“The door’s unlocked,” she whispered, snatching it and closing it quietly, like this needed to be kept secret.

“That’s good,” Milo answered slowly, a little confused by that look on her face. “Open it.”

“No, I mean, the door was unlocked when I got here,” Eve explained. She took her hand off the doorknob and used it to point at him with great intensity. “Someone unlocked my door.”

Milo’s thoughts immediately went to Trent. They had just seen him. Milo had seen that predatory look in his eyes, skating over Eve’s curves. “Does your ex still have a key?” Milo wondered. They both glared at the door like it might spring and attack them itself.

“Of course he does!” Eve hissed in a whisper full of adrenaline. “He stalked out after I caught him with the neighbor! Lake! And—and we didn’t see each other after that! I didn’t want to ever see him again! I never thought his ass would need to use it, I—I never even thought about it again!” Her eyes were wide and dire, looking toward Milo for answers.

Milo pursed his lips, thinking about that hungry look in Trent’s eyes, and decided that he should go into the duplex first. “It’s probably him, then,” he said, stepping past Eve and pushing the door open. “Whoever it is, you’re safe,” he promised and she followed him into the foyer. Her heels made delicate clicks on the wooden floor. “Come on out, guy,” Milo called as he strolled through the foyer. “We know you’re in here.”

For a moment, there was nothing but silence, and Milo thought that they might have been wrong; maybe this was just a good, old-fashioned burglary.

Then there was a faint crash upstairs, and a male voice yelped, “Shit!”

But it wasn’t Trent’s voice.

Milo and Eve gawped at each other.

It was Cliff.

Eve and Milo bolted up the stairs and a naked Cliff Bauer exploded through her bedroom doorway. He had a rose corsage strapped around his dangling member, and behind him, there was a fire.

“Cliff!” Milo boomed. He really did not understand this scene at all, and he did not like things he didn’t understand.

“Where’s your extinguisher?” Cliff boomed down to Eve.

“Th-the kitchen,” Eve stammered, pointing vaguely downstairs. Cliff bolted past her without another word, rose corsage swinging between his thighs as he lunged down the corridor, toward the kitchen. “Beside the fridge!” she yelled after him, trying to advance past Milo on the stairs, toward her bedroom, but Milo reached out and grabbed her arm. Cliff reemerged from the kitchen, fire extinguisher in hand.

Eve’s lips moved as he galloped past her up the stairs, but neither of them said anything. Cliff dove back into the smoky bedroom and sprayed down the bed with the thick foam.

“Cliff,” Eve called to him. Milo let her go and she was free to advance. “What just happened?”

Cliff coughed and turned to face the other two, ducking his head and striding from the bedroom. He ripped the rose corsage off of his dick and threw it to the ground, then ran that same hand through his rumpled cinnamon-and-gold hair. He handed the fire extinguisher back to Eve and answered, “I was upset. And lonely. And confused.” His eyes went to Milo. “So I kind of called Allison.”

“Aw, man,” Milo said, his tone subdued. He didn’t want Cliff to have these feelings. They were so unnecessary. He was going to end up making the biggest mistake of his life, and going back to his stupid bitch of an ex-wife, just because she was the conventional, classic choice. Didn’t he see that both Milo and Eve really loved him? Milo swallowed and shook his head.

“It’s not what you think,” Cliff explained. Still, he sounded so heartbroken, so winded, and why was he in Eve’s bedroom if nothing had just happened? “It’s—we talked. And she told me—she told me that,” He swallowed thickly. “Galen’s not my biological son.”

“Oh, my god, Cliff,” Eve exclaimed, coming forward and wrapping her arms around his naked torso. “I’m so sorry. I don’t even know what else I can say.”

“You can tell me how much I owe you for the fire damage,” Cliff replied morosely, parting from her.

“What the hell, man,” Milo snapped, eyes flashing, stepping forward and whipping an arm around Cliff in a hard hug. “How could she do that to you?”

“When she was accusing me of having affairs and being gay, when she got so cold, so cruel,” he murmured into the other man’s shoulder. “She was sleeping with some guy from work. I liked him. He came to our house-warming. Anyway, he’s—they’ve been seeing each other for a while now. A few months. And she wanted me to know.”

“Do you believe her?” Milo wondered, pulling up from his hug with Cliff. The three of them simultaneously turned and began moving back into the smoky bedroom.

Cliff nodded somberly. “It never made sense to me. I thought that maybe I was wrong on the math, what with so much other stuff going on, and we did occasionally have sex.” He unfolded a pair of pants and shirt he’d stashed nearby and jammed one leg into the pants. “I never let myself think about it too often,” he went on. He pulled the pants up his other pant leg and zipped. “On some level, I knew.”

“You’re staying,” Eve said simply, as if it was just a fact. She walked to the window and wrenched it open, allowing the odor of the fire to dissipate, even though the night was cold. “You’ve got to stay with us tonight.”

Cliff looked from Eve to Milo.

“I don’t think so. I shouldn’t have come. It was a big, stupid gesture.” He grimaced and went on. “There were candles. When you yelled, it startled me. I knocked a over candle and it caught a corner of the bedding.”

* * *

The three went about the cleanup in almost complete silence, all embroiled in their own thoughts. Bedsheets were thrown out and changed and the windows were opened wide. Eve, Cliff, and Milo convened on the living room couch when they had finished.

“Well, the mattress and bed survived, so that’s something,” said Milo.

“True but I don’t know if I should be here,” Cliff said, sliding his hands over his thighs. “I think even catching a woman’s bedding on fire is karma’s way of saying just stop.” He bowed his head to Eve, then to Milo, beginning to stand. “I’m going to go.”

Eve sighed and placed her hand firmly on Cliff’s thigh, pressing him back to the couch. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “I want you to know that I love you, Cliff. We love you. Please stay.”

“Really?” he asked.

“Cliff, of course.”

Cliff looked to Milo.

“I’m going to get us some drinks,” Milo announced, standing and retreating to the kitchen. Both Cliff and Eve understood that this was just Milo being Milo.

“He talks about you all the time,” Eve whispered when he was out of the room.

“I know,” Cliff said. “We don’t need to do this tonight. I didn’t come here for that. It’s not about that.”

“Well, then what is it about?” Eve wondered. “You had a rose corsage on your dick, Cliff.”

“I went a little overboard, I know.”

Milo strode back into the den carrying three drinks. Eve took hers eagerly and started trying to drink her anxieties away. Ah, gin and lemon juice with a splash of soda. Milo had already memorized her favorite drink. At the same time, she was sure he’d never admit concocting this drink especially to her tastes.

“Whoa, girl,” Milo said, touching her wrist softly.

Eve brought the glass down and blinked at Milo uncertainly. “What?”

“You just chugged half of that,” Milo stated, looking torn between amusement and concern. “And half of it was neat gin.”

Eve simpered, bashful, and ran her fingertip around the rim of the glass. “Nerves,” she explained.

“You’ll probably regret that,” Milo surmised.

“Look, Cliff,” she blurted, ignoring Milo and pouring all her attention into the prodigal lover. “When you found out this horrible thing about Allison—and about Galen—you came here. That means something to me. That means a lot to me, actually.”

“I’m not ready,” Cliff insisted. “For some crazy reason, I thought—for a second—I was ready to choose. But I’m not.” His eyes darted over to Milo. “I’m not ready to choose.”

“You don’t have to choose,” Milo reassured him. He brought his hand up onto his shoulder and rubbed. “It’s not like that. Eve is right. Just stay.”

“Eve is right,” Eve echoed. “Stay. Talk to us.”

Cliff sighed. “I asked Alison why she was doing this. Why she was ever with that other guy instead of talking to me. Being with me. She said that she finally knew what it was like to ‘finally be with a real man.’ Finally be with a real man—”

“No,” Eve said. Just one simple, blurted word. No. She sat her drink down with a thud and turned to face Cliff, squaring her shoulders and straightening her back. She felt bolder with the gin coursing through her veins. “She was wrong. You are a man, Cliff.” She slapped her hand to Cliff’s chest and left it planted there. “She can say whatever she wants. You could always shake me up with a single touch. You fucking drip masculinity.”

She felt his fingertips scrape over her cheekbone and her heart fluttered. It was happening. He was giving in. He was hers.

“I can’t,” Cliff breathed, so close to her that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her lips.

Eve’s heart splintered and her brow furrowed. Her lips cracked open, and his lips crushed against hers before even a breath could escape. She let his kiss move over and through her. Her arms wrapped around the back of his neck, his arms bound around her waist, and they were the only two people in the universe, suspended outside of time and space, just making out, coiling around each other like serpents.

Warmth flowed through Eve, and a soft moan rumbled around in the bottom of her throat. Too abruptly, Cliff’s lips were gone, and her own were left tingling.

Cliff turned and glared at Milo, gray eyes flashing with anger. Cliff’s chest rose and fell hard. “We can’t,” he spat at Milo. Eve realized that, while her eyes were closed, Milo must have kissed or touched him.

But Milo didn’t let him twist away so easily. “We can,” he said. Every fiber of his being seemed to vibrate with a desire to touch Cliff, but he restrained himself. Cliff’s body language was stiff, he wasn’t feeling comfortable. “Cliff, I love you. And you love me. You can’t tell me that we can’t do this.”

Milo pressed forward and his lips touched Cliff’s. Next, a hand came and slid into his hair, binding there. Eve watched with a kind of wistfulness, relieved to see them together, even if the center might not hold even for another minute. At least in this second, Cliff’s shoulders loosened, and the muscles of his neck unlocked. Milo’s hand traveled deeper into his hair and their mouths moved together for a deep, slow, tender kiss. They were both so large and muscular yet they touched with such gentleness.

Eve settled back down onto the couch, feeling an unexpected peace settling over her. She felt very happy and very horny. As the gin wove itself through her veins, it unlocked her knees and relaxed her pussy. She let her hands roam, invigorated by Milo and Cliff’s display. Milo’s hands moved down Cliff’s torso, undoing his shirt buttons as they went. Eve couldn’t look away from this magnetic love scene, and her hands smoothed over her bare thighs, rolling her black dress up to her hips, revealing her panties.

Milo rushed Cliff back onto the couch, directly beside her, unzipped his pants, and had them off with a fluidity that surprised her. The pants went flying into a corner of the room, and Cliff’s thick manhood stood rigid and tall for Milo.

As Milo lowered himself to take Cliff into his mouth, Eve’s middle finger slid into her panties and toggled at her clitoris furiously, as if she was afraid that she might miss her train if she didn’t board now. The intensity of the sensations rocketed through her body, sending her back, writhing against the cushions. She was not about to be discreet. She had been waiting for two months to see this.

Milo moved over Cliff’s cock with precision and tenderness, but for Eve, the truly erotic element was Cliff’s face. His expression was always so serene, so balanced, but just now, he looked ecstatic.

Eve slid her panties over her thighs and down, slipping them over her ankles and stepping from them. Now she could spread her legs further apart. Now her men could see her pleasure as she watched. Her knees stretched as far apart as they could possibly go, and she ground her hips forward on nothing at all.

Cliff looked from Milo to Eve, and stayed pinned to her for a moment before he reached his hand between her thighs and filled her crevasse with his index and middle finger. He made a crook with his fingers, flicking hard at her little trigger at his fingertip. Eve stopped touching herself and arched her back, hands sinking into the cushions of the couch. She had forgotten that she was more than just the voyeur in this scenario.

Cliff’s thumb ground over her clitoris, and he pumped at her with single-minded dedication that Eve’s folds grew tight and slick, ready to take all of him in. Her juices coursed over his knuckle, provoking him onward, and Cliff withdrew his drenched hand from her. He ran his index finger over his tongue, never breaking eye contact, and Eve trembled with the intensity of this moment.

She shuddered at the look in Cliff’s eyes. It was the same wild look Milo had in his. Those looks meant no more rules, no more boundaries. They were all bright and dewy with sweat, all reaching for each other, working each other toward orgasm. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt so raw, so exposed and yet so safe.

Eve’s eyes softened with relief as Cliff took his fingers from his mouth and grinned at her. “I have to taste that for myself,” he breathed while twisting and stretching as Milo continued pumping over his length with his mouth. Cliff’s mouth covered Eve, so soft, so warm and wet that she couldn’t be sure where her pussy ended and his mouth began. She thrust and writhed against his tongue as he skirted through her folds, suddenly coy, and would then attack again, sending sparks through her entire nervous system.

“Cliff,” Milo instructed, pulling off the other man. “Get on your knees in front of her.”

Cliff obeyed. He was so hard, she had trouble understanding how he was able to maintain consciousness. It looked like a steel baseball bat.

Cliff put his face between Eve’s legs again, lapping at her slowly, softly. Milo played his manhood against Cliff’s entrance, already relishing the ass he knew was awaiting him. He worked into Cliff carefully and lovingly, but also with a little impatience.

“Oh, dear God,” Milo exclaimed, almost under his breath. He began pumping fully into Cliff, feeling his every inch with mind-numbing pleasure. His thrusts shoved Cliff forward, deeper and harder against Eve’s pussy which was spread wide open in front of him. She whimpered and buried her hands in his hair and humped at his chin and Milo tensed and slid perfectly through Cliff’s smooth, tight hole. Cliff breathed in Eve’s rich aroma, caught between these two who he loved so much.

With sexy, sweet Eve’s pussy laid out before him and Milo’s cock inside him, Cliff’s mind began to gently fall apart. Milo moved with increasing speed, in and out, in and out, ballooning to proportions that boggled Cliff’s mind. He knew it would be time soon. He couldn’t hold on to his load much longer; it gathered and tingled at the base of his prick, but when Eve shuddered and clutched and squirted all over his chin, Cliff lost his composure and lashed cum wildly, all over the floor.

He felt Milo shove to the hilt inside him, felt him spasm to completion, and for a moment, everything was quiet.

Eve was the first to make a sound. She giggled loosely. “That was amazing,” she murmured dreamily.

Milo drew tenderly from within Cliff who then lurched wordlessly toward his clothes. Eve watched him in a daze as he fumbled into his pants. Normally, after sex, he would cuddle, get philosophical and then drop off to sleep after a murmured conversation, while his head was buried in the crook of Eve’s neck.

“I should go,” Cliff announced, shaking his head at himself and grabbing his shirt from the floor.

“What?” Milo snapped.

“No, stay,” Eve cooed, sitting up straighter.

But Cliff was still shaking his head. “I told you I wasn’t ready,” he said. He marched toward the door barefoot, shoes dangling from his fingers, and strode right out and onto the stoop.