Corin

---

I set the case of beer on the counter, slid four bottles out, twisted the tops off, and handed a pair to Canaan and Aerie, and then one to Tate. I cracked the top off the Johnnie Walker Black Label, took a long pull, and then handed it to Tate. She took a swig, hissing as she swallowed it, and passed it to her twin, who swallowed and grimaced, and then handed it to Canaan who took a long swig.

“So.” I held up my beer. “Here’s to the truly bizarre and utterly confusing amount of multi-directional sexual attraction in this room, and us four figuring it the fuck out before we make even more of a mess of things than we already have.”

“Multi-directional sexual attraction,” Aerie echoed, her eyes on me now. “I’ll drink to that.”

“Me too,” Canaan and Tate said in unison.

I laughed as we clinked bottles. “Oh, yeah, this is gonna get even weirder before we figure things out.”

There was a silence as we all sipped beer and tried to pretend the silence wasn’t awkward or filled with sexual tension.

“So. Anyone want to play cards?” Aerie suggested. “I have a couple of decks in my purse.”

Hours later, we’d played countless hands of gin rummy, war, poker, and twenty-one. That had led to some kind of cockamamie drinking card game the girls had picked up in Thailand, which involved Aerie’s extra deck of cards, lots of shouting, lots of drinking, and lots of chaos. By eleven, the four us were pretty wasted.

We’d eaten all the snacks, and had just finished the last of the beer, and the whiskey was half-gone.

And that was when a really drunkenly brilliant idea hit me.

I gathered the cards up, separated the decks, set one deck aside, and shuffled the remaining deck. “How about poker again?” I suggested.

Tate waved a hand. “Nah, it’s boring unless you play for actual stakes. Playing for quarters and spoons just isn’t challenging.”

I winked at her, and then shifted my gaze from her to Aerie, and then my brother. “That’s why we up the stakes.”

Aerie snorted. “Up the stakes, meaning strip poker?”

I just shrugged, quirking an eyebrow.

Canaan shoved the half-empty bottle of Johnnie into the center of the circle; we were sitting on the floor by the fireplace since there wasn’t an actual table. “I’m in. But I say we make the stakes even higher. If you have to strip, you have to do a shot.”

I laughed. “You’re nuts, bro. We’re already half-wasted.”

Tate blew a raspberry. “Psssh. Lightweight.”

“Oh, like you’re sober?” I teased.

“Maybe not sober, but I’m not wasted either.” She shoved her feet back into her sneakers, which she’d kicked off hours ago, and then shrugged into her hoodie. “I’m in.”

Aerie followed her sister’s lead, putting her shoes and sweatshirt on, which meant Canaan and I had to do the same, donning extra layers, including a slouchy beanie for Canaan and a backward fitted hat for me. It was Aerie’s turn to deal, so she shuffled the deck again several more times and then dealt the cards.

We spent a few quiet minutes examining our hands, and then we went around the circle, hitting or staying.

“All right,” I said. “We’re playing for shoes this round.”

Everyone agreed, and we showed our hands; Aerie and I lost our shoes.

Next round, Canaan and Tate lost their shoes, and soon after Aerie and Tate ended up barefoot.

We’d decided to skip the shot lost bet, by unspoken agreement, and instead opted to do a round of shots when we dealt a new hand.

Within an hour, Canaan was down to his T-shirt and underwear, Tate was left in underwear, shirt, and bra, and Aerie was in just her bra and underwear; I was winning, thus far, being in jeans and T-shirt still. I kind of had to win, though, because I could only lose two hands or I’d be naked, since I was commando under my jeans.

“How far are we taking this?” Canaan asked. “Is there an endpoint, or are we going ’til everyone is, like, totally naked?”

We were all hammered by this point, but at the stage of drunkenness where everything is fun and hilarious and a great idea.

“Quitting is for quitters,” I said. “We play ’til we’re naked as jaybirds.”

Tate and Aerie exchanged glances. “We’re in,” they said in unison.

Canaan and I exchanged glances next, and we both understood that the game was on. “Naked it is,” I said, and handed the deck to Canaan to shuffle and deal.

“Shirts,” Tate said.

I exchanged cards, and ended up with a killer hand, while Canaan, if I was reading his tells correctly, was less than thrilled with his hand.

“I see you shirts, and raise you bras,” I said, with a quick glance at Aerie.

Aerie chewed on her lower lip, staring at her cards, and then tapped the floor, seeing the bet, and Corin, after a hesitation, did the same.

We showed our hands, and that’s when things got interesting.

Aerie had three of a kind, Corin had two pair, and Tate and I both had straights.

Which meant Aerie, with a laugh and a curse, threw her cards down, and Canaan just snorted a laugh.

Canaan ripped his T-shirt off and tossed it aside, leaving him in just his tight black boxer-briefs. And then it was all eyes on Aerie, and the question of whether she’d keep playing or quit. She gazed at each of us in turn, and then at Tate again, and then drew a deep breath.

“Fuck it,” she murmured. “But I need another shot first.”

She tipped the bottle back, took a quick swallow, and set it down. Then, biting her lower lip and eyeing each of us in turn yet again, she unhooked her bra and let the straps sag off her shoulders.

“If I keep playing,” she said, hesitating before taking it all the way off, “just know I’m going to get the rest of you naked with me.”

“So far your poker luck hasn’t been too great,” Canaan said.

She just stuck her tongue out at him, and then with another sigh of nerves, straightened her back and tossed the bra aside, leaving her topless, wearing nothing but her lacy white thong.

It turns out that identical twins aren’t one hundred percent identical.

That’s a joke, because obviously, being an identical twin myself, I know this.

My point is, Aerie’s tits weren’t a carbon copy of Tate’s. Equally hot, just…slightly different. Hers hung a little closer together, with slightly darker areolae and smaller nipples, and her left breast was more noticeably larger than the right.

I confess I stared openly, and Aerie just lifted her chin and kept her back straight.

“All right, boys, you’ve gotten your stare in,” she snapped. “Tate and Cor, you need to do a tie-breaker.”

“Does a tie mean we both lose the original article of clothing we bet on?” Tate asked.

“Fine by me,” I said.

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Canaan said.

“Shut up and do a shot, Cane,” Aerie said, handing him the bottle.

Canaan drank, and I finally ripped my gaze from Aerie’s tits, meeting Tate’s gaze. She had an eyebrow quirked, and her face reflected amusement; clearly she knew I’d been staring at her sister’s tits, and found it funny. Or something.

“So we both lose shirts?” Tate asked.

I nodded. “Yep. And then we each draw a card from the deck and whichever one of us has a higher card is the winner, meaning the other has to lose an extra item.”

Canaan laughed. “You better hope you win, bro, because if you don’t, you’re the first one naked.”

“First one naked is the first one in the lake?” Aerie suggested.

“I’m in,” all four us said in unison, and then we laughed.

“Fine,” Tate said, and stripped out of her T-shirt.

I took mine off next, and then Aerie was shuffling the cards. I was torn between staring at Aerie as she shuffled, each slight movement made her breasts twitched and swayed and shimmied, and staring at Tate in nothing but bra and panties.

She was wearing a matching set, which I hadn’t noticed the first time around. Deep, rich red, the bra was a half-cup, leaving most of the upper portion of her boobs bare, and it had sheer lace and opaque lace in a complicated pattern, revealing flesh and hiding her nipples. The underwear was little more than a strip of red silk around her waist and a tiny triangle over her core.

And shit, I was hard inside my jeans. Dammit.

A glance at Canaan told me he was fighting a similar battle. My gaze slid from Canaan to Aerie, and her eyes met mine, and I found my gaze traveling down her body. She was sitting cross-legged, revealing the tendons on the insides of her thigh, her thong tugged tight against her core, revealing the shape of her pussy, and a darker patch against the white lace; she was turned on by this, staring at me, at my straining zipper, at Canaan and the obvious bulge in his underwear.

Another glance at Tate, then. She was sitting with her knees pressed together, draped to one side, hiding her core. Her nipples were poking hard against the fabric of her bra…yeah, she was just as affected by all this as the rest of us.

Aerie slapped the deck of cards on the floor between Tate and me. “Each of you take a card and don’t look at it. When you both have a card, on the count of three, put it face up on the floor.”

If I lost this tiebreaker, I’d have to take off my jeans, which was my remaining article of clothing.

And I was hard as a damn rock.

I swallowed hard, sucked in a deep breath, and slid a card off the top of the deck, holding it hidden between both hands until Tate had drawn her card.

“On three,” I said, meeting Tate’s eyes. “Cane, count it.”

Canaan let a beat of silence extend, ratcheting the tension to a thick, stifling level. “One…two…three.”

Tate slapped her card down face-up first—an ace of hearts.

Dammit; anything less than an ace in my hand, and I was the loser.

I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding…and tossed the card down.

“Holy shit!” Canaan laughed. “What are the damn odds!”

Ace of diamonds.

“Once more,” Aerie said, reshuffling the deck, and then again, and then again, before handing it to Canaan, who cut it and reshuffled it himself.

The deck between us, Tate drew first, and I went second.

Aerie counted it off. “One…two…three.”

Tate and I went at the same time, this time. Tate had a queen of spades…

And I had a ten of clubs.

“Fuck,” I said, with a laugh.

“First naked, first into the lake!” Aerie said. “Off with the pants, bitch!”

I took a shot, and then a second. I hesitated.

Then I stood up, let out a shaky laugh, and ripped open my jeans and shucked them off.

My heart was hammering, my pulse loud in my ears. All three pairs of eyes were on me; Canaan’s on my face, laughing, and Aerie’s and Tate’s, obviously on my erection.

Aerie was the first to look away, blushing, and her gaze went to Tate. She held in a laugh, and then it came bubbling out, a snort at first, and then a guffaw, and then she was collapsing against her sister.

“Think my dick is funny, do you?” I demanded.

Aerie shook her head. “Oh no…no way!” she said, trying to catch her breath. “There is not a single damn thing funny about that.”

Aerie pressed her mouth to Tate’s ear and whispered something, which set Tate into hysterics. “AERIE!” she shrieked, sounding scandalized.

“What? Just wondering.” Aerie’s gaze flicked to me, then, meeting my eyes for a split second.

That split second was enough though. There was curiosity in her eyes. Lust…

Uninhibited by the booze.

I felt her gaze go to my cock, which was still straining painfully. “First one naked, first one in, huh? Well, last one in makes breakfast!”

I took off out the door, as much to escape the situation and my own confused arousal and attraction to Aerie as anything. I jogged through the woods, picking my way carefully between the trees to the lake and onto the dock.

I heard the others behind me, all of them laughing.

“Jump in, Cor!” Canaan hollered. “I’m sure it’s plenty warm!”

Yeah, right.

I didn’t give myself a chance to think. The second I hit the end of the dock, I leaped in.

Fuck, that water was cold. I gasped an embarrassingly breathy inhalation of shock, twisting around as the others reached the dock. The cold water should have doused my erection, but the first one to the end of the dock was Aerie, topless. Jogging.

God, that did not help anything, the sight of a topless, running Aerie. Those big, lush, pale breasts bounced and swayed so tauntingly my cock tried to go even harder than it was, which wasn’t really possible. I couldn’t look away.

But then it got worse.

She reached the end of the dock, paused, staring hard at me. The moon was high and full, bathing everything silver and bright, shining off her skin, illuminating her into high relief as she shimmied slowly out of her thong.

She was waxed bare.

Another moment of hesitation, and then she jumped in.

Alcohol was still blazing through me, my buzz only slightly lessened by the sudden shock of cold. I was struggling against the arousal, the attraction, knowing there was a reason to keep fighting it, but having increasing difficulty remembering why, especially when Aerie hit the water and surfaced, laughing and spluttering.

Tate was next in line, followed closely by Canaan.

They reached the end of the dock at the same time, and I didn’t miss the long look they shared. Aerie was swimming toward me, distracting me from the tableau on the dock. Aerie followed my stare.

“Come on, slowpokes! Get in here!” she called out.

Canaan shucked his boxers first, and Tate slipped her bra off and then shimmied out of her thong. Canaan watched that show, you can bet, and then Canaan pounced. He grabbed Tate around the waist and tossed her into the water, following behind her with a shout.

Tate hit the water shrieking, went under, surfaced, laughing and coughing and gasping. “Cane, you ass!”

And now all of us were in the water, laughing, splashing.

A full-on water fight broke out, a crazy free-for-all. It was impossible to see anything through the onslaught of splashing, and I caught a glimpse of pale flesh and heavy breasts, and lunged, smacking a geyser of water to cover my approach. Impossible to tell who was who, I shot my hands out and grabbed her, yanking her under the water. She fought and twisted, kicking, but somehow the fight turned into a grapple, her skin soft and slippery against mine, her calves grazing my knees, and then her thighs brushed mine, and we surfaced momentarily, each of us gasping before diving under again to resume wrestling for dominance. She was strong, lithe and slippery and hard to keep a hold on. I felt her waist brush my stomach, felt her thighs brush mine, and then in a serpent swift move, she wrapped both legs around my waist. I could feel her bare pussy against my stomach, and I was hard as a rock, my cock nudging. Her breasts were smashed against my chest, and in the darkness under the surface, her hands scraped against my back and clutched at my shoulders, and her mouth was hot and eager on mine.

She moaned.

I groaned.

Tongues tangled.

And I knew, knew—by the feel of her body, by the difference in the way she kissed, and in some other indefinable, intangible, way, I just knew—it was Aerie.

We surfaced yet again, the water here just deep enough that we could keep our heads above water if we danced on our tiptoes. It was Aerie, I confirmed as I blinked water out of my eyes. Her hair was loose and pasted to her face and shoulders. Beyond Aerie, behind her, I could see Canaan and Tate still splashing each other, but the splashes were turning into darting, grabbing hands, and then Canaan had Tate under the water and she was laughing. She dove, and I caught a flash of thigh and a hint of her ass flashing in the moonlight, and then she was rocketing out of the water, both of her hands caught in one of Cane’s; they were closer to shore, where the water was shallower, and standing up Tate was only in the water to her waist. She fought Cane, and I had a moment where I was clinging to Aerie while staring at Tate as she jerked and shimmied, making her tits bounce and sway.

But my attention was brought back to Aerie as she pushed off me, settling onto her feet, ducking under the water with a mischievous grin. I watched, waited, and then she pounced. Leaping out of the water, she hit me full force, tackling me, cackling as she knocked me under the water. She had both of my wrists in her hands, pushing them behind my back, and her feet were hooking behind mine, constantly tripping me, and keeping me off balance. I fell backward into the water, kicked to swim, and she landed on top of me, off balance, slamming onto me. Her tits smacked against my face, wet and stuttering against my cheek and mouth as she toppled forward as I sank. I stood up suddenly, flipping her completely over, but she was quick to grab my ankle and yank, and then I was under the water with her.

We were all tangled up, then, hands scrabbling. I caught a handful of something, which I realized as I gently squeezed it, was her breast. The tangled wrestling somehow became something else…her hands sliding over my hips, mine cupping her tits, and then her core grinding against my thigh, both of her legs wrapped around one of mine. She had her hands on my butt, and then she was clutching my cock and grinding, all of this under the water. We surfaced briefly, gasping, tripping, staggering and swimming.

I heard a laugh somewhere, a breathy, aroused, female laugh, and a male grunt.

This was crazy.

Some part of my drunken mind knew this wasn’t how things were supposed to go.

But Aerie felt so good. She wasn’t stroking my cock, just exploring it. Fondling it, finding the base and then wrapping her fist around the head, then slipping downward. All the while, her hips were flexing, her pussy grinding against my thigh. I had her ass in my hand, and her breast in the other, and we were in shallow water, swimming aimlessly as we twisted and swam and hopped a few steps.

And then we crashed into flesh.

I blinked, the soft wet silky skin of Tate’s thigh against mine, Canaan’s hands on her waist, just then descending from her chest, and Aerie’s shoulder was wedged against Canaan’s side. The jumble of flesh was confusing. The moon bathed all of us in light, exposing and illuminating everything, Aerie’s hand on my cock, Tate’s breasts, Canaan’s erection jutting out of the water, Tate’s fist around the base.

God, what we were doing?

We all froze, eyes flicking from person to person, and then we all sprang away.

“Wow, so um…” I was the first to break the silence. “That was…”

“We’re all really drunk,” Aerie said.

“Let’s not let this get weird,” Canaan said.

“You said it first,” Tate put in, “there’s a lot of multi-directional sexual attraction happening here.”

“No shit,” I said. “I just wasn’t thinking it was gonna play out quite like that.”

I felt dizzy, off-kilter, aroused and confused and drunk and mixed up in a dozen different directions. I’d just been messing around with Aerie.

This wasn’t how things were supposed to go.

I tripped backward, toward the dock. “First one in, first one out, right?” I said it just for something to say.

I heaved myself up onto the deck, and Tate was already there reaching for a leg up. I extended one hand, and Tate took it, and then offered me her other. I took both hands and hauled her up onto the dock. She slid her ass onto the planks, twisted to put her knees under her, and then stood up.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Um.” I gestured. “Towels?”

“Oh.” She paused, staring up at me. “Good idea.”

So we jogged through the forest, pine tree needles sticking to our feet. I reached the bathroom first, thankful for the stack of thick blue towels under the sink. I handed one to Tate first, wrapped another around my waist, and then slid two more out.

“I’ll take these to them,” I said.

Tate just nodded; she stood in the middle of the bathroom with the towel pressed against her chest, her braid wet, makeup gone, eyes wide.

I went back to the dock with the towels. Canaan and Aerie were both crouched in the water near the dock, faces close, murmuring to each other. They went silent as I approached, both of their eyes on me.

“Thanks,” Canaan said.

Aerie said nothing, but her gaze on mine was unreadable. There was a slight smirk to her lips, and a quirk to one eyebrow, but I still had no idea what she was feeling about what had just happened. I had no idea how I felt about what had just happened; I felt like I should say something to address what had just happened, but I was still buzzed and couldn’t think of anything. I turned away and went back up to the cabin, leaving Canaan and Aerie in the lake, still, huddling together, murmuring to each other in low tones.

Shivering, teeth chattering, I entered the cabin, and stopped dead in my tracks: the bathroom door was wide open, and Tate was in the shower, her body a vision of curves in the steam fogging the glass door of the shower stall. She saw me the moment I entered the cabin, her body facing away slightly, her head twisted to watch for me. I couldn’t really see anything of her except the side of her thigh, the curve of her ass, and her arm covering her chest. She’d taken her hair out of the braid, and it was slicked backward, clumped and pasted to her back.

I crossed the cabin to stand in the doorway of the bathroom, the towel still around my waist. Her gaze on mine, Tate turned to face me, dropping her hands, allowing me my first full frontal view of her lush, beautiful, naked body. And, god, was she fucking gorgeous.

Without a word, she shoved open the door, a silent invitation.