her friend and her friend’s husband had a threesome. She looked up and down the hall, ensuring the coast was still clear. Then she edged to the door and inclined her head to listen.

Beyond the heavy door she could hear Philippe and Paloma talking, Paloma laughing her light sound, even her laugh tinged with that Brazilian-English sound, with some German and Portuguese. But she couldn’t make out the words. She edged even closer, getting her ear almost touching the door.

From close behind her, a click and a male voice: “What you up to, Chey?”

Her heart jumped, and she almost swallowed her tongue, snapping away from the door and turning, folding her arms across her chest. Her pulse pounded, her heart raced, and her cheeks burned. Cody had come out of the room next to Philippe’s, carrying extra pillows under an arm.

“You scared the shit out of me,” she whispered.

“Sorry,” he whispered back. He looked to the door where she’d been huddled, then back to her, a mischievous look on his handsome face. “Man, I love spying, Chey. Me and some of the guys took twelve hours once, sneaking up on this farmhouse in Afghanistan, all these goats and shit, and then when it’s night, we got our night-vision—”

“Well, I don’t have night-vision right now, Cody— Hey, you don’t have night-vision goggles here or anything, do you?”

“No,” he said, laughing. “Why would I have that here? At home, sure. But here?” He turned to look at Philippe’s door and then faced her again. “Why’re we spying on my buddy?”

“You don’t want to know what they’re talking about?”

“He’ll tell me later.”

“He’s probably not going to tell me.”

“So, what? That means you gotta creep around outside his room? Tell you what, you want a tip? You go in this room next door to his, it’s empty, you see, and you can put a water glass up to the wall...”

“That works?”

“Sure it does. Or, how about this? I’ll tell you what he tells me. How about that?”

She smiled and narrowed her eyes on him. “Can I trust you?”

Cody recoiled as if mortally wounded by her words, clutching at his chest, his big, good-looking tanned hand clutching a handful of his tank top. He smelled so fucking good. She laughed and grabbed his wrist and he pulled her in for a one-armed hug, pillows under his other arm. “Don’t worry,” he said, “I got your back.” To prove it, he swatted her bottom.

The unprovoked and unexpected feel of his hand slapping her ass got her clenching her muscles and going on her toes, an out-of-the-blue sexual feeling shivering through her. She pressed together her knees, squirming against his hard and muscular body. She changed the subject. “You think they’re going to get back together?”

“I don’t know. It’s a good sign, don’t you think, Paloma coming all this way?”

“The Grand Gesture.”

“What’s that?”

“Something I like better when guys do it.”

“Sounds dirty, Chey. You be careful talking to me like that. Might be the middle of the day, but you can get me horned up with just a little wink.”

She looked up into his turquoise eyes, getting lost in them a moment, then saying, “I better be careful then.”

“Or reckless,” he said, “depending on what you wanted.” Now his hand dipped down her lower back, and instead of swatting her bottom he coddled it, his fingers stroking over the under curved of her cheeks and setting off her tickle buttons as he got closer to where her sex hid. She stepped away from him, giggling, hiding her nipples with folded arms; they’d tightened at his masculine touch.

“You want to teach me this Grand Gesture sometime soon, Chey? Sounds intriguing.”

She said, “It’s for people in love, Cody. In love, but apart. The Grand Gesture can bring them back together if the other is willing.”

Cody nodded. “You think Philippe’s going to accept Paloma’s Grand Gesture?”

“That’s what I was here to find out.”

“You’re a curious little kitty cat, aren’t you?”

She shrugged, smirking, feeling embarrassed and hoping her incomplete claim was enough to stop Cody’s questions.

“I get curious, too, sometimes,” Cody said.

“I’m sure you do.”

“Like, you know this thing you’re cooking up for Byron?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What are you and I going to do when it’s going down?”

“You and me? That might take the selflessness out of it.”

“That’s what it’s about? You and how you feel?”

She scowled. “No, it’s just about him.”

Cody’s mouth turned down, not out of disappointment or disagreeableness, but out of an assessment and approval of her stated motive. “I like it,” he said, then swatted her butt again, stepping away now, ready to go into Philippe and Paloma’s room, delivering the extra pillows. Then he paused and turned back, that handsome hand rubbing at his chest. “I love the way your nipples rub on me when you’re horny.”

Man, and there went those butterflies again, flitting up from her nether regions to tickle throughout her torso. She rolled her eyes and then growled as if irritated—smiling like a schoolgirl the whole time—then trotted up the stairs to meet Byron, Cody chuckling behind her.