The Home-wrecker (The Goode Brothers)
The Home-wrecker: Chapter 21

What just happened?

My wife is staring up at me from the floor, my cum covering her face. As our eyes meet, it feels like waking up from a wild dream.

Dean moves first, quickly grabbing a towel to clean her up as I reach down to pull her to her feet.

“Uh, are you okay?” I ask.

She seems taken aback by the question. “Of course I’m okay,” she replies. “Are you okay?”

Am I?

“Yes, of course.”

Dean stands nearby, watching our awkward exchange. “Good start,” he mutters. “Now…”

Now…what? I think.

“You guys really suck at conversations,” he says, crossing his arms.

Tilting my head, I give him an exasperated glare. “Not helpful.”

Briar goes to the sink to rinse her face, and I swallow down my humiliation. This isn’t us. We don’t do crazy shit like this. We’re a respectable, married couple. Not some kinky couple still in their twenties and down to experiment.

“I think what Dean is trying to tell us, Caleb, is that we need to talk about what we just did,” she says, patting her face with a paper towel.

“Why?” I ask.

She lets out a sigh.

“You should talk about it,” Dean replies, “so your wife doesn’t start to feel ashamed of blowing you in the kitchen with another man involved.”

My eyes widen as I turn back toward her. “Do you…feel ashamed?”

She shrugs. “No.”

“There you go,” Dean replies. “And what about you?”

“What about me?” I quip back.

“Did you like it?” Briar asks.

My gaze scans over to Dean. I know the question is not whether I liked the blow job—that’s a given. The question is whether I liked seeing another man touch my wife, feeling jealous and compelled to reclaim her. Telling her what to do just to watch her please me so I can shower her with praise.

Did I like that?

To be honest, I liked it a lot fucking more than I expected.

Just as I open my mouth to reply, the doorbell rings, and we all stare at each other in shock.

“Shit. Your mom is bringing Abby back.”

“I should go,” Dean says, moving toward the back door.

Briar and I rush to clean up and compose ourselves, and I make it to the foyer first.

Abby barrels through the front door excitedly, and my mother trails far behind. “I’m going swimming!” my daughter shouts.

“Not without me or Mom,” I yell in her direction.

“I don’t think she ever runs out of energy,” my mother says with an exasperated smile as she reaches the front door.

“I think you’re right,” I reply. “Thanks for keeping her for a couple of nights.”

“Oh, anytime,” my mom says. “She keeps me young.”

I laugh to myself as my mother hovers near the door. I feel her looking at me with that comforting, motherly expression on her face.

When she reaches out and squeezes my arm, I tense. “And how’re you doing, darlin’?”

How am I doing? Well, aside from the fact that my father is going to prison, my marriage is falling apart, my estranged brother’s ex-boyfriend found his underwear in my pocket, and my wife gave me a blow job while another man watched in our kitchen this morning, I’d say I’m doing fine. Nothing out of the ordinary, right?

Of course, I don’t say that. I just nod and give her a reassuring smile. “I’m okay, Mom.”

“Good,” she replies, looking pleased. “Well, I should get going. Don’t forget about family dinner on Sunday.”

“Of course,” I say with my hand on the door.

After my mother leaves, I find myself standing there, frozen in place. I’m still reeling from whatever that was.

What was that?

I can’t decide if I should feel good or bad about what happened. Was it wrong to take advantage of Briar? Or let another man touch her like he did? I’ll admit that watching him kiss her felt like slapping some sense into me.

It was like finding a part of myself I didn’t know existed but only getting a taste. I want more.

Finally leaving the front door, I walk up the stairs to find Abby clumsily putting on her bathing suit. Briar is there helping her, and the moment she hoists the straps over her shoulders, Abby takes off in a sprint as if she can’t get in the pool fast enough.

“You need sunblock!” Briar shouts after her.

With our daughter gone, it’s just Briar and me, and the moment our eyes meet, there is a sudden tension between us. Was Dean right when he said we suck at communication? Why can’t I just talk to my wife about what happened? It’s definitely a me problem.

“I should…go with her,” Briar says, rising from the floor.

“Yeah, of course,” I stammer. There won’t be time for that conversation today, not with our six-year-old around.

I try to go back to work on my laptop, but it’s futile. There is too much swirling through my mind. Instead, I walk out back, where Abby is splashing in the pool while Briar sits on the side with her feet in the water.

“Daddy, look how long I can hold my breath!” Abby shouts, mispronouncing breath with an f instead of a th because of the missing teeth in the front of her mouth. A smile stretches across my face as I watch her.

She sticks her face under the water for no more than fifteen seconds. “Good job, peanut.”

When she wipes away the wet hair stuck to her face, she looks up at the apartment above the garage. “Will you ask your friend to come swim too?”

Briar and I glance nervously at each other.

“No, honey. He’s probably busy,” Briar says softly.

“Can you just ask him?” she begs. “He can hold his breath for a long time. Mommy had to save him.”

Briar chuckles to herself as I glance between them.

“Please, Daddy!” Abby whines.

“We said no,” I reply, sitting on one of the chairs by the pool. “Stop begging, Abby.”

Just then, she waves up at the apartment. “There he is!”

Briar and I turn to look up to find Dean staring out the window. A moment later, he steps out onto the landing outside the apartment. Awkwardly, he waves down at us.

“Will you come swimming with me?” Abby asks.

“Um…” Dean stammers. “I don’t…think so.”

“Please…” she whines.

“Abby, what did I say about begging,” I say, scolding her just as Dean cuts in.

“Fine, I guess.”

As he disappears into his apartment, Briar and I share another nervous look. After our morning, it feels unnerving to play with our daughter like nothing happened.

After a few minutes, Dean emerges in the same tight swim shorts he normally wears, and I have to force my eyes not to look. But Briar doesn’t bother looking away. I see the way she watches him. The way she pushes her tits forward when he’s near her. The look of desire on her face.

Her words play back in my head. How she accused me of wanting Dean to touch her. Of bringing him here with the intention to test her. Why would I do that? Why would anyone do that?

But she has a point. Why don’t I fight for her more? Deep down, I know he’s not trying to take her from me. After this morning, it seems quite the opposite is true.

So, how would I feel if they were to really touch each other? Jealous? No. Maybe a little left out. Maybe a little aroused.

Maybe a lot aroused.

“You have to relax,” Dean says to Abby. “You flail around too much. Just take a deep breath and go under, but try not to panic.”

“Like this?” she asks. With a big gasp, she pushes her face underwater and almost immediately starts splashing around and coming up a second later.

“That was terrible,” he says, staring down at her with a furrowed brow.

Briar giggles, looking away from them as I feel myself fighting a smile as well. Dean doesn’t talk to Abby like everyone else does. It’s clear he doesn’t have experience with children, and judging by the way he is with her, I don’t think he even likes children. So, seeing him talk to her just makes me want to laugh.

“Come here,” he mutters with a sigh. Taking Abby’s hand, he leads her deeper into the pool. “We’ll go down together, but just look into my eyes and try not to think about breathing. Just count in your head or something.”

“Okay,” she says with an excited giggle. He rolls his eyes as he takes her hands.

Watching as they each take a long inhale, I bite my lip as they sink down to the bottom together. This time, Abby doesn’t flail and splash. And nearly thirty seconds go by before she swims to the top.

“Mom, did you see that?” she squeals. “How long was that?”

“That was so good, peanut!” Briar says with excitement.

“Thirty seconds,” I call as if I was keeping time. “That’s a new record.”

Dean swims up and gives Abby a proud smile. “Much better.”

“Thanks, Dean,” she says between gasps for air. When she reaches the edge of the pool, she looks at him with a toothless grin. “Wanna race to the other end?”

He stares at her, confused. “I’m not going to let you win.”

This only makes her giggle. “Ready, set, go!” She pushes her feet off the edge and swims as fast as her little legs can propel her across the surface. Dean is there before she reaches the middle, but she doesn’t seem to care. She’s all giggles and excitement. Even when he beats her again and again.

Until the very last round, when he claims he’s running out of energy, and she manages to touch the edge before him.

After another hour of swimming, Briar makes sandwiches for lunch, and the four of us eat them on the patio. Dean is still in those barely there shorts, and Abby is still beaming at him after he spent all morning playing with her in the pool.

When her lunch is gone, she hops up from the chair. “Can I go inside and watch TV?”

“Yes,” Briar replies. “Hang your bathing suit up in the bathroom.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Abby says, nearly bouncing in place as Briar continues, “And clean up your plate.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Okay, you can go.” Abby starts to sprint away before Briar yells for her. “Wait! Come back.”

“What?” Abby whines as she returns to where Briar is still sitting. Pulling her close, Briar presses a big kiss right on Abby’s cheek with a smile. “Okay, that’s all. You can go now.”

With a giggle, Abby takes off with her plate in her hand, closing the patio door so it’s just the three of us left outside alone.

Shit.

“Thank you for playing with her,” Briar says softly, picking at her sandwich. “She really liked that.”

“Of course,” Dean replies. “She’s a cool kid.”

Hearing him say that, I smile. But then, no one says anything for a while, and what we did this morning hangs over us, bathing the space between us in tension.

It’s Dean who breaks the silence first.

“Fuck, this is awkward. Let’s just talk about it.”

Briar’s head snaps up and she stares at him as if she’s waiting for what he’ll say next.

“You first,” he says to her.

“Me?” She points to herself.

“Yeah, you. What did you like about it?”

Her lips part as she stares at him with shock. Fidgeting in her seat, she glances toward the back door to ensure we’re really alone before she says, “I liked being told what to do, and I liked being fought over a little.”

A grin slowly forms on his face. Then he looks at me, but I stop him immediately.

“Don’t bother asking. You know I liked it.”

This feels like a conversation my wife and I should have had already, but conversations seem to be a problem for us. What I’m wondering as I stare at her is if she liked it because of him or if she liked it because it helped us break down a barrier between us. One where we feel comfortable expressing our desires with each other.

And honestly, what does it matter? It’s not like this is going to become a regular thing. Because where does it end? If we bring this man into our bedroom, and then one thing leads to another, what was meant to help us communicate better will end in threesomes and an open marriage, and it all just sounds so messy.

And fucking hot.

“So when are we doing it again?” he asks.

My gaze lands on Dean with intensity. I should stop this, right? This can’t end well.

Briar fidgets again. “Maybe this is what we need, Caleb.” She must notice the discomfort on my face. “If we want to continue trying for this baby, and we don’t want to be miserable doing it, then why don’t we just go for it? You can’t tell me that after this morning, you don’t want to explore this more.”

Her pleading eyes are on my face, and I feel the desperation in her tone. She’s right. We do need to have sex anyway, so why not invite someone who seems to know how to make our sex life not so miserable?

“What about tonight?” I ask, deciding to just go for it.

“I had a client tonight, but they canceled on me. So I’m free.”

“Wait, should we…pay you?” Briar asks, and something in me sours. I don’t want it to be like that. I don’t want this to be a transaction. It sounds so impersonal.

Dean shakes his head. “Fuck no. This isn’t work for me.”

“Then what is it?” she murmurs.

With a huff, he smiles at her. “Fun.”