Provocation

Welcome to Provocations! I'll let you know up front that this is a series about swinging. But it is a series by Publius68, so if you want or need a lot of drama, revenge, broken relationships, and general tragedy in your swinger stories, move on now. You won't enjoy this one, and I don't want to waste your time.

I like swinger stories, but the overwhelming majority of them are either depressing as fuck, or if they are not, they just don't make sense. I mostly wanted to write this series because I do not personally understand swinging in real life. More to the point, I don't understand how a loving, devoted couple makes the transition, successfully or otherwise, into swinging. The few swinger-adjacent stories I have written, I've just jumped on past the decision point as if it just... happened naturally. I do not find that very plausible, and my regular readers know how important that word is to me.

So expect a lot of fun, humor, and some serious slow burn in the overall story, but Provocations is oxymoronic, since it will have plenty of Bow-Chika-Wow-Wow amidst the slow burning! And while this series is posted in Group Sex for consistency, various chapters may not have much of that. It's coming.

Whatever, lean back and enjoy this. I have no idea as of this point where this is going, or how long it will take to get there. Let me know if you enjoy the ride.

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Provocation - One

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"You are good to drive, right?" Gwen asked me as we got into the car.

"I'm fine," I said. "I had like four drinks all night, but we were there over three hours."

"Cool, let's roll," my girl said, buckling her seatbelt. I was barely backed out of Ron and Cathy's driveway when she added, "That was fun as always, but damn! It's like living in those insurance ads sometimes with the two of them!"

I laughed. "Yeah, they do channel old parents a little, don't they?"

"They are a year younger than us, but sometimes they want to act like it is 1961 or something," Gwen giggled. "We must have spent five minutes listening to them fret over the seating arrangements for four people."

"Ever since they got married, Cathy has been reading her grandmother's old books on 'entertaining'," I said, shaking my head. "Whenever they go off on some tangent about 'the right way to do things', I feel like we're children."

"And that is why we are not getting married until it is time for kids," Gwen declared. "The minute you put a ring on my finger, I know that I'll be out in the street, flagging down neighbors to talk about bundling car and homeowner coverage."

I agreed in amusement. Neither of us wanted to revisit the M-word until we decided to have kids.

If

we ever decided to do that. But we also weren't getting married for a host of sound financial, career, and logistical reasons as well.

We were not holding off because of doubts, thank you,

Mom

. Every time I looked at my auburn-haired gal, I saw my partner for life. Richer or poorer, sickness or health, death do us part were all baked into the cake for us without a ceremony. We had bought a house together for crying out loud.

"Whereas tomorrow night, when we go out with Sammy, Deidre, and Zoe, all of whom are older than us, we will feel like we are the aged stick-in-the-muds!" Gwen agreed.

We drove in silence for a bit. "Honestly, I think we are lucky those three still want to go out with us, since we moved in together," I admitted.

"You did start lecturing Zoe on the value of building home equity two weeks ago," Gwen snickered.

*

Deidre and Zoe's chosen club was, as usual, too loud.

Christ, I do sound old!

Fuck it, Gwen and I are what we are, and we each are as happy with it as one could expect for a couple whose 20s have now entered the rear-view mirror..

"Carl! Gwen! You are finally here," yelled Zoe, barely audible over the thumping beat. She slid over in the booth they had commandeered before our arrival to make room for the two of us.

"You are both behind. Catch up," ordered Sammy, holding out two Heinekens to us from a bucket in the center of the table. His enormous, dark hands made the bottles look small.

We both sighed and took our bottles. I at least make a token effort to slam back mine, swallowing about half. Gwen took one long sip, then set hers down.

"That is a tiny sip," Deidre said suspiciously. "Are you preggers?"

"If I had a bun in the oven, I would not have even taken the sip," Gwen laughed. "No, I want a couple of shots, not beer." She patted her tummy. "I have to fight this enough at the gym as it is. I think I'm swearing off beer."

"Unless you grew a beer belly in the last eight seconds," Sammy laughed, "you have nothing to worry about." Zoe and Deidre also looked unsympathetic about my lady's weight issue. Her mostly non-existent weight issue.

Look, Gwen is no supermodel. Her nose is, um, Roman in its majesty, and her front teeth are off-center enough to just be noticeable. But her face is expressive, and marvelously so. Currently, it was expressing slightly smug gratitude at being told she has no weight issues by people other than me.

Her waist is admittedly thicker than she wishes, but her belly is nicely flat, if certainly not washboard muscular. She can and does do sit-ups for days, but while all that core strength gives her wicked groundstrokes on the tennis court, it fails to deliver the definition she craves. I like her waist. I love putting my arm around it. Much of the reason for that is that doing so puts me close to grabbing her ass. Gwen does have a supermodel's ass, and when she's being honest with herself, she knows it.

I will admit that she unfortunately has a supermodel's breasts as well.

Unfortunately is the wrong word. Gwen's breasts are lovely, proportionate, and a joy to play with. But, honestly, I am easily distracted by big tits, and Gwen's are only just big enough to be grabbable. I'll never tell her this, but if she ever decides she wants a boob-job, I'd write the check in a second. That shameful secret admitted, I would love them even more if they were larger, but I could not possibly love any larger set even as much.

So, she's not a knockout, but Gwen knocks me out. For my money, she is the best-looking woman among all our female friends, even Cathy, who I must admit possesses an enchantingly large pair.

Gwen shoved her beer toward me. "Go get two shots so we can both catch up."

I rolled my eyes, but while I may not be married, I still know how to follow orders. "Okay. What do you want yours to be?" I asked.

"Both shots are for me. These two beers are for you," she said firmly, leaving the second bottle in front of me. "I think they have Chairman's Club here. I'll take two shots of that. Neat, please!" She finished with the sweet smile I love.

"Anyone else?" I asked. Sammy was good with his beer, but Zoe and Deidre wanted Kamikazes, since I was already going to fight through the crowd at the bar.

I returned faster than I had any right to hope with Gwen's rum and the other girls' less strong shots. When I did, I found that Sammy and Zoe had both already hit the dance floor, though not together.

I was dead certain that Zoe had fucked Sammy at some point. Gwen was equally certain that Deidre had fucked Sammy repeatedly. In both instances, we are talking about the past. Their friendships were stronger than their needs. And none of those three has a problem with getting needs taken care of. Deidre and Zoe may not be as enchanting as Gwen, but they are plenty sexy. And Sammy is... Sammy.

Case in point, I saw him over at another table filled with four girls in varying flavors of good-looking, flirting with all of them simultaneously. In moments, he had asked the blonde to dance, and she had excitedly gotten up. Unfortunately for her, Sammy's usual MO indicated that she was the one he was least interested in. He'd be fishing in that pool off and on all night, between hanging out with us.

Zoe was... more direct. She just went out on the fairly crowded dance floor and grooved by herself until an appealing applicant approached. One already had, and she moving in a way designed to give him more hope than he probably had.

Or maybe not.

"Damn," Deidre laughed to us, downing the shot I had brought her. "Zoe is shaking her ass at him hard for this early in the night!"

Zoe took that moment to glance our way, and Gwen cheerily waved her first shot at our dancing friend before downing it with a gasp.

Deidre got up to do much the same as Zoe was, but paused. "This'll be warm by the time she throws that guy back," she said, touching Zoe's Kamikaze. "That would be a shame..." She slugged back Zoe's shot and hustled out to the floor to dance near Zoe, ready to dance with her when she inevitably dumped her current partner.

"Christ," I said in Gwen's ear so I didn't have to shout. "They are all older than us, but I feel like we can't keep up!" Another benefit of speaking into Gwen's ear was that it gave me an opportunity to nuzzle.

She let me so nuzzle a moment before replying, "Hey! We do okay." She sipped and then slammed her second shot. "We are Ubering home, just like them." She grabbed my hand, "Let's show them we can still dance."

Of course, we could still dance. Better than any of those three, to be honest. When I met Gwen, I was a better dancer than her. Since then, as we fell in love, our dancing skills and habits converged. For these three that we usually clubbed with, dancing is sort of showing off. It is an interview process where no one knows quite who is interviewing whom, for what position. For Gwen and me, dancing is about demonstrating to each other how in sync we are--how we can anticipate and enhance each other's moves.

Still, she and I only danced three songs before we retreated to defend our group's table and to let me drink Gwen's beer before it got warm. Honestly, that was probably all we would dance together tonight. Clubbing these days for us was mostly about getting lightly drunk and watching the circus. We watched the floor and kind of regretted leaving it when we did, as the next song slapped something fierce.

That rarest of things, a waitress, appeared at our table. Gwen ordered a bucket of bottled waters, another bucket of Heinekens, and two more shots of Chairman's Club. That should keep all of us out of the scrum at the bar for a while, at least.

As usual, the circus provided lots of fun watching, beyond our own circus that we came with.

But Deidre and Zoe took the cake for the early part of the evening, when they convinced some random dude that he was about to have the night of his life. The two of them started dancing with him simultaneously, and both were grinding on him... hard.

"Oh, that poor bastard," Gwen observed as we watched.

"He's enjoying himself," I countered. He was enjoying himself a lot, except when I could see him twitching his hips in that way a guy does when he is trying to get his cock to slip into a more comfortable position in his pants.

"Not for long, and you know it," laughed Gwen.

Sure enough, the song ended, and both our friends smiled at him, lightly caressed his arms, then said goodbye, heading back toward our table and leaving the poor bastard looking like they just shot Old Yeller.

Zoe plucked at the arm of a waitress on her way and ordered something. The two of them plopped back into the booth, glistening slightly from the exertion and smiling.

"That was fun!" Deidre said loudly over the music.

"That was cruel!" I countered with a grin.

"That's what I said!" Deidre laughed.

Gwen laughed along with both of them. She had been her share of cruel on the dance floor back in the day.

I had experienced such cruelty from others myself at times, so I laughed less hard. But I still laughed. The dude had been well compensated.

The waitress duly showed up with Zoe's order. More shots. This was going to be an epic night.

The four of us downed them in unison and relaxed. But not for long.

"Come on, Deidre," said Zoe, tugging on our friend. "Moar dancing!"

Deidre was reluctant, however. "Give me a few. I've had more than you," she complained, waving at the empty shot glasses.

Zoe was not dissuaded. "Carl! We haven't danced in weeks. Let's boogie!" She was out of the U-shaped booth and around to my end in a flash, dragging at my hand. I rolled my eyes in pretend reluctance at Gwen, who merely shoved me to get on with doing my duty.

Zoe kept pulling me out onto the dance floor, but just as she was about to release my hand, I clamped down and led her into a spin. She laughed and went with it before we settled into normal gyrations to the thumping music. Gwen and I manage some choreographed, dance lesson-type dancing sometimes, Cha-Chas, Rumbas, and a lot of Hustle, but our friends are just 'move your body' types.

I had never heard this song, but I liked it. It had a wild beat, and it had the women on the dance floor all moving... extravagantly. Zoe was no exception.

Suddenly, she wobbled a bit, not to the music, but just momentarily unsteady. She laughed at herself and wiped at her lips with her fingertips. "That was a strong shot," she yelled.

I just nodded, as if agreeing. I always find it amusing how the brain, when it tastes strong alcohol, goes into drunk mode long before the actual booze has any chance of meaningfully entering the bloodstream.

But the shots did seem like they had been stronger shots than usual. It must be a new bartender tonight--one who hasn't learned to water down the shots to the club's specs.

The upshot of all this was that Zoe started dancing with me like I was a stranger, instead of... just me.

She had on a new outfit that I had not seen before. When we first got there, I had considered the tight, mid-thigh, black leather skirt to be the star of the ensemble, as it showed off her skinny but nicely shaped legs to perfection. But as she got going out on the dance floor, working her shoulders in all directions, I gained new and profound appreciation for the emerald green top she wore.

Zoe has the biggest tits of anyone in our little clubbing group, and the blouse initially disappointed me. It was loose as hell, with lots of extra fabric around the neckline, and just sitting there, the garment played down those mounds. But out on the floor, with her leaning forward and back and shaking side to side, I realized that the neckline was deep. Like, belly deep. The more she moved, the more that window on her cleavage opened and closed, and the more its opening moved around. And since she wore no bra under there, her boobs were moving around a good bit as well.

It was arresting.

Look, I'd had several beers and a couple of shots already, and we hadn't been there that long. So I had reached Tipsy Stupid. You know the condition. Your brain is just distracted enough to not worry about little things. This is as opposed to Drunk Stupid. Drunk Stupid is where you do dumb shit like get behind the wheel. Or tell some random large lesbian stranger that her political views are 'fucked up'.

I have been Drunk Stupid. Fortunately, I had a friend abscond with my keys the one time.

Nothing had saved me or my right eye from the consequences of the other time.

Since I was only Tipsy Stupid, I refrained from responding to Zoe's increasingly frenetic display by doing something disastrous. But I did something stupid enough.

I leaned in for a better look, trying to make it look like just another dance move.

Zoe was into it now, and she was more tipsy than me. Bordering on drunk.

She responded to my eyes and to how close they were to her by grabbing the back of my head and pulling my face down and almost into her cleavage! The view was really, really good now. Zoe's boobs still are not big, per se, but they have plenty enough flesh to move a lot.

I did manage to have the sense not to let her plant my face all the way into her cleavage, but I was dumb enough not to pull away for a good long while...

The song ended, fortunately to be replaced by one I hate. That snapped me out of the hypnotic effect, and I slipped Zoe's grasp. That helped her realize just what she had been up to, and with whom. We grinned at each other sheepishly and headed back to the booth.

The look on Gwen's face had me grimacing lightly, and Zoe veering off to the restrooms.

My lady wasn't mad, but she had clearly been watching the whole time. Her look was... challenging.

I slid into the booth and tried to be casual by grabbing a fresh beer. She snuggled next to me but gave me the smile of a mongoose.

"I love that last song," I said, looking for something to talk about.

Gwen just leaned over and kissed the back of my jaw, right below my ear. "I'll bet you love it more now," she silkily spoke in my ear.

"Um..." I said, trying to parse all the mixed signals. "Maybe I shouldn't be drinking more beer just yet," I tried, waving the beer half-heartedly.

Gwen just nipped my earlobe and purred once more into my ear, "More like, I think we need to keep any more shots away from Zoe for a while!" Then she sat back, fully relaxed.

I had apparently been... forgiven? Even when Zoe returned and slipped into the booth once more, apparently already amnesiac about trying to shove my face between her boobs, Gwen made no more arch observations--to either of us.

Only a few moments later, Deidre returned and plopped back into our booth beside Zoe. She held three shots in her hand. "Lemon Drops!" She crowed, setting hers down in front of herself and holding out one each to Zoe and Gwen.

Gwen intercepted both proffered shots and handed the second one to me instead of Zoe.

"Awww!" Zoe objected.

Deidre looked at Gwen inquiringly.

Gwen just held up her shot imperiously. "Cheers!" she demanded. Deidre automatically clicked glasses. I hastily did too. We tapped them on the tabletop and downed them.

"Awww!" Zoe repeated.

"Zoe needs to skip a round," Gwen told Deidre.

That cleared up Zoe's amnesia. "Oh, hey, Gwen! I mean..." she started to say.

But Gwen cut her off swiftly, and with a smile. "No worries, girlfriend. You just have had a few extra, and I don't want you getting yourself in trouble," she told her like a good sober companion, even though she was hardly that herself by this point. "Not every guy would be as much the gentleman as Carl was just now," she added in a tone of genuine concern.

On the face of it, this was hardly a novel conversation. We had all looked out for each other's inebriation levels for years when we went out clubbing.

But Zoe still blushed. Deidre caught it and laughed. "Oh ho, Zoe! You forget who you were dancing with?"

Zoe looked like she wanted to hotly deny it, but then deflated. Her shoulders slumped, and she held up her thumb and forefinger an inch apart. "Maybe a little?" She blushed.

All three women laughed. I unwisely laughed along with them.

All three turned their eyes on me. Deidre tilted her head in challenge.

"Hey!" I objected to the sudden, wordless interrogation. "

I

was a perfect gentleman. Gwen just said so!" I added, cleverly employing an unimpeachable witness.

"I said, 'as much of a gentleman as you were, '" Gwen smirked. "There is a world of difference between fractional and perfect."

Now I was the one fucking blushing.

They were all laughing even harder. I felt Gwen's hand massaging my leg reassuringly. Well, she was mostly massaging something in the neighborhood of my leg, which was much more reassuring. The grope was also out of character for Gwen when we were out in public like this. I could do with this sort of forgiveness.

We joked around about a couple about fifty feet away who were not so much dancing as demonstrating a series of porno sex positions while fully clothed, after which Deidre declared that it was time for her and Zoe to go and pick up a couple of pornstars themselves. Still laughing, our two friends slid out and into the crowd.