MB Saucy Side: Love in the Time of Pet Ownership (Kenna Version) (Patreon)

Kenna’s backyard is enclosed by high trees that block off the view from other houses. Still, kissing her outside feels exposed. Especially since neither of you are wearing clothes.

Neither of you had intended to sunbathe nude. Both you and Kenna had been very decently dressed in swimsuits at first, Kenna holding a bottle of hypoallergenic oatmeal shampoo and a brush, and you carrying pile of clean towels. Giving Annie and Cass baths in the blow-up pool was always easier than doing it inside with slippery tiles, and the shih tzus preferred to sundry rather than be subjected to the hairdryer (which ranked only below the vacuum cleaner and Glitch’s orange high tops on the dogs’ list of mortal enemies).

The point is that today had started off very innocently. It simply hadn’t ended that way.

Your girlfriend’s lips break away from where she’d been trailing down your neck, and she sprawls back in the hammock to catch her breath, staring at you with a smug half-smile that is part prideful ownership and part devoted awe. You stare at her form appreciatively in return, until your gaze flickers to your bathing suit floating in the kiddie pool’s soapy water. Kenna’s is nowhere in sight. You’ll need to locate them before neighbor’s kid comes over to trim the grass tomorrow—you really don’t want to explain to Ms. Langley why her son’s push mower got jammed by string bikini top.

Kenna stretches, and your attention is once again captivated by the way her taunt muscles ripple at the movement. You’ll always admire her looks, but by now the sight is so familiar and your relationship so comfortable that your mind wanders to the matter of sunscreen. It’s a good thing the hammock you’re both lying on is beneath a shaded tree, otherwise Kenna’s skin would’ve already become redder than a blushing lobster. As it is, only a few bluish marks mar her paleness, mementos marking the places where your lips had lingered a little overzealously: the nape of her neck, next to her naval, upon her thighs.

“We should give the dogs baths more often,” your girlfriend muses with a satisfied grin.

“At least the girls got clean, given that we were so . . .” You lean in close, lowering your voice to a husky whisper. “. . . Dirty.”

Kenna groans, but there’s an amused gleam in her gray eyes at your horrible-but-in-an-amazing-way pun.

Your tongue teasingly flicks the shell of her ear, and her amusement darkens to desire. Her hand wraps around the back of your head, dragging you towards her lips.

“Should we go shower?” she asks against your mouth.

You wordlessly wrap your arms around her neck. You can look for her bikini later.

Kenna rises as if to drag you back inside. Then she freezes, abruptly releasing you so that you tumble back onto the hammock. The net sways beneath the suddenness of your weight, twisting to the side and causing you to land ungracefully on the grass.

You throw Kenna an affronted look, but she doesn’t notice. Her eyes dart around the yard, her expression growing increasingly panicked.

“Where are the dogs?” she asks.

You scan the yard for Annie and Cass. Before you and Kenna became . . . distracted, the dogs had been snoozing on the deck while they dried off from their bath. Now, they’re nowhere in sight.

“Annie, Cass!” you call out as Kenna bends over to check beneath the patio. Normally, you’d enjoy witnessing your nude girlfriend in such a position, but right now you’re too worried to enjoy the view.

The dogs don’t respond to your summons.

“They didn’t crawl under the deck,” Kenna says, straightening back up. “Maybe we left the gate open?” Her face is even paler than usual, and she sprints around the patio and towards the gate before you can stop her.

Oh, no.

You’re not sure whether Kenna realizes that she’s still naked, nor that she would particularly care if anyone saw her. This is, after all, the woman who considered opening the front door in a too-small towel to be an acceptable social behavior. But the backyard gate connects to the front yard, and the front yard lacks the tree barrier. If Kenna steps out there . . .

Well, you’ll no longer have to worry about Kenna’s swimsuit ruining Langley Junior’s lawnmower, because Ms. Langley will probably forbid the kid from ever working for you and Kenna again. No one wants their thirteen-year-old exposed to a jogging nudist.

Because when sprinting off like Kenna was just doing? Things swing.

Suffice to say that Kenna is probably on the verge of breaking at least two dozen neighborhood HOA rules. Especially if Annie and Cass escaped from the front yard like they did last week; the last thing you need is your girlfriend running down the street like the empress flaunting her new clothes. Even if said empress is extremely fit and hot.

You grab your swimsuit from the pool, pulling it on as quickly as possible (which isn’t very quickly given that it’s still wet). There must be at least one divine power who’s merciful to accidental exhibitionists, so you send up a quick prayer that the neighbors currently have their blinds drawn to ward off the midday sun. You’d always planned on hosting a block party after you’d moved in with Kenna, but this isn’t the best way to issue invitations.

There’s no time to locate Kenna’s swimsuit, so you snatch one of the towels used to try off the dogs before racing off after her.

Sure enough, the gate connecting the back yard with the front is wide open. One of you must’ve forgotten to latch it after taking the dogs for a walk; Annie long ago learned to nose open doors unless they were fully closed. It was probably Kenna. She still has trouble remembering to shut the gate all the way, as it was only installed after you revealed that her pets’ predilection of barking at every innocent passerby like aggressive hecklers at a comedy show made people think that she was an abusive dog owner. Yes, the dogs were the reason you two first met (and probably integral to you falling in love), but you’d rather not deal with a well-meaning pedestrian calling animal control.

You discover your girlfriend in the front yard. She’s standing with one hand on her hip, the other waggling a disapproving finger at two shih tzus whose tongues loll out the sides of the mouths who gaze up at her adoringly, completely oblivious to the fact that they’re being chastised.

Kenna’s expression is stern. Her body is . . . still naked.

You toss the towel at her head. She grabs it before it hits, and for a moment only stares at it cluelessly. Then she looks down at herself.

“Oh,” she says.

Oh, indeed.

The dog towel is too small to wrap around her waist, so Kenna holds it in front a skimpy shield as she backs toward you and the gate. Annie and Cass follow, still blissfully unaware that their unplanned excursion almost caused their owner to almost get arrested for public indecency.

You wait a moment before following Kenna and the dogs into the backyard, squinting to check all the neighboring houses. Thankfully, no one seems to have noticed your girlfriend in all her glory. You two are safe. More importantly, the dogs are safe.

You heave a sigh of relief and join Kenna in the backyard, this time making sure to latch the gate all the way closed.

“Sorry,” Kenna says, though she doesn’t sound particularly apologetic. “I didn’t know whether the front gate was closed. If they’d escaped during rush hour . . .”  She trails off, her face twisting with pain that causes you to feel a momentary twinge of guilt over the fact you once briefly considered having Sally fake a vision over a similar situation. To win a stupid school assignment, of all things.

God, you had messed up priorities back then.

You wrap your arms around Kenna. “It’s fine,” you say soothingly. “The girls are okay. Plus, no one saw—"

Hey, Button? Nick’s voice interrupts your reassurance to Kenna. Your brother sounds amused, which never bodes well.

Maybe my eyes were playing tricks, Nick continues. But I was just driving home, and I’m pretty sure that I saw more of your girlfriend than I ever wanted to see. Maybe you two can keep your games limited to the bedroom from now on?

You gently kiss Kenna’s lips. “I love you,” you tell her. “Also, we need to move.”