And it seems like there is no way I can warn her without telling at least part of the truth. I drank the 7-up and tried to convince my stomach that it was dinner, then tried to convince my head that it was time to go to sleep. The dinner part was a tough sell, but the bedtime part wasn't too hard. After the wild sex with Cindy, the wild dreams last night, and the panic I'd felt all day, I was ready for a good nights' sleep. Before I dozed off I resolved to have a heart-to-heart talk with Nancy tomorrow evening.

I pulled her into the living room right after dinner, and sat her down on the sofa next to me, telling her there was something we needed to talk about. I took a deep breath and plunged right in.

"Nancy, I've done something that I'm very ashamed of. It's so bad that I dread telling you about it, but I know I have to."

She immediately looked suspicious, but covered that look with one of concern.

"Whatever it is, don't be afraid to tell me. We ... I love you, and if we share our problems, we can try to work through them."

I nodded. "Thanks. Actually, it started with the four of us that play poker together. One night we cooked up a really evil plan together, and we all swore we would all go along with it, myself included. I can't believe I agreed to do it, but now it's happening."

"Oh, Richard! You're not doing something illegal, are you? If they catch you, will you go to jail?"

I shook my head. "No, not illegal, but worse than that, really." I paused a moment, then went on. "It's immoral; it's despicable; it's a terrible thing to do to you."

"To me? What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about something that proves I don't really love you the way you love me, the way I have always believed I love you."

Her eyes widened. "You mean SEX? You mean you guys are having sex with other women?"

"Yes, it's about sex, but it's not just having sex with other women. Nancy, I ... I gave the other three guys permission to ... to try to seduce you."

"You WHAT?"

"I know, I must have been insane. We all must have been insane. When it happened we weren't thinking or acting as if we were married. The truth is we were behaving like horny teenagers. Each of us gave the others permission to try to seduce our wife."

"So I suppose you have been out fucking the other three women," she said bitterly.

"Whoa, slow down. Think about it for a minute. Have the other three guys been fucking you? Have any of them tried to seduce you recently? I didn't think so. Why do you think I would be doing it when they're not doing it?"

"Because I can tell you're not telling me the whole truth here. You're hiding something from me."

"True. Or, at least I haven't told you the whole truth yet. I just need you to hang on while I explain some more things. Don't jump to conclusions, please?"

"OK," she said very suspiciously, "I'm listening."

"The deal was we would each give the others one chance to seduce our wife, and it would be at one of the weekly poker games."

"I don't understand. You'd all be together then, so ..."

"Shhh, I told you to listen. The plan was that when we got together at one of the guy's places, we would start the game, and then he would get an emergency phone call from his office, and have to go in to work to handle some crisis. That would leave the other three guys alone with his wife for the rest of the evening."

"Oh, that is so evil!"

"That's what I told you."

"But you wouldn't really go through with it, would you?"

"It started last week at Bob's house and, yes, he did go through with it."

"And what did you guys do after he left?"

"We can talk about that in a little bit, but first, we need to talk about something else. I'm sure you remember that next week we are hosting the poker party here."

"OHH! You mean ... but Dick, ... you won't go through with it, will you?"

"Honestly, Nancy, I don't know. That's what we need to talk about."

"But, Richard! This is crazy! Why would you do this to me?"

"Look, in the first place, I gave them permission to try to seduce you. I didn't give them permission to rape you. That was one thing sensible that we all agreed on. No one was allowed to use any force, or threats, or blackmail, or in any way get the women to do something they don't agree to do.

"So, one way I've been looking at it is that I don't own you. If you were to decide that you want to have some fun with them, then that is your decision. Our being married doesn't mean you can't do things on your own sometimes, and make your own decisions."

"Yes, but it does mean I've promised to be true to you."

"Correct, and that is your promise; it's not my demand; it's not the law. It is always up to you what that promise means to you."

"But don't you realize how awkward it would be for me to have them hitting on me all night?"

"Yes, Nancy, I do, and that's part of why I said I must have been insane to agree to the plan. That's also part of the reason I decided to talk to you about it, even though we all swore that we wouldn't tip our wives off."

"So you're already breaking the rules you guys made."

I nodded.

"Does that mean you might break them more?"

"Yes, I might. But I've tried to see how to get out of this, and I just can't see how to do it."

"What if you canceled the get-together next week?"

"It would just postpone the seduction attempt to the next time they were here. The same thing would happen if you made some excuse not to be here."

"What if you didn't go when you got the so-called emergency call?"

"That would get pretty nasty. They would blackball me; none of them would ever speak to me again. The same thing would happen if I did go, but then came back early."

"So it sounds like you are saying we have to go through with it."

"Yes, unless you can think of a way out. Nancy, I'm scared, but I keep telling myself that I need to trust you, that I do trust you, so nothing will happen. For some reason, though, I'm having trouble convincing myself."

"So, let's go back to last Tuesday. Maybe what happened then is affecting the way you feel about next week."

"Maybe," I mumbled.

"So I take it something did happen."

"Well, of course something happened," I bluffed. "We tried to seduce Cindy."

She looked at me suspiciously. "Tried, or succeeded?"

"She did get pretty turned on," I admitted. "Since she didn't know what was going to happen, we were able to sneak up on her emotions."

"You didn't answer my question. Tried, or succeeded?"

I dropped my face in shame. "Succeeded," I whispered.

"So you're telling me you fucked Cindy two nights ago?"

"Yes."

"And now you're afraid that somebody might fuck me next Tuesday?"

"Yes."

"Don't you see anything unfair about that?"

"Yes," I said, raising my head and looking at her, "but I can't help it. I love you, and I'm jealous."

"You should have thought of that before you fucked Cindy."

I didn't know what to say, so I just nodded.

"Richard, you have just screwed up big time."

"I know."

"No you don't know. If you hadn't said anything to me there is no way I would have let those guys seduce me. But now that I know what you did last week, I think I'm going to be ready and willing to party when the guys get here. Oh, are we going to have a wild night!"

"No! You don't mean that, Nancy!"

"You think? Just wait and see. This is going to be the first time I let myself go wild since before I started going with you. You're going to be really sorry you decided to mess around on me.

"Oh, and don't even think of trying any of those ways out we were talking about a while ago. I'm going to have my party no matter what you do."

She bounced up out of the sofa. "Oh, this is so exciting! I'm going to go see right now what I can wear that night. And Saturday I'm going to spend half the day in the beauty parlor getting ready. Oh, I can't wait! Why does Tuesday have to be so far away?"

With that she skipped off to the bedroom, humming. I slunk deeper into the sofa cushions, totally devastated.

For the next two hours I was pretty much a basket case. I thought about going to jack off in the bathroom, but then I wasn't sure I even wanted to, and besides, I didn't want to chance running into Nancy in the hallway. Maybe I should go find a whore, but I'd never done that in my life, and I didn't feel like taking chances. The most appealing thought I had was to go out and get drunk, but I didn't seem to have the energy to even make it to the car. I ended up grabbing the TV remote and half watching some stupid shows.

Finally Nancy poked her head into the room.

"Turn off the idiot box, and come to bed with me. I'm feeling horny."

She came over and sat beside me. "You didn't really believe all that stuff I said about partying with the guys, did you?"