It was a long-held fantasy come true. I was enjoying the kiss of a lifetime with my best friend. She initiated it and it was every bit as exciting, wonderful, marvelous, fantastic, and arousing as it could possibly be. My problem with my husband's infidelity seemed like a distant memory, and not nearly the happiness-ending trauma that it had first seemed. The kiss had to end sometime, though.

"I have wanted us to do that for so long, Cath." she said as she pulled her face away from mine.

"I wish we had done it so long ago, Kyra."

"No, that would not have been good. There is a right time for such things and that was the right time for that."

"I suppose you're right. It was perfect."

"And now is the right time for this." She pushed open my bathrobe, leaned down, and sucked my nipple greedily into her mouth.

"Ah! God that feels incredible. Please don't stop."

"I have no intention of stopping until you push me away. I'm so glad we both want this."

"Less talking, Kyra. More of... whatever this is."

Her mouth moved to my other nipple and sucked it in.

**********

I am so far ahead of this story that I must stop. This is the story of how I joined the Last Wives Club. It's not really called that, except by Kyra and me and maybe a few others. I won't tell you the club's real name. That happens after you join.

This story started in a hotel room after I had left my husband. I discovered that he had dallied with one of our regular babysitters, a college girl who worked for a service in our suburb of Saint Louis, Missouri. It was almost midnight and I was drunk and I was pouring out my pain over the telephone to my best friend, Kyra.

Kids nowadays would call her my BFF. She was my roommate during my freshman year at Wisconsin State University. We went through a lot of growing up together. I had naively blundered into the big wide world of adult freedom, direct from an all girl Catholic high school. Kyra was much more worldly, not a virgin and not a stuck up prude. I helped her boost her self-esteem and become more selective about who she fucked. She helped me to open my eyes and see that my religion relied on sophistry and indoctrination of defenseless children.

I was ignoring calls from my husband and texts from my twelve year old daughter. I was trying not to think of the pain I was causing her and my ten year-old twin boys. I had checked into the hotel, because that's what had worked for Kyra when she had left her husband two years earlier. She told me later that getting away to a rented bed and calling me had saved her marriage and helped her find happiness.

The circumstances were a bit different then. After discovering her husband's infidelity, she had come to St. Louis on a Friday and checked into one of the best hotels before calling me. My husband was out of town on business, so I had dropped the kids for a sleepover at two different neighbors' houses, and gone to her room to console her. We were seriously smashed by the time her sister-in-law had called. That was a conversation I'll never forget. Kyra had put it on speaker phone. Elizabeth was pissed-off about that, but accepted it.

"Kyra, please don't do anything stupid."

"Too late, Lizzy. Cath and I are fucked up! " Neither of us could restrain howls of drunken laughter.

"Just drinking I hope. That's not a problem. Cath, take care of my sister-in-law. She moved a small fortune on her way out and it would be a shame if she pissed it away."

Kyra was laughing so hard there were tears in her eyes. "A small fortune. That's fucking hilarious. Where I come from, ten million dollars is a huge fortune."

I almost fainted when I heard the amount. I knew they were rich, but not ten million rich. My husband and I both had good careers and were considered very well off, but not ten million well off. I sobered up quick when I learned the stakes of the game.

"Cath, just please help her through the night and get her to the corporate terminal at Lambert Airport at 10 AM. Can you join us for the weekend?"

"No, Liz. Sorry. Two games tomorrow afternoon. The life of a soccer mom."

"Please, Cathy. Don't ever apologize for putting your children first. I have so much respect for that."

"Thanks, Liz. I'll get her to the airport at 10."

Two years later, it was my turn. It was a Thursday night and I had to work the next day. I was staying at a business-class hotel near Lambert, using my frequent traveler perks to pay the bill. Kyra was in Chicago and I could tell she was working on her computer as we spoke.

"I'm glad you called me, Cath. I'll help you as best I can. You don't want to burn any bridges just yet. Trust me, and I'll set you up for whatever you decide."

I had no idea where this was going, but I trusted her. The next day, I followed her plan. I scheduled vacation time the following week, the first time I did so without consulting my husband since our wedding day. It was also the first time I had excluded my kids from my vacation plans since they were born. When work ended, I drove to Spirit of St. Louis airport. A limo was waiting there to take me home to pack. The driver was a woman and an armed bodyguard. Kyra's wicked sense of humor had obviously gotten the better of her. She knew that my husband would not try to stop me with physical force and with a woman there, he couldn't hope to convince me to stay.

I packed a bag a bag and made a point of letting him see that my sexiest little black dress was coming with me. Whenever he asked a question, I answered with some variant of "I'll let you know." Kyra had told me that the key was to be non-commital and unsympathetic to the disruption I was causing. I kissed the kids goodbye and made sure that they saw that I didn't kiss my husband goodbye. I told my daughter not to text me for the next 2 hours. By that time, I was in the air for my first ride in a private jet. In the meantime, I continued ignoring all calls.

A limo, Mom?

Pretty cool, huh? Wait 'til I tell you about the private jet.

A private jet? Sweet! Dad's in the doghouse?

Yup.

Is it another woman?

No more questions, girl. I'll be back next week, but don't tell your father that. Let him sweat. He deserves it.

When will I hear from you?

Every night around 9. Be good. Take care of your brothers. Let them know I'm not mad at them. No fighting! Time to step up and make me even more proud of you.

Okay.

Her terse reply was actually welcome. She would have been more dramatic if she was upset. I was surprised when the plane didn't land at Chicago. Kyra wouldn't tell me where it would take me, and nobody on the crew would tell me either. The pilot told me that he 'wouldn't dare ruin Ms. Kenady-Wilson's surprise'.

We flew across lake Michigan and landed somewhere along the west shore of Michigan. When I deplaned, Kyra was waiting for me. We hugged and exchanged good-to-see-yous and then she surprised me with,

"Welcome to the club."

"The victims of cheating husbands club?"

"I know it sucks, but nothing will change the past. I hope you'll be joining the Last Wives Club."

"The what?"

"That's just my name for it. We're realists. We think about the future with or without our cheating husbands and we turn the lemon into lemonade. That's what I can help you do. It worked for me."

We got into her rental car and I had to comment. "First a limo, then a private jet, now a Ford Ugly?"

"Well, the staff of where we'll be going probably gossips the most about the richest people, so we're flying under the radar."

Where we were going was a spa resort, exclusively for women. As we were checking in, Kyra mysteriously whispered, "You're Mrs. White and I'm Mrs. Cardinal." Those are our school colors. She always was a bit of a jock.

She handed a credit card to the woman at the desk and I had to do a double take. It was a plain solid red card, no logo, no lettering, not a single word on it that I could see. The woman raised her eyebrows, slid the card through the reader and said, "Mrs. Cardinal, it's a pleasure to have you with us. Here are your nametags. You're in suite 416. There must be some mistake. That's only a Princess suite."

"No mistake. We're princesses this weekend." When Kyra gave that enigmatic reply, my curiosity was really piqued. I later learned that Queen and Empress suites were the norm for red card holders. I also learned that the red signified the shed blood of marital warfare. But that's getting ahead a bit.

We checked in and had dinner. As we ate, we looked over the menu of spa treatments and, since I had never been to a spa resort, I took Kyra's advice and we scheduled ourselves on the buddy system so we could stay together all day and talk while they took care of us. After dinner, we retired to our suite and started the serious drinking. Of course I cried and she consoled me, but she wouldn't tell me anything more about this club, saying only that a new life would begin for me the next day. I wanted to blame my husband for everything, but each time I did, she would say something like, "Well, we're really all just apes that wear clothes," or, "It isn't helpful to dwell on what he's done to you, it's more important to think about what he's done for you." I began to think that she might be inducting me into some kind of 'obedient female' cult.

Little did I know how wrong that was. When we finally couldn't stay awake longer, we gave each other goodnight hugs and slept in our separate beds.

I expected a hangover the next morning, but I awoke surprisingly refreshed. We donned bathrobes and slippers and went to breakfast. The rules were strict, no makeup, no jewelry, no undies, no hair care, and no comments about the other women's appearances. This was Saturday morning and we would all be reborn or reinvented over the next two days. It was acceptable, maybe even advisable that we start the day looking out worst. Kyra and I were probably the youngest women there, the only ones in our late thirties. Most of the women were over 50, but there were a few in their forties. We had a full two days of treatments scheduled, including manicure, pedicure, hair removal, mineral bath, massage therapy, and hair styling.

Kyra suggested that we both go for totally bare on the pubic hair removal. "Think of this as a rebirth. Besides, if you decide to have sex with your husband again, it will really make him wonder about what happened this weekend." Her grin was so evil that I had to laugh.

Dinner that evening was quite different than breakfast that morning. Dressing in our finest was encouraged, even though there were no men to impress, unless you include the wait staff and most of those were likely gay. We were dressing for ourselves, and for each other. Many of the women looked years younger than they had that morning. There was a relaxed air of optimism in the room. Kyra and I sat at a table for two and drank each other in with our eyes. The food was excellent, the wine flowed, and even though I knew that we were only postponing reality, I was in love with the me that I was becoming. I decided, perhaps drunkenly, that it was a night for shedding inhibitions.

When we returned to the room, though, Kyra had other business on her mind. We had changed out of our finery into bathrobes and Kyra made it clear that it was time to talk about my future. She explained that, as we lollygagged in this pleasure palace, others were preparing for the assault on my husband's self image. When I returned home, if I so chose, he would find me armed with a proposal for how to achieve rewards and avoid punishments.

"So, I'm not supposed to tell him about any of this."

"Nope. Your marriage, as you imagined it, is over. But you can still have a rewarding partnership. Keeping this trip a secret will give you leverage that you can use to gain compliance. You want him to understand that you have options, that you have wealth and power to draw upon. Perhaps he'll think that you have a rich lover. We want him to think that you have a benefactor. Eventually we will confirm that, but without details. Trust me, Cath. This works. I was faithful to Benedict until I caught him cheating. Now we're both free to mess around. We keep up appearances and avoid making lawyers richer. We still have sex, and in some ways it's been better than before. But the most important thing is that now I'm part of something that a traditional marriage could never be. Something better."

"And it involves other lovers?"

"Not repeat lovers, but I've had casual sex with other people."

"People? Not just men?"

Kyra seemed a little anxious, like she was afraid of how I would react to what she was about to tell me.

"Two of them were women. Does that... bother you?"

"No. I'm open minded. I guess I'm a little surprised. You were always so boy-crazy in college." I tried to hide my excitement at learning that she had sex with women. She was the only woman that I had ever had sexual feelings for.

"Well, I wanted to find out if I was missing anything. There was always this one woman that I've wanted to go further with, but she was unavailable.

Was? My hopes soared as I dared to believe that she meant me?

"Was this other woman a... was she into women?"

"It didn't seem so. She never seemed interested in me in that way. And like you said, I was always boy crazy so I probably didn't seem interested in her either."

I suddenly noticed how much closer we were as we talked. We were leaning toward each other, our faces just about two feet apart. She was tickling the edge of my personal space.

"Well, maybe she was interested in you, too. But just too shy, confused, worried about the consequences, and whatever. Maybe she wouldn't be so... concerned now."

"I'd like to think that was the case." She set her drink down on the table beside the couch and when she turned back toward me, she was even closer. "I'd like to think that we could be more for each other than we've ever been."

I was watching her lips as those words came from her mouth and I wanted them. I looked up into her eyes and saw what I wanted to see, desire, passion, promise, hope, and an invitation. I knew that just one more thing was all that would be required to bring her to me. I didn't have the courage to cross that gap between us. It simply wasn't me. But I did find the courage to say, "That would be wonderful."

Kyra crossed the gap. She was always the brave one. I met her with anticipation on the other side of that short but oh-so-risky leap of faith. Our lips met. So soft. So warm. Her tongue came from between hers and touched my upper lip. My lips parted and let it in, where my tongue met it and connected our desires together. There was no turning back now. I had confirmed my desire for her and our kiss became mutual. I didn't want it to end. Our lips talked to each other without words. Our tongues spoke truths without shaping sounds. She leaned forward and I let her wedge me into the corner of the sofa. She pushed and I submitted, just the way I wanted it to be. But of course, the kiss had to end sometime.

"I have wanted us to do that for so long, Cath." she said as she pulled her face away from mine.

"I wish we had done it so long ago, Kyra."

"No, that would not have been good. There is a right time for such things and that was the right time for that."

"I suppose you're right. It was perfect."

"And now is the right time for this." She pushed open my bathrobe, leaned down, and sucked my nipple greedily into her mouth.

"Ah! God that feels incredible. Please don't stop."

"I have no intention of stopping until you push me away. I'm so glad we both want this."

"Less talking, Kyra. More of... whatever this is."

Her mouth moved to my other nipple and sucked it in. I felt the backs of her fingernails slowly slide down my belly past my navel. When they reached my newly smooth mound, a shock wave of pleasure rippled through me. I spread my thighs apart as the backs of three fingers continued down with one on each side of my slit and one down the middle. I felt the coolness of air contact as my curtains slipped open. She reversed her fingers and now the tip of her middle finger slipped in between my pussy lips.

"So wet," she said.

"Shhhhh! Don't tell my husband," I quipped.

"It'll be our secret." She returned her mouth to my happy nipple.

I felt her finger dip into my honey hole and then come up to circle my waiting clit. "Ah! God, Ky, that feels good."

She dropped her knees to the floor, positioned herself between my knees, and started kissing and licking down my inner thighs. When her tongue entered my slit, the unnamed tension that had permeated me since discovering my husband's betrayal evaporated. I was desired. I had a future filled with possibility and promise. The one other adult who mattered most to me was draining the hurt from my life and replacing it with joy and lust for life. My hands went to my nipples and increased my pleasure. Each probe of her tongue and each thrust of her fingers brought me closer and closer until the cliff went beneath and I found myself freefalling into the semi-consciousness of blissful orgasmic release.

Her tongue relentlessly pursued every iota of satisfaction that it could coax from me until, finally, I could take no more and I pushed her face away, "Oh, God! Kyra, thank you, thank you, thank you."

"It was an honor, Cath."

"An honor?"

"Yes, and a pleasure. Those sounds you made were very erotic. I loved hearing them."

I snorted, but I was still confused. "Why an honor?"

"Well, I'm honored that you called me and I'm honored that you came here with me and I'm going to guess here, but am I your first woman lover?"

The word 'lover' actually stunned me for a second. Wow, how far I have come from the devout Catholic girl who first met Kyra 20 years earlier.

"Um, yes Ky. I've never wanted another woman, but I've wanted this for so long. Now I want to do it for you."

"Thank you Catch, but let's not rush that."

"You don't want me like that?"

"Oh sweetie, I very much do, but I just got myself off with my hand while I was doing you. And besides, at the end of this little vacation, I'm going to ask so much more from you."

"More? What is this about, Kyra?"

"I can't tell you just yet. There's so much preliminary ground we have to cover. It's pretty big."

"Can't you give me a hint?"

"Hmmm, a hint. Okay, I'm going to ask you to help us save the world."