Whatever It Takes

by Ben Boswell

  I laughed. "It's okay. You can just admit she was a great fuck and you wanted more."

  Kris slapped my wrist.

  "No, I mean it. I've um, had a few hook ups over the years. And, well, Tina... I mean Kris just seemed different." He smirked. "And yeah, I was looking for another round."

  "Okay," I said. "Now we all know how we got here. But what do we do next?"

  Kris looked over at Damon. "This doesn't really involve you. We appreciate your help back at the other motel. But if you want out, we'll understand."

  He nodded. "I appreciate that. And to tell you the truth, I don't know what I can do to help. But it seems like you need all the help you can get."

  Kris continued. "As I see it, we have two problems. The first is Sal. He wants his 250 grand or 10 kilos of cocaine back. The second is DeMarcus who seems to think we'd be better off dead."

  She paused to see if anyone had anything to add.

  "So, any thoughts?" Kris asked.

  I shook my head. Jessi looked down.

  Finally Damon spoke. "Everyone has a weakness. The key is to find it and exploit it."

  _____

  It was easy to phrase it that way. Finding actual exploitable weaknesses was a whole other issue. We went around and around, as we finished off a couple of cases of beer.

  The best we came up with was a murder spree. Gun down Sal, Rock, Jerry, Vinny for good measure. Then take care of DeMarcus, Tyrell, and Boogs. Oh sure, we might have to hit a few others along the way. But all we had to do was kill seven or eight people, all of whom were armed and dangerous, and get away with it.

  It was an enjoyably bloodthirsty, drunken fantasy. But in the end, we ended up no closer to a solution than we were when we began.

  It was getting late. Time to go to sleep. We had two bedrooms, and in theory constituted two couples. It was a testament to how fucked up things had become that I didn't know how those two couples would shake out. In a weird way, I wasn't even sure what I wanted anymore.

  The idea of spending the night with Jessi was undeniably hot. She was a sexy, dirty girl, and though I'd never really admitted it even to myself, I had always wanted to fuck her. The idea of replaying even half the things I'd seen her do at the Four Seasons or in Ramirez's office was intoxicating.

  And anyway, it was pretty obvious that Kris would prefer spending the night with Damon. I had never fucked her like that. She'd never responded that way. I wasn't under the illusion that Jessi would want to be with me for the long-term, but she might be able to salve my wounds if Kris picked Damon over me.

  "Let's go to bed." It was Kris.

  I looked up, expecting her to be tugging at Damon. But instead she was looking right at me, unwavering and confident in her choice. I smiled.

  We walked into the other bedroom.

  "You were worried I'd choose him?" she asked perceptively.

  My eyes shifted unconsciously to the bed, still disordered from her most recent session with Damon.

  "Yes."

  "Oh honey. I'm so sorry."

  "Don't be," I replied. "He does... things to you."

  She nodded. "He does. Daniel, I'm not going to lie to you. He's a sexual dynamo. I really, really like having sex with him. But I love you. It's not a close call. I would never trade you for him."

  "Okay," I replied softly. I didn't know how to respond beyond that.

  She stepped in close and cupped my face with her palms. "Baby, don't shut me out. Tell me what you're thinking."

  "I'm hurt. I don't blame you. But it hurts."

  "Okay. Do you still love me?"

  "Of course," I replied defensively.

  "Well, what about Amber? That's her name right? And what about Jessi? They both gave you pleasure."

  I nodded. "They did, but..."

  "But what? God, Daniel, for so long we were together, just the two of us. And in a way I wish we could go back to that. But we can't. And now the truth is that whether we like it or not, we've both enjoyed sex with other people. And," she blushed, "I found I can enjoy sex just as sex, without any love or affection, just the physical act. I never thought that is something I could do. I always thought that people who liked sex for sex were weak somehow, undisciplined, whatever."

  "Like Jessi."

  "Yes. Just as she's spent years living in my shadow, I've spent years looking down on her, on her lifestyle, on her choices."

  "Well... she has made a lot of bad choices."

  Kris nodded. "And how. But I'm not sure having sex for pleasure was one of them."

  "So, what, we have an open marriage now?"

  She hesitated. "No. Not an open marriage. But maybe a flexible one?"

  "Damon really got to you."

  "It isn't just him. Oh fuck, Daniel. I feel so dirty to admit it, but there were times, with Sal, that I really enjoyed it. And Rock. Some of it, I was just trying to get through. But there were several times where..."

  She trailed off.

  "I dunno," I replied. "All the rules are out the window right now. I don't blame you for anything you've done, whether you had to do it, or just wanted to. But I'm not sure I can be okay with sharing you like that."

  She nodded. "I understand, but you wouldn't be sharing me. You'd just be sharing my body... sometimes."

  "I'll think about it. Okay? It's not something we need to decide on right now."

  "No. It's not."

  We remade the bed and got ready for sleep. I was in my boxers. She pulled on my tee shirt. She cuddled up next to me.

  "So, how was my sister?" she said after a moment.

  "Oh God, Kris. Is that what this is about?"

  She hesitated. "You think I'm trying to punish you?"

  "Are you?"

  "No. I was just, you know, curious. Sal, the others, you know, they'd all had Jessi too. They kept comparing us."

  I nodded, remembering the contest he'd held to see who gave better head.

  She continued, "They were mostly doing it to humiliate me, taunt me, you know. But I don't know, I guess it put the idea in my head. What did you two do anyway?"

  "You sure?"

  "Tell me," she said firmly.

  I sighed. "We heard you when we walked in. Jessi dragged me over for a closer look."

  "Dragged you, eh?"

  "Well, I didn't fight her, but it was her idea. You were on your hands and knees. He was behind you. We saw you come. And she went down on me."

  "So you were in her mouth while he was inside me?"

  I nodded.

  "Does it make me sick," she asked, "that I think that's hot?"

  "Yeah, a little."

  "Did you come in her mouth?"

  I nodded.

  "When?"

  Fuck. She had me.

  "When he came inside you."

  "Kinky," she cooed.

  After a pause, she added, "So you never answered. Which one of us is better?"

  "Kris!"

  "Maybe you just need a reminder."

  "You don't need to do this."

  "All this talk has me a little randy," she said as she ducked under the covers.

  Jesus. That was almost verbatim the reason Jessi gave for blowing me. Kris seemed to be turning into Jessi.

  She pulled down my shorts, exposing my cock. She licked the length of my shaft, using just the tip of her tongue, a ticklishly sexy sensation. She massaged my balls. I stiffened quickly, and as I did, she took me deep in her mouth.

  She blew me slowly. Long, wet swallows, punctuated with a swirl of her tongue over my glans. She grabbed me by the base of my cock, pumped me firmly between her thumb and index finger.

  "Oh, God, that's good," I moaned.

  She crawled back up next to me, breathed hotly onto my neck. "Better than my sister?"

  "God, yes."

  She giggled.

  "Good. Then you probably won't mind if I do this."

  She swung her leg over me, impaled her wet pussy on my cock. She was so hot, so ready. I remembered that she hadn
't showered since fucking Damon. He was still inside her. But it felt so good, so slippery that I didn't mind.

  I pulled her tee shirt over her head, freeing her gorgeous tits. Her areolas were puffy, her nipples erect. I took them into my mouth, one at a time, sucking hard, but not too hard apparently. She let out a sultry moan, ground her pussy against my pubic bone.

  I grabbed her ass, squeezed her cheeks hard, and urged her on. She rode me faster, her breaths coming in ragged gasps.

  "Oh God," she moaned.

  I felt her pussy spasm on my cock. That sent me over the edge. I came inside her.

  She collapsed on my chest, both of us breathing hard. She pushed her face into the crook of my neck.

  "Daniel, I love you so much."

  "I love you too Kris. And I always will."

  _____

  I woke up a couple of hours later. We'd fallen asleep with the lights still on. I untangled myself from Kris and tucked her under the covers. I turned out the lights and got up, ducking into the suite to get a glass of water from the kitchenette.

  I noticed that Jessi and Damon still had their lights on, their door cracked open. I wondered if they'd fallen asleep the same way we had. I decided to close their door; maybe let them sleep in if we got up earlier than they did the next morning.

  As I approached their door, I realized they were still awake, talking softly. I peered in. Jessi was face down on the bed, lying on a towel. She was naked. Her body was covered in bruises, welts. I winced to see her that way.

  Damon was kneeling beside her, gently rubbing baby lotion over her injuries. They weren't talking about it. They were talking about anything else. Sharing silly stories, memories.

  She rolled over after a while and he soothed her injuries. He gently massaged her breasts, her battered nipples. Coated with oil, they gleamed in the dim light, stiffening.

  She took his hand, moved it down to her pubic mound.

  "There too?" he asked.

  She nodded.

  He shook his head angrily, but tenderly massaged her there as well.

  "That feels nice," she sighed.

  She wasn't just talking about soothing her wounds. She slowly began thrusting her pelvis against his hand. He slid his well-lubed thumb into her slit and firmly rubbed her clit.

  She moaned happily. Her breaths came in shallow gasps.

  "Oh God," she sighed as she clenched his hand to her sex.

  "You're the best doctor I've ever had," she said with a big smile.

  "And you're my sexiest patient."

  She reached for his crotch. "Your turn baby."

  He pushed her away. "Naw. Get your sleep."

  "You sure?"

  He grinned. "What can I say? Your sister wore me out."

  "That cunt," she replied with a grin.

  Damon kissed her forehead. He lay down beside her and pulled the covers over them both. Then reaching over, he turned out the lights.

  _____

  We still didn't have a good plan of action when we woke up the following morning. I wanted to trade-in our car. And we all needed extra clothes and such.

  Damon and I went out to do those errands. The first bit of business was going back to our house to pick up both some personal belongings and the deed for the car.

  Spending time with Damon was more than a little awkward. We tried to make small talk about football and beer, but it was forced at best.

  After a while he took a deep breath.

  "Look man, we need to talk about this."

  I sighed. "Yeah. We do. Okay."

  But I didn't know where to begin, what to say.

  He filled in the silence. "I didn't know she was married. That's not the kind of thing I do."

  "She lied to you," I replied. "I don't blame you."

  "You blame her?"

  "I... I'm not sure I blame anyone."

  I paused before continuing. "This is hard. Let me go back to the beginning."

  I told him our story, including things I'd recently learned. About how Kris and I met as kids and shared everything together, our first kiss, our first everything. How we'd been together so long that we never even really questioned it, or why we were there, or what the relationship meant. Precisely because we'd been together so long, from such a young age, meant that we'd never really dug below the surface.

  I explained about Kris and Jessi's home life: my newfound realization that part of why Kris had clung so tightly to me for so many years was that I was an escape from the turmoil at home and then later as Jessi's life became unmoored, I acted as an anchor for her, a touchstone of stability, a shield against what might be lurking inside her as well.

  And finally I talked about how things had changed since Sal burst into our house. How suddenly everything seemed to have been thrown into question.

  "It's not that she doesn't love me. She does. I know that. But I don't think she ever realized—maybe still doesn't realize—that there is an instrumental component to her being with me. I was there to protect her from chaos. And chaos found us anyway."

  "It's not your fault, man," he replied sincerely. "Nothing you could have done."

  It was weird talking that way to Damon. He was a virtual stranger. But we were intimately linked. He'd fucked my wife and saved my life. I needed someone to speak to, and he was a good listener.

  "So why are you with her?" he asked.

  "I don't know for sure. It is easier to analyze others than oneself. I'm sure she has her theories about me. I love her, of course. Can't imagine life without her. Maybe that's it?"

  He laughed. "You think too much. It doesn't really matter why you two ended up together. All that matters is that you love each other and you work well together."

  "Yeah, but it gets to what our lives look like. I think Kris and I will always be together. But it seems like we're no longer on the straight and narrow."

  "Yeah, but that's okay dude. Two roads diverged in a wood, and I... I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference."

  I laughed at the incongruity of this tattooed bruiser quoting Frost at me.

  "What's your story?" I asked.

  "What? A meathead like me can't read books?" he replied gruffly.

  I grinned. "We're here. You can kick my ass later."

  He grinned back.

  _____

  The house was a mess. At some point Sal or his boys had tossed the place. Or maybe it had been DeMarcus' guys. We now had so many enemies that I couldn't be sure.

  Damon and I were both armed, and he could obviously handle himself, so I wasn't worried about running into anyone. Truth be told, I sort of relished the possibility. Cold blooded murder was one thing... self-defense in my own home quite another.

  It occurred to me that we could actually stage that. Move back into the house, use the girls as bait, and lure in the bad guys. I pitched it to Damon.

  He shook his head. "First, that sort of lying-in-wait constitutes premeditation. Second, you never want to get into a firefight if you can avoid it. Third, you don't want to put Kris and Jessi at risk like that."

  I nodded.

  We packed up some clothes, a few other house wares, and some personal papers. As I left the house, I had a weird sense that I would never return there again. It made me shiver. I pulled the door shut and walked to the car.

  _____

  We had traded the old Accord for an even older Taurus. With new plates, I felt like we'd put a little more distance between ourselves and the people after us. But I knew we couldn't run forever.

  I still didn't quite know what we had in Damon. Bartender, tattoo freak, poetry reader, expert at hand-to-hand combat....

  "Dude, I need to ask you. Back at that other motel. What the hell was that?"

  "I told you, it was just dumb luck I was there."

  "No, I mean once you got in. You took out two armed men in like ten seconds."

  "They were punks."

  I sighed. "Yeah... and..."

  "I've had
training."

  "What, like MMA?"

  "Something like that." He paused. "I was a SEAL."

  "No shit?"

  "No shit. Two enlistments worth."

  "You kill any bad guys?"

  He rolled his eyes at me.

  "Bin Laden?"

  He shook his head. "Naw, I was on Team 4. We were doing mostly counter-narcotics. I... um... I can't really talk about it, you know?"

  "Can't? Or don't want to?"

  "Both I guess."

  I nodded. "Okay. But can I just ask why you got out?"

  "I've always dreamed about tending bar."

  "Yeah?"

  He laughed. "Well, that and getting tired of being on twenty-four hour alert and then getting dropped into a swamp in the middle of the night to shoot it out with narco douchebags."

  He paused, shaking his head at some private memory. "Funny thing. Here I am again, mixed up with some drug dealing shits. I guess it’s my fate, eh?"

  "You don't have to, you know. You don't owe us anything. If anything we owe you."

  He chuckled again. "Yeah, well, that's not how I'm wired. Someday you can play amateur shrink with me and we can figure out why."

  It was interesting news. I still wasn't crazy about the idea of my wife having sex with another man. But I had to admit, her recruitment of him onto our team had evened the odds.

  _____

  We got back to the motel. The girls had made sandwiches for lunch. We cracked open some more beers. The sense of domesticity struck me as frightening. Was this our new normal?

  The girls were giggling, asking Damon to explain his tattoos. He had a story behind each one, though I got the sense he was making them up as he went along.

  I cleared my throat. "Okay... so what's our plan here?"

  Kris looked over at me. "Do you have any thoughts?"

  I shook my head. "I dunno. But... we're dealing with two drug dealers. Can't we, like, set it up so they turn on each other?"

  Jessi objected. "The problem is they are in a different business. Sal is wholesale; DeMac is retail. If anything, they'd be likely to be partners."

  I was thinking aloud. "What if DeMac bought from Sal and then stiffed him."

  "Yeah, okay," Kris interjected. "But how do we arrange that?"