Chapter 10: The Uninvited Guest
The moving of Catriona’s things was a slow, organic process. A stack of sketchbooks migrated to the dresser in Aidan’s room. A drawer for her clothes emptied, then filled again in his chest of drawers. Her favorite pillow appeared on their bed. Within a week, the second bedroom became a dedicated studio, the quilt folded away, the air smelling permanently of linseed oil and graphite.
It was a Thursday. The documentary on nebulas was a blur of color on the screen, but they weren’t really watching. Catriona was sprawled with her back against the armrest, her legs a heavy, welcome weight across Aidan’s lap. His hand absently traced the ink on her calf—a small, sleeping fox curled around her ankle. Her toes flexed against his thigh with each pass of his thumb.
The city hummed beyond the windows. A lavender candle, one of Catriona’s new ones, burned low on the side table, wicking away the last of the daylight anxiety. This was the new quiet. Deeper than before.
The scrape of a key in the lock was a jarring, metallic wrong note.
They both froze. Aidan’s hand stilled on her leg. Catriona’s head tilted, listening. The door swung open.
Diane stood in the doorway, backlit by the hallway’s harsh fluorescent glow. She clutched a bottle of amber liquid by the neck. Her usually sharp eyeliner was smudged, her hair escaping its ponytail. She blinked, her eyes adjusting to the lamplight, taking in the scene: the intimate tangle on the couch, the domestic quiet, the single wine glass on the table.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she announced, her words slightly slurred. She kicked the door shut behind her. Then she just stood there, the charge in the room shifting palpably. Her gaze traveled from Catriona’s bare feet in Aidan’s lap, up the length of her legs, to where Aidan’s palm rested high on her thigh. Something flickered in Diane’s eyes—a sharp, hungry recognition. It wasn’t just envy. It was desire, plain and complicated.
“Everything okay?” Catriona asked, her voice careful. She didn’t move her legs.
“Peachy.” Diane walked over, the confidence in her stride only slightly compromised by the whiskey. She dropped onto the couch beside Aidan, close enough that her knee pressed against his. The bottle of whiskey made a solid thunk on the coffee table. “Didn’t mean to crash the nest. Just needed… company.”
The air tightened. The documentary narrator droned on about cosmic dust.
“You’ve got company,” Catriona said. Her tone was neutral, observant.
Diane poured three fingers of whiskey into Catriona’s abandoned wine glass. She didn’t ask. She drank half of it in one go, her throat working. She exhaled, the sharp, peaty smell blending with the lavender. Her eyes landed on Aidan. “You’re a quiet one, aren’t you? Just sitting there, holding the world in your lap.”
Aidan felt a prickle of heat at the back of his neck. “It’s a pretty good world.”
“I bet it is.” Diane’s smile was all edges. She turned her body toward him, one arm draped along the back of the couch behind his shoulders. Her fingers, when they brushed accidentally-on-purpose against the nape of his neck, were cold. “You two just… settled right in, didn’t you? Like you’d been here for years. Not months.”
“Feels that way,” Catriona agreed. She was watching Diane now with a focused curiosity, the way she might study a difficult composition. She shifted, drawing Diane’s attention. The movement made her leg press more firmly into Aidan’s groin. He sucked in a quiet breath.
“It’s good to see her like this,” Diane said, her words directed at Aidan but her eyes locked on Catriona. “Unclenched. When she was with that prick, she was always… holding her breath. Now she just is. You did that.”
“She did that,” Aidan corrected softly.
Diane’s hand, which had been resting near his shoulder, drifted down. Her fingertips grazed the bare skin of his arm where his t-shirt sleeve ended. A casual touch that lingered. Then her hand slid to his knee, her palm warm through the denim of his jeans. She left it there.
Aidan was utterly still. The weight of Catriona on his legs, the weight of Diane’s hand on his knee. Two points of contact, pulling him in different directions.
Catriona watched Diane’s hand. A slow, knowing smile touched her lips, not reaching her eyes which were dark and unreadable. She took a sip from the whiskey glass Diane had used, her gaze never leaving her friend. “You know,” Catriona said, her voice a husky murmur that seemed to amplify the silence in the room. “We’ve never had a guest stay the night. In this configuration, I mean.”
The sentence hung there, full of implication. Diane’s fingers flexed on Aidan’s knee. “Is that an invitation?”
“It’s an observation.”
The charge in the room became a live wire. Diane looked from Catriona’s face to Aidan’s. She searched for hesitation, for a no. Aidan’s mind was a blank static. This was uncharted, deep space. The only constant was the solid, real warmth of Catriona against him. Her foot gave the slightest press against his thigh. A signal.
Diane leaned forward, bridging the gap between herself and Catriona. The movement was slow, deliberate. She cupped Catriona’s cheek, her thumb stroking the arch of her freckled cheekbone. Then she kissed her. It wasn’t a friendly peck. It was deep, tasting of whiskey and a long-held want. Catriona’s hand came up, tangling in Diane’s messy hair, pulling her closer. A soft, wet sound broke the quiet.
Aidan watched, his blood pounding in his ears. He was outside of it and central to it all at once.
Diane broke the kiss, breathing heavily. She turned her head, her eyes finding Aidan’s. Her pupils were blown wide. Without a word, she shifted her body, swinging one leg over so she was straddling his lap, facing him, displacing Catriona’s legs. Catriona made a low sound, adjusting, her hand now resting possessively on Diane’s hip.
Diane was a solid, real weight. She smelled like night air and expensive perfume and despair. She placed her hands on his shoulders, her gaze intense. “Okay?” she breathed, the question barely audible.
Aidan looked past her, to Catriona. Catriona met his look, her green eyes fierce and clear. She gave a single, almost imperceptible nod. We.
He looked back at Diane. He nodded.
Diane’s mouth crashed into his. It was hungry, less practiced than Catriona’s, all need and sharp edges. Her tongue pushed past his lips. One of her hands slid from his shoulder, down his chest, over his stomach. She palmed him through his jeans, finding him already hard, and let out a ragged gasp against his mouth. “Jesus,” she muttered.
Her hand fumbled with his button, his zipper. The sound was obscenely loud. Cool air hit his skin, then the hotter, shocking touch of her hand slipping inside his boxers, wrapping around him. He groaned into her mouth, his hips bucking involuntarily.
Catriona watched, her breathing shallow. She leaned in, her lips finding the skin of Diane’s neck, her teeth grazing her earlobe. “See?” Catriona whispered, her voice thick with a possessive awe. “I told you it was a lot.”
Diane’s hand stilled, just holding him, her forehead resting against Aidan’s. She was trembling. When she spoke, it was to Catriona, but she was looking at Aidan, her expression naked and raw. “What do you want?”
Catriona’s answer was immediate. “I want to watch him fill you up.” Her hand slid from Diane’s hip, around to the front of her jeans. “I want to see if you can take it.”
Diane shuddered, a full-body spasm. She kissed Aidan again, softer this time, almost apologetic. Then she pushed herself off his lap, her movements unsteady. She stood before them, and with a defiance that looked like courage, she unbuttoned her own jeans, shoving them and her underwear down her thighs. She didn’t undress fully. It was more vulnerable this way.
Catriona guided her back down, not onto Aidan, but onto the space on the couch between them. The leather sighed. Diane lay back, her head on the armrest, her chest rising and falling fast. Catriona knelt on the floor beside the couch, her hands on Diane’s knees, pushing them apart. She looked up at Aidan.
Her eyes held a question, a check-in. In them, he saw the sleepwalking goddess, the painter of deep green halls, the architect of this moment. He saw only certainty.
He moved, shifting off the couch, kneeling between Diane’s spread legs. The reality of it—Diane exposed and waiting, Catriona’s intense gaze—was almost too much. He used his hand, guiding himself, the head pressing against her. Diane’s breath hitched. Her eyes were wide, fixed on his face.
He pushed in slowly. A tight, burning inch. Diane gasped, her back arching off the couch. “Fuck. Fuck.”
Catriona made a low, encouraging hum. Her hand rested on Diane’s stomach, feeling the muscles clench. “Easy,” Catriona murmured, to both of them. “Just go slow.”
Aidan obeyed, sinking deeper with a gradual, inexorable pressure. Diane’s hands flew to his arms, her nails digging in. Her mouth was open, her eyes squeezed shut, a tear escaping from the corner. It wasn’t pain, not exactly. It was overwhelm. The sheer, unbelievable fullness of it.
When he was fully seated, they both went still, breathing raggedly. Diane opened her eyes. They were glazed, awestruck. “Oh my God,” she choked out. “Cat. You weren’t… you didn’t exaggerate.”
Catriona smiled, a wild, proud thing. She leaned down and kissed Diane deeply, swallowing her friend’s moan as Aidan began, very slowly, to move.