© 2025, All rights reserved -- mimaster
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Ann was silent as she sat at the table. Chad was just staring at me, smiling as if he was a cat and he'd caught the canary. After what seemed like days with no one saying anything, I finally broke the thick tension.
"What's the big deal about playing a game, Ann?"
She closed her eyes and chuckled to herself; a wry smile crossed her face.
Chad spoke up and said, "It's a little more complicated than that."
"What the hell happened while I was gone?"
Ann opened her eyes and said, "Dana told Chad about what I showed her... and that kind of opened a can of worms."
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
She leaned forward, putting her elbows on the table, making her loose top fall forward slightly. I saw Chad shift in his seat, trying to sneak a peek, but she didn't care. Her mind was on what had happened while I was reading to Dana's girls.
"Remember before, at dinner? We were talking, and Chad said he wondered what it was that made Dana change her mind about being more adventurous."
"Yeah... I remember."
"Well, the thing that changed her mind was... me. And you."
"I'm afraid to ask what that means," I said, taking another gulp from my glass of wine.
"It means I showed her some of the pictures from your trip to West Virginia with Tina."
My eyes flew open. I'm not sure if I smiled, or if it was just the shock of her statement, but she grinned back at me as she put her feet up on the glass table, crossing her ankles as she sipped her Chardonnay.
"You... showed... wait, which ones?"
"Uh... all of them, actually," she said, matter of factly, a hint of a shrug coming from her shoulders. My lengthy silence must have concerned her, because she finally asked, "Are you okay, baby?"
"I'm fine... I just --"
"I know. I'm sorry."
"I'm not mad Ann. Just surprised, that's all. I thought you said earlier that Dana was your role model for being a parent and a slut at the same time. You said she was wild... didn't you?"
Ann laughed and said, "She is wild...
now
... because I showed her the pictures. So, I'm not sorry I showed her, Neil. I'm just sorry I didn't tell you. I don't regret showing her at all... I had to."
"You
had
to?"
"Yeah... I think."
"Now I'm confused," I said, looking over at Chad.
"Don't look at me... I'm confused now too," he chuckled.
"It's what you and I do, Neil. We've kind of touched on it before, but we seem to rub off on people... sexually. I think in a good way. That's the real reason you fucked Carol when you were out there, wasn't it... to help her get past her divorce?"
"Yeah... but it was also because I was supposed to be James Bond, and that's what he does."
"Sure... and I was okay with that, because I set it up. But before me, you and Dawn healed each other, and then there was the woman... the maid at the hotel that you and Dawn helped. And I've done it. There was a time or two after I dumped Ray, but before you came into my life, where I fucked a guy to kind of help him out, which helped me out... so to speak. I mean, I think that's what we do. Just look at what's happened since we've been together. Look at our parents, and your parents' friends, and now my Aunt and Uncle. They've all opened up, and I think that is totally because of us and how we are together."
Ann was right, of course. But I wasn't sure what she was driving at. "Well, there's no argument there, babe. But what does that have to do with showing Dana the pictures."
"Everything. She didn't believe me."
"Believe you? What didn't she believe?"
"I needed proof," Dana said as she stepped back out onto the deck with a white cardboard box tucked her under her arm. It looked like a standard issue board game from either Parker Brothers or Milton Bradley. She put it on the deck floor next to her as she sat down and handed Chad her empty stemmed wineglass. "Ann was right, and as luck would have it, I've never been happier to be proven wrong."
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Chad had gone inside the house to get another bottle of wine. I didn't drink wine often, which was a shame. I actually knew quite a bit on the subject, but the guys I hung out with were more beer drinkers. I suppose it went with playing in sports leagues. Still, I had an appreciation for good wines, and I always found it relaxing when I had a glass in my hand. I'd been around Ann when she'd had a few beers before, and I didn't know how wine affected her, if at all. Yet like me, she seemed to become more relaxed the longer we sat and talked.
Dana on the other hand, was beyond relaxed. She was loose, and wired... and visibly horny. She had been sitting on Chad's lap, and she had practically been giving him a lap dance in front of us. Not that I minded... Ann seemed intrigued by what Dana was doing, and based on what I saw, I knew she was horny too. But with Chad in the house, the focus of Dana's prurient energy seemed to change from Chad, to... elsewhere.
She looked at Ann and said, "So, did you ask him?"
Ann shook her head and said, "No... because I'm not sure I'm up for this. I already told you that."
"Come on... you're the one that said I was too uptight all the time. Look, we don't have to do it
exactly
like the instructions say. We can do whatever you're comfortable with. But I want to have some fun. And I think you do too. What do you say... do you wanna play?"
I looked at Ann, who gave me a look that was half 'I'm sorry', and half 'I want to do this'... with a little 'I want to fuck your brains out' thrown in for good measure. I was more intrigued than I was confused. I knew whatever it was they were sort of discussing, it was going down the all too familiar path of being sexually charged.
I studied Ann, who sipped her wine slowly, sexily, peering over the top of her glass. Her eyelids were half shut, but her dark brown eyes glowed from the reflection of the Tiki lamps Chad had lit all around the deck. And in those eyes, I could see her passion and excitement simmering just beneath the surface, ready to explode. It just needed to be ignited.
Knowing that, I decided to just relax and trust her. Whatever this was all about was up to her. I'd yet to be upset or disappointed from anything she had set up before, and even though this seemed to be staged by Dana, I knew she knew what was going on. So there was no reason to think this would be any different. Content that she knew what she was doing once again, I was more than happy to go along for the ride.
At least, that was before she grinned at me when she finally answered Dana, saying, "It's not up to me, Dana. It's still Sunday. It's totally up to Neil!"
I felt a lump appear in my throat to go along with the instant pit I got in my stomach. I was suddenly nervous, and I didn't even know what we were talking about yet.
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"Prove you wrong about what?" I asked Dana as she stared at me over her newly refreshed glass of wine.
She let out a nervous laugh, and Ann said, "Go on... tell him! You brought it up."
Dana took a deep breath and said, "I just didn't understand the whole 'James Bond' thing. It seemed silly to me at first, and Chad was putting all of this effort into helping Ann."
"She got jealous," Chad said with a laugh.
"I wasn't jealous. Well, I guess I was, but not about Ann. I was jealous because you were so excited about what she was doing... and you...."
Chad patted her on her thigh. "I know honey... I was so caught up in it that I didn't give you enough attention," he said, soothing her.
"Well, that's part of it. But you know as well as I do that you wanted that to be you. Ann understood Neil's love of James Bond, and I never bothered to try and understand yours. In fact, I never said this before, but I think
you
were jealous of Neil because he was going to get to live out a fantasy that you wanted for yourself."
Chad looked at his wife, and his expression changed. It was as if he was suddenly enlightened, and that lit up Dana. Especially when he said, "You know... you're probably right. Maybe I was a little bit."
"I think you were... but that didn't stop you from putting all that work in that night for Ann. And I know I got in a tiff about it, but I just didn't get it then. It wasn't until she talked to me about what Neil was doing that I started to. But Ann, you have to admit... setting up Neil for an adventure like that with someone you'd never met? I'm sure you can understand why it all seemed so far-fetched to me."
"Sure, but like I told you then... I've never lied to you, so what would I have to gain by lying then."
"I know that...
now
. And I'm sorry I doubted you."
I thought I had a handle on the entire thing now. Putting two and two together, I hoped I was going to come up with four instead of some odd number. Taking a stab at it, I said, "So, let me see if I got this. Ann needs help from Chad to set up my Bond weekend because she doesn't have enough time to do it herself, plus, he