Once back inside, I drank. Copiously. Three glasses of rosé and a shot of something I'd found being distributed once I'd ingested a hefty number of canapés.

I didn't know how else to get the images out of my mind. Finding Chi and Harvey in such a compromising position, and then witnessing Harvey's wife dive into it all with open arms—it was too much.

Too arousing. Too intriguing.

The dinner itself was late; something about last-minute changes to the menu, which I attributed to Mollie having been in the kitchen when I got there. And since there were no assigned seats, everyone plopped down wherever they wanted and dug in.

A few speeches, a few cheers, toasts to the soon-to-be newlyweds. Axel sat as far away as possible from where I'd been standing, in a corner, watching over everything. As the wedding planner I didn't get a spot at this table. Violet had given me permission in St. Tropez, but Estelle didn't want me anywhere near her family.

I loathed her for it, but I had to pretend like I understood.

As the wedding planner I also wasn't supposed to drink as much, but the alcohol was the only thing dulling my thoughts. Thank goodness I didn't see Axel again once dessert was served, as he pretexted some emergency and had to leave. After that, Estelle steered clear of me, focusing on her fiancée and their guests.

When the tipsiness shifted to downright drunkenness, and most of the guests were laughing, raucous, and spilling booze, it was time to go home. Chi had disappeared—they never came back inside, though Harvey and Blair did. I couldn't rely on them to help me, and I wasn't about to ask anyone else for a ride, so I pulled up my Uber app and ordered a vehicle. Possibly. I wasn't sure. My eyesight was blurry, and I swayed side-to-side as I meandered out the front door and waited outside.

A cool breeze brushed over my cheeks, slightly waking me up. But I wasn't lucid, not fully. The flashes of Chi and Harvey kissing, Harvey and Blair kissing, Chi and Blair kissing—they invaded my thoughts, captured me. Chi and Blair hadn't kissed in front of me, not that I could remember, but still, the potential of it happening turned me on.

Why was I turned on? It wasn't Chi, I knew that. They'd never aroused me before and never would. That was a boundary we'd both promised not to cross. But Blair...

Blair was delicious. That fiery red hair, those soulful eyes, her deft touches over her husband's erection, her fingers eager unwrap whatever package Chi kept hidden. And Harvey...well, he reminded me a bit of his brother, didn't he? That must have been it.

Axel. Thinking of him while inebriated was never a good idea. Somewhere between leaving the restaurant and getting into my Uber, I wondered about him. Where he'd gone, why he'd left, what had happened to him after we parted ways. I still felt him inside me—that, or I was still super wet from envisioning the future threesome I'd stumbled upon—and recalled I was underwear-less. I giggled, feeling naughty.

The Uber driver didn't speak to me, and I was thankful for it, because I wouldn't have known what to say. I was in that state of intoxication where my lips were loose, and my thoughts unhinged. Where I'd have no problem spilling out all my woes and divulging all the secrets I kept.

Axel was my husband. I wasn't supposed to marry him. We got married anyway. We fucked under the balcony at his sister's rehearsal dinner. His sister hated me. I discovered his brother, about to cheat on his wife—no, wait, not cheat. About to have a threesome with my wedding planning assistant, who happened to be my best friend—

"Whoa," I said, spinning in the backseat as the driver pulled up at the curb of my building. I probably shouldn't have entered the car at all; I didn't remember getting in. Didn't remember what the driver looked like, if they'd had that flashing Uber sign on their windshield.

Shit, I could have gotten kidnapped and hurt. But if I'd waited for a more secure ride, I'd have likely ended up further berated by Estelle, and in my drunken state, I'd have said things I'd regret.

"Thanks," I muttered, struggling to get out of the vehicle, trying not to look like I was in too much of a hurry. Just in case. But the moment I tripped onto the sidewalk and closed the door behind me, the driver took off.

If anything, they were a dick for leaving such a drunk woman alone on the sidewalk of an L.A. neighborhood, but...whatever.

I fumbled for my keys, managing somehow to get upstairs to my studio in time to collapse to the ground. I felt lightly nauseous, but no stomach pain, so I figured it was the usual mix of alcohol making me dizzy. I'd be fine.

I pressed my hands to the wall to stand up, and half-laughed, half-cried as I navigated to my bed in the dark, losing my shoes and purse in the process.

I hadn't been this drunk in a long time. Maybe there'd been more than the rosé and the shots, but I had no clue. And I also had no clue if I'd even remember any of it tomorrow.

It was perhaps best if I didn't.

Oh, but I'd remember Axel. Spotting him across the room, dashing as always. Dapper. Enticing without even meaning to, his lips not even trying to form a smile, his voice not even trying to be deep and seductive.

He didn't try, didn't need to. Everything he did or said was magical and it subdued me. No effort needed. And if he did put in efforts, one would never know.

Which was why falling for him had placed me in a complicated situation. His family rejected me—well, one of them, at least—and didn't trust me, which led to me questioning myself and my own motives, morals. It hurt, physically and emotionally, to be so unsure of myself. To start panicking any time Axel and I were in a room together.

Would everyone see it, sense it—that love between us? The serious attraction, the bond that had formed between us? Wouldn't they all detect it? Wasn't there some aura around us, a neon line linking us together, with the words we're married displayed above it?

"Fuck." I collapsed onto my bed. My legs dangled off the mattress, and my head hit the duvet. I peered up at the ceiling and saw stars; not the love-struck kind, but the kind that said I needed to sit up or at least put my feet on the ground for some balance.

I settled for the latter. I didn't feel like sitting up. This was comfortable, laying down, my body resting at last. No one had told me how physically exhausting acting could be. Though I didn't need to act as much once Axel had left, but...if I didn't maintain the illusion, Estelle would catch it.

Estelle. I growled, then chuckled at the weak sound of my growl. Her growl would be louder. She was much fiercer than me, no doubt. She had more resources, more ways to hurt me. I didn't want to mess with her, didn't want to get caught.

I didn't want to lose Axel.

I reached beside me for my phone, but realized I'd left it in my purse, which I'd dropped somewhere between the front door and the bed.

"Oh well," I said with a sigh, still glancing up at the ceiling as if it were a screen about to display my life like a TV show. "Guess I'll lay here and reflect, then."

Bad idea. Bad idea. Not the laying down part, no, that was fine, I wasn't as dizzy anymore. But the reflecting part. No, I couldn't reflect, not now—the whole point of drinking so much alcohol was to suppress all those reflections.

But it was too late—the liquor and wine were no longer doing their jobs, and all the thoughts I'd tried so hard to stash deep inside came back out, unbidden.

Chi. Harvey. Blair. A threesome in the making? I should have stayed and watched. Axel had left, anyway, and no one inside seemed to give a shit what was going on on the deck. When I'd returned inside, they were all so busy with their conversations and nibbling on the appetizers, no one even noticed me. And in any case, the corner where Chi and Harvey had chosen to entwine their tongues wasn't in full view of the windows.

Smart. Very smart.

I should have lingered. Taken inspiration. A threesome...that was something I'd always wanted to try, officially, properly. Olivia and I had fooled around a little, tried some stuff back in our hay-day, but we were trashed and clumsy. I didn't consider those attempts to be the real thing, and neither did the women who'd been with us.

Plus...I was more intrigued by the notion of having at least one man in the threesome. My ideal roster was two women and one man, but I'd be fine with two men, too.

I'd had my share of touching sessions in bed while picturing a scenario; me being pleasured by two people at once, then watching them pleasure each other.

Wasn't that a normal thing to fantasize over? I knew Chi had—and now had proof of it—as we'd discussed it once or twice while getting drinks or dinner. I knew I wasn't alone in desiring something like that.

But...I was married. To Axel, who, according to his brother, wasn't super open to that kind of stuff. I found it hard to believe that Axel wouldn't accept his brother's lifestyle, but I did doubt he'd be okay with a threesome. He'd made it quite clear to me he didn't share.

Nor did I share, and yet...oh, fuck, there was something so fucking hot about someone lusting over him. He was mine, he'd always be mine, but to observe someone else wanting him, touching him, craving him...it ignited a foreign spark of desire in me.

My hand wandered to the lower parts of my dress. I didn't need to touch myself to know I was wet, still. And if I did touch myself, it'd be too late; I'd have to indulge in this fantasy, scratch that itch before it got the best of me.

I'd have to masturbate to the possibility of a threesome with my husband.

But no...no, it was so unlikely, I didn't see why fantasizing over it would be such an ordeal. I'd never get to have a threesome, not for real. So was it so bad that I wanted to picture having one, anyway?

I wasn't mad that Axel would deny me one. I wouldn't even ask, because I didn't want him to feel obligated. If he wanted one—and that was a huge if—then I'd rather he express it without me giving him the idea. But it wasn't a deal-breaker if he slammed his fist on his desk and gave me a huge no.

I wouldn't go behind his back, either. No cheating, not me. Axel was my husband, for better or for worse, and I'd accept whatever boundaries he had, as I knew he'd accept mine.

But...

I squeaked in surprise when I realized my hand, my damn drunken hand had somehow found its way under my dress and between my inner lips. When my fingertip jolted against my clit, I came to life, electricity shooting up my spine.

How was I so aroused? Axel had given me perfect sex down on the beach. I didn't need this. No, I didn't even want it, I—

"Liar," I whispered to myself, holding in a moan as I began to circle my center. I gave up on trying to stop myself; if my body wanted to be touched, I'd give it what it wanted. Sometimes stroking myself helped alleviate the hangover after a night of binge-drinking.

I was a liar. I did want this, the touching, the wetness. But I didn't want to do it to myself. I wanted someone else with their head between my legs, and someone's cock or pussy up against my face.

"Fuck," I said, already approaching a climax. My finger was working fast as images raced through my mind—all sorts of positions favorable for threesomes, all sorts of locations and sexy sounds and sensations.

It was all Chi's fault. They and Harvey had planted this awful seed in my mind, and it grew, grew. And by being so drunk, I wasn't able to block my thoughts, as I'd hoped. They kept coming in waves, more intense than the last.

I didn't even know any guys I'd want to fuck while Axel watched. Or any women we could invite to join us without Estelle somehow finding out. With her prominent position in the LGBTQIA+ scene in L.A., and her goddamn P.I., she'd find out.

Oh, but the idea of it all...

Axel fucking me while I sucked someone's cock? Sexy. I couldn't tell who that someone was, but in my mind, their member was large and delicious. Axel was turned on watching me do it.

Or maybe I was licking someone's pussy, maybe rubbing off on someone's thigh while someone suckled on my nipples, and I was stroking someone's dick into submission—

I'd fall asleep with my fingers still lodged deep inside of me, not a care in the world, wouldn't I?

Fuck it. Problems would be for tomorrow; for tonight, I'd make myself come until I was too tired to think again.

☼☼☼