Excerpt of Coming Clean by Inez Kelley

Grant’s Butterflies

How do you ask your best friend to fuck your wife?

Grant slathered olive oil across the hot grill in a burst of nerves. He shouldn’t be sweating this. Cade had been his buddy since fourth grade, his college roommate, his best man when he married Vivi. They’d been through first beers, first girlfriends and first fuck-ups. They knew far too much about each other to have secrets. But this wasn’t a secret—it was a fantasy.

Vivi’s fantasy.

Well, it had started that way.

He lined the ribs on the grill and let his gaze drift to the patio door, catching sight of Vivi carrying a plastic basket toward the laundry room. Even after ten years of marriage, he was head over ass in love with her. She was his other half, and each day with her was a gift. Every curve of her body, each tiny freckle he knew by heart. There wasn’t one thing about her he hadn’t memorized, from her sleepy sigh as she drifted to dreamland to the shuffle of her feet in the morning. He could never give her up. He’d never share her with anybody…unless that was what she wanted.

Vivi wanted Cade.

Actually, she wanted them both at the same time.

That and more.

So did Grant.

Which scared the shit out of him.

Vivi stepped into the backyard, carrying a steaming pan, and his breath jammed in his lungs. Greedily, he lapped up the way the sunlight turned her pony-tailed hair to old penny auburn and kissed her cheeks with health. A smudge of barbeque sauce along her wrist highlighted the delicate bones, and his mouth longed to feel the pulse there. Beneath a mint green T-shirt, her high breasts pressed tightly, outlined by the lace edging of her bra.

She handed him a saucepan and a brush, her bottom lip tucked between her teeth. “We don’t have to do this.”

“Ribs would be kind of plain without the sauce,” he teased.

Her eyebrow quirked upward. “You know what I’m talking about.”

“I know.” Grant lovingly thumbed the single dimple that appeared with her smile.

For a long minute, she studied his face, searching for something. He deliberately kept his expression blank. He should have known better. Vivi could sniff out a Christmas gift in July.

“Are you sure you’re okay with idea of the three of us?”

He jerked the grill lid up and slapped a brushful of dark red sauce across the ribs. “I told you what I…what happened when we were kids, between Cade and me.”

He’d told her about that teenaged experiment right after they got married. She’d never judged him. It had opened the way for more personal, deeper discussions of their sexual pasts, their fantasies. That freedom wove itself into their marriage, and he’d always enjoyed listening to her dreams. Some of them he helped her enact, others he adapted as best he could. She did the same for him. Like that cheerleader outfit she bought a few years ago… He got hard just remembering what she’d done with those pompoms.

Her arms slid around his waist, her breasts pressed tight to his back, and kissed his shoulder through his shirt. “Yeah, but that was a long time ago. This is now. Do you still want everything you told me about?”

Grant fixed his eyes on the sizzling ribs but didn’t see them. He saw only the night this idea had been born.

Vivi’s body had shuddered as the aftershocks of orgasm ricocheted through her. Every muscle had gone limp, her thighs releasing the vise-like hold they’d had around his hips.

“Ride ’em, cowgirl.” He chuckled as her sweat-damp naked body collapsed beside him.

She poked his side. “You didn’t seem to mind playing horsey.”

“Hell, no. I’ll play any game you like.”

She snuggled up beside him, kissing his heaving chest. She swooped her long hair over her shoulder and propped her chin on her laced fingers. “Anything?”

With his eyes closed, he felt her stare rather than saw it. “Anything.”

He didn’t need his sight to know her cheeks colored when she turned her face away and said, “Never mind.”

“Come on, what?”

“I just…I don’t want you to get mad.”

The silky skin of her back slid under his palm. “I won’t.”

“Promise?” she asked. He nodded and she took a slow breath. “I was kind of…fantasizing.”

He cracked one eye and smiled. “Care to share it?”

A slight firming of her muscles tightened his stomach in anticipation. Vivi fingered his hair. “Okay, here goes… remember your promise. I was thinking about…a threesome… with two men.”

Grant cocked his head at her. “Was I one of them? Ouch!”

Vivi smoothed the lock of hair she’d just tugged. “Of course you were.”

“So who was the other guy? That actor that makes you drool?”

“Does it really matter?” Vivi nibbled her lip and looked away.

“Yeah, I want to know.” She wouldn’t turn her face toward him and her evasiveness piqued his curiosity. “Vivi, tell me.”

She brought her gaze back to his. “It was Cade.”

His bones turned to sheetrock.