Chapter 26: The Unexpected Call
The water was turning to cool silk against his skin as the last of the sun’s warmth bled from the sky. Aidan floated, eyes closed, listening to Thea and Sloane bicker good-naturedly about filter settings on the terrace above. The peace was a physical thing, a pleasant numbness in his limbs.
The buzz from the lounger where his phone lay was a jarring, metallic intruder. It vibrated again, skittering on the marble.
“Your wife is calling,” Sloane singsonged, not looking up from her tablet.
Aidan paddled to the edge and heaved himself out, water cascading from him onto the hot stone. He grabbed a towel, scrubbing it over his face before picking up the phone. Catriona’s face, lit by the familiar soft light of their living room back home, filled the screen. Her auburn hair was a messy halo, and she wore his old university hoodie. She looked effortlessly beautiful, and for a second, the villa, the pool, the entire Mediterranean fantasy felt starkly artificial.
“Hey, you,” he said, his voice roughened by water and exhaustion. He sank onto the lounger, the linen cushion soaking through instantly.
“There’s my superstar,” Catriona crooned, her grin wicked. The camera angle shifted, jostling, and Suki’s face appeared beside hers, cheek pressed to Catriona’s shoulder. Suki’s green eyes were bright, her smile shy but knowing.
“Hi, Aidan,” Suki said, a soft murmur.
“Hey, Suki.” A thread of confusion wove through him. They were together? Catriona was supposed to be at her sister’s.
“We’ve been watching the livestream feed,” Catriona said, her voice dropping to that low, intimate register that always went straight to his gut. “The pool stuff. My god. Thea’s angles are getting so much better.”
Aidan felt a flush that had nothing to do with the fading sun. “You were watching?”
“Every glorious second,” Suki confirmed, her gaze flickering down, then back up to meet his through the screen. “The underwater clip is already cutting together beautifully. The light through the water on your… on the penetration. It’s stunning.”
Catriona nuzzled Suki’s temple, her eyes locked on Aidan. “It gave us an idea. A really good idea. For the next scene.”
The terrace behind him felt suddenly very quiet. He could no longer hear Thea and Sloane. They were probably listening.
“Okay,” he said slowly, drawing the word out.
“We want you to do them together,” Catriona said, her words a soft, explicit bullet. “Sloane first. Then Thea. No pulling out. We want to see you finish inside. Both of them. Close-ups, Aidan. Slow motion on the… aftermath.”
Aidan’s breath hitched. He was instantly, overwhelmingly hard under the damp towel. The casual, post-coital calm of two minutes ago was incinerated.
“Cat…” he started, but she cut him off, her tone turning director-sharp.
“It’s the logical progression. The subscribers are rabid for it. The comments on the last creampie compilation with Suki were all ‘when does he do the others?’ This is premium content, darling. The ultimate collaboration.” She smiled, but it was all teeth. “Our channel needs this. I want to see it.”
Suki leaned closer, her lips nearly touching the microphone. “I’ve already set up a split-screen edit in my head. The contrast… it’s going to be visually incredible.” Her voice was clinically passionate, but her pupils were blown wide. “We want to see it drip out of them. In detail.”
A phantom pulse throbbed through him. He thought of Sloane’s tight clench around him, of Thea’s demanding heat. The clinical instruction merged violently with the raw memory of sensation. The distance between this sun-bleached terrace and his dim living room collapsed. They weren’t just watching; they were choreographing. He was their puppet, and his strings were being pulled from five thousand miles away.
“They might not…” he began, a weak protest.
“They will,” Catriona interrupted, sure as stone. “I already texted Thea the storyboard. She’s on board. Sloane will be. It’s what the narrative needs.”
As if on cue, Thea appeared at the terrace door, her camera already in hand. She gave Aidan a thumbs up, her expression one of pure, frenetic creativity. “Light’s going fast. We should set up inside. The master suite. Big bed, white sheets. Classic.”
Sloane stepped out behind her, a robe tied loosely around her waist. She met Aidan’s gaze. Her face was unreadable for a moment, then she shrugged one bare shoulder, a faint smile touching her lips. “Artisanal,” she said, echoing Thea’s earlier word, but it sounded different now. Heavier.
“See?” Catriona’s voice chirped from the phone, triumphant. “A full team effort. Now go on. We’re staying on this call. I want to watch you work.”
Aidan looked at the screen, at his wife’s hungry, proud expression, at Suki’s eager, supportive smile. He looked at Thea, already calculating lenses, and Sloane, waiting by the door.
The fantasy was no longer his to float in. It had a script, and an eager, paying audience of two watching live from his own sofa.
He stood up, the towel tenting obviously in front of him. “Okay,” he said, the word sounding final in the twilight air.
“That’s my boy,” Catriona purred. “Don’t forget. Slow motion on the finish. We want to see every drop.”
Aidan ended the call. The screen went black, reflecting his own face back at him for a split second—a stranger with kind, hazel eyes, standing dripping wet on a marble terrace at the edge of the world.
He turned towards the villa, towards the lit doorway where the two women waited. The warm breeze carried the distant laugh of a stranger from the cocktail party down the cliff, a sound from another, simpler universe. He didn’t look back at the infinity pool, now a sheet of black silk merging with the night. The horizon was gone. There was only the path ahead, well-lit and meticulously storyboarded, leading inside.