5 Objection! Erection! Confession!

Franziska Von Edgeworth, Maya Fey Wright,
Maggey Gumshoe, Adrian Andrews, and Ema Skye
The Ball Room, Los Angeles

The Kurain Master fidgeted with her empty glass, still mulling over the somewhat ironic fact that while Franziska had essentially commanded the others to regale and entertain her with the lurid details of their private lives with their partners, the German woman was notoriously tight-lipped with sharing such details herself! Maya would know! She’d tried – just a fortnight ago!

The results had been embarrassingly painful…

Two weeks ago…

Phoenix Wright and Maya Fey Wright
Miles Edgeworth and Franziska Von Edgeworth
Edgeworth’s Penthouse, Los Angeles

“It’s painfully embarrassing that whenever you two foolish fools get together, it is nigh impossible to decipher either of you from the children! Now both of you, shut your foolish mouths post-haste!” Franziska brandished her whip threateningly at the two sullen lawyers.

“Yeah, and act your ages, not those of our kids!” Maya admonished, waving her finger at both their husbands. “Neither of us want to hear a peep out of either one of you until you learn to play nice! Five minutes of silence, as of now!”

“He started it,” Edgeworth muttered petulantly, then buried his head in his newspaper when Franziska shot him a look that could have rendered him plant food!

It was after dinnertime. The butler had retired downstairs to his place a few floors down for the evening, and Edgeworth was in his armchair, looking over the challenging New York Times crossword puzzle, the answers which he’d confidently boasted to his childhood chum he was going to input with ink rather than a pencil! (Thoroughly unimpressed, his courtroom rival had merely smirked in response and called the prosecutor a Poindexter Show-Off.)

At his end, Phoenix was struggling, for the umpteenth time, to successfully figure out how to change his Dumb Phone ringtone from the Steel Samurai theme song!  Maya still refused to help him with that, as she insisted the nearly 20-year-old theme as caller-ID was “nostalgic.” (Edgeworth had inserted that it was actually “dated and annoying.” Phoenix had retorted that Edgeworth’s face was “dated and annoying!”)

Hence, the two wives had had to make an objection and give the two 42-going on-5-year-old men a five-minute “time-out!”

Ergo, the living room, and the entire condominium, was presently filled with rare, peaceful silence. The twins and Mia were quietly watching some kid’s TV show on Nickelodeon in Gregory’s bedroom, and Ace was currently napping in Mila’s room.

“Would anyone like to have some coffee and cake?” Franziska offered her guests. “Hendricks made your favorite, Liebling, black forest cake.”

“Sounds good, meine Dame,” Edgeworth murmured, furrowing his brow at a particularly mind-bending clue in his puzzle.

“Sure, thanks Franziska,” Phoenix nodded and resumed his mind-bending task of figuring out his ringtones.

“I’ll come help serve,” Maya offered, rising from the sofa and following her friend into the kitchen.

The women seemed to have forgotten that the highly sensitive, top-of-the-line, two-way audio receiver of Ace’s baby monitor, the other which was in Mila’s room, was perched on the dining room table, which was directly in between both the kitchen and living room.

Both men looked up with a start as they heard Phoenix’s wife, loud and clear from the other room.

“Hey, Franziska, can I ask you something?” Maya began awkwardly. “Sorry, it’s sort of personal…”

“Don’t be foolish Maya,” Franziska answered. “We’ve been friends for nearly 20 years! Our husbands are the godfathers of each of our children! There should be no barriers between us!”

“Hmmm, maybe we should turn off that monitor till they return to give them some privacy,” Phoenix ventured noncommittedly as he frowned at his phone. “You know, give them some privacy?”

“It’s fine, Wright,” Edgeworth dismissed absently while tapping his Mont Blanc fountain pen against his chin. “I’m not paying much attention, are you?”

“Nah, not really.”

“Nick has been begging me to go to 5th base but he’s a bit too…above average and I’m kind of apprehensive!” Maya blurted out. “Franny, have you and Miles ever tried it?”

Edgeworth’s pen froze in mid-air, and Phoenix felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise, just as Franziska let out an affronted gasp.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You know…” Maya’s voice trailed off in embarrassment as she mumbled. “Backdoor?”

There was the unmistakable sound of a china cup suddenly shattering on the kitchen floor, followed by the sounds of a gratuitous steady stream of German curse words from Franziska in response.

“Gah!” Phoenix jumped up off the sofa. “I’m going to turn that blasted thing off this instant!”

Without even looking up from the paper, Edgeworth grabbed his friend’s arm, effectively halting him.

“Touch that thing, Wright and I’ll break your hand!”

“You know…” Maya clarified unnecessarily. “When things that normally enter via the front door, ah, decide to take a different entrance passage…hey! You said I could ask you anything, so you can stop giving me that death glare already!”

“Ngh! How dare you insinuate something so inappropriate and foolish, you shameless fool!” Franziska snapped. “Don’t you know I am a respectable married mother and not that kind of Schlampe?!” 

“Well, I wasn’t trying to offend you by insinuating you may know from personal experience!” Maya wailed elegiacally. “But you’re supposed to be the über sophisticated European one…would you happen to know what’s normal for couples…perchance? I mean, it kind of makes me afraid, as Nick is well, how do I say this…quite a bit more than ‘normal’…?”

“Just…kill me…now…” Phoenix groaned and took his free hand, which wasn’t currently imprisoned by the prosecutor’s iron-grip, and clapped it against his face, which was an identical shade to Edgeworth’s suit.

“Maya Fey-Wright, if you don’t immediately cease sullying my poor ears with this…overshared, nasty information I could have easily gone another century without hearing, I swear I shall make my whip speak for me!”

“Well fine! You go and be all uptight and puritan then!  I was hoping that being married the longer of us two, you could actually be relied upon for valuable advice!” Maya retorted. “And the only reason I thought I could ask you about this was that last month, at Adrian’s engagement party, you downed a few glasses of wine and confessed that Miles seems to suffer from the same “horse-sized problem” that Nick does…”

Edgeworth let out a slight moan and slid down slightly in his chair.

“Objection!” Franziska shouted furiously. “How dare you bring that up! Drunken antics and confessions are completely inadmissible, don’t you know anything!?”

“For Pete’s sake, we aren’t in a court of law, Franziska! Ouch! My arm!”

There was the unmistakable crack of leather against flesh.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

“Ow! My other arm! I’m sorry that my embarrassing reminder of your husband being as well-hung as mine –  incidentally, which most women would deem as bragging rights, by the way! – brings you such outraged indignation, Mother Theresa! Yow! OK, you’ve made your point, Franny! Enough already! Please!”

Phoenix flopped back down onto the sofa and buried his burning face in his hands, then peeked at Edgeworth through his fingers. “Um, shouldn’t we be doing something?”

“Wright, I wish to live to see next week’s crossword puzzle! If you wish to live long enough to figure out your bloody phone or see your daughter learn to tie her shoelaces – my bet would be on the latter being the sooner and more likely to occur – I suggest you make like a seafood buffet and clam up!” Edgeworth raised his newspaper higher to further cover his equally fiery cheeks.

“B-But my dear wife just got whiplashed by your not-so-dear wife!”

“Dammit, Wright! Never meddle in female discussions if you know what’s good for you!” Edgeworth glared at him over the tops of his glasses. “Not unless your imbecilic self is actively soliciting a boot to the head!”

Present Day…

Franziska Von-Edgeworth, Maya Fey-Wright,
Maggey Gumshoe, Adrian Andrews, and Ema Skye
The Ball Room, Los Angeles

A boot to the head would still be more welcome than this sudden graveyard gathering, Maya decided, sighing soundlessly. I’d be all for it, too, if I thought it’d kick-start the life back into the otherwise mort mood of everyone here at this damn table!

To distract herself from these dismal thoughts, the Kurain Master looked up to see what was going up on the stage, which was a prime example of a pure, unadulterated balls-to-the-wall, nail-biting raunch-fest!

Presently, there was quite a lot of sweaty grinding, mild frontal groping, and a metric shit-ton of bare ass-grabbing! There were men in the crowd at the same time as the women onstage – where on earth had they come from?! Maya’s jaw dropped as she witnessed a girl from the wild bachelorette table next door, laying on the stage, entirely covered by a hunk, only one spare arm sticking out, pulling him even closer! The bride herself looked like she was getting electrocuted during her lap dance, as if they were to touch two bare parts of their body together it would trip a wire!

Well, at least some folks were kicking up their heels and having a good time!

“God bless her,” Maya declared, breaking the silence and giving a mock salute with her drained juice glass.

“There is nothing Godly about this!” Franziska snapped. “It is utterly devoid of any redemptive qualities and serves only to titillate the prurient interests!”

“Some women just really get off on places like this,” Adrian shrugged. “Who are we to judge? Us, who have front row seats here practically in pervert’s row!”

“We are not in pervert’s row! That would be if we were in those happily-occupied direct chairs right in front of the stage!” Maggey defended. “It just so happens that we had to take this table…right next to the stage because it was the only one available when we got here!”

“Am I the only one who finds these places more amusing than arousing?” Ema drawled, flagging down a waiter and placing another drink order for a Kinky Blow Pop. “I mean you’ve seen one dong, you’ve seen them all, right? You kind of get immune after a while.”

“I still think a man’s Glied should not be for public viewing and one special person’s private viewing pleasure only!” Franziska grabbed her newly replaced Popped Cherry cocktail and tossed back half of it in one gulp, gasping as it seared a burning path down her throat. “How would any of you feel, knowing another woman has been aware of the details of your partner’s …parts?”

“Well, at Adrian and Simon’s engagement party, you knocked back a few too many and gave us some serious TMI on Miles’ said parts!” Maggey sniggered, too drunk to notice the infuriated blush spreading across Franziska’s face at the reminder.

“Yeah, you may as well have drawn us a picture!” Ema chimed in, clapping a hand over her mouth to smother her own giggles. “What was it you called him? Seabiscuit?”

“Cut it out, Ema!” Franziska growled, cheeks further reddening, but her eyes dropped to the table. “I was drinking that evening and can’t possibly recall every foolish thing I said!”

“I thought it was Mr. Ed?” Maggey was wiping the tears of mirth from her eyes. “Or would you prefer if I’d say Herr Ed, instead?”

“I was not in the right sorts from the copious amounts of vintage wine Klavier insisted on bringing from our native land to the party, so I shouldn’t be held accountable for that night!”

“Come on, Franny!” Adrian joked. “This isn’t a courtroom! Drunk or sober, anything epically hilarious that you overshare indeed can and will be used to tease you mercilessly amongst your friends!”

“Stop it!” Franziska cried plaintively, angry tears now forming in her eyes as looked at her friends. “Please!”

Maya looked with concern at the birthday girl, noting that she no longer seemed angry, just genuinely distressed, and discomfited by the relentless ribbing.

“Guys, come on, knock it off!” The Master ordered, using her best authoritative Mommy voice and shooting a warning look at their friends. “Can’t you guys see if she’s not kidding here?”

Maya then turned to the distraught German woman and gently placed a hand on her arm.

“Franziska, please don’t be so upset, they were only teasing,” she urged softly, noticing her friend was actually starting to sniffle. “We can’t have another birthday where the guest of honor is crying at her own party!  Otherwise, I’m going to feel like this is a time machine warp and we’re in a part-two redo of 14 years ago, circa my 21st shindig at The Borscht Bowl Club!”

Franziska reluctantly exhibited a watery smile, but when she looked up at Maya again, her beautiful gray orbs were still glistening.

“Oh no!” Ema gasped in dismay as she saw the unshed tears sparkling in the former prosecutor’s eyes. “Franny, please forgive us!”

“We didn’t mean it!” Maggey wailed, sounding near tears herself now. “We’re so sorry!” 

“Oh, honey! Please don’t cry!” Adrian begged. “We totally suck and stuff! You have full permission to punish us to the maximum in any way you see fit! I decree that you give us each 1000 lashes!”

Speak for yourself, woman! Maya thought grimly. As much as your kinky self may very well deserve– and possibly enjoy! – Such retribution, let the record show that I didn’t partake in this razzing at all! Also, I’ve already paid my dues with that whip, thankyouverymuch!

“I know I am being a foolish fool,” Franziska admitted, dabbing at her eyes with the napkin Maya handed her. “But I cannot desist from feeling like I have breached a most sacred trust with my husband! As though I have sullied the sanctity of my marriage by revealing something so revealingly private about my Miles’ privates, by unwittingly…exposing such privy details, and in such an unseemly manner!”

“Hey, you had no problem trying to make us confess details of our love lives!” Ema protested.

“That’s the worst part! While I’ve always attempted complete discretion in my personal affairs, due to my upbringing, I know how you American girls just love to share – sometimes even overshare! – And I have done my best to keep up with them when in Rome antics!” Franziska looked beyond miserable. “Despite being gun-shy myself, I very much still wish to be kept abreast in the ongoings of my dearest friends! If sharing is caring, then so be it, and let it be how we maintain our female bonds, despite us all now being partnered up and/or having children!”

“Oh, Franny…” Adrian soothed, reaching across the table and patting her best friend’s hand. “And of course we’ll all still be close, marriage and children shouldn’t have to change that. There’s no need to beat yourself up like this! It’s alright…we understand.”

“I don’t think you do! I know it seems hypocritical of me, and it’s most unintentional. Yet I can’t help the way I was raised and having old-fashioned values! Miles is my husband, the father of my children, not just some random man I had…one-time relations with! My father always said a lady was not to speak of such personal matters, like a common strumpet, and should honor her husband, and have more respect than to air out details that only a wife should know!” Franziska buried her burning face in her hands. “That’s why I’m so ashamed! I cannot imagine Papa’s reaction if he were still alive and had heard me then! Heaven forbid if Miles had heard me …what would he think of me!”

Oh, man! Maya thought sympathetically, patting Franziska’s shoulder. It always comes back to old Manfred Von Karma, doesn’t it? That diabolical fiend seriously did a number on her, didn’t he? The poor woman has more demons in her closet than Beelzebub!

“Let me get this straight,” Adrian began slowly. “You think your husband, who has loved you for nearly twenty years, would suddenly think his wife and mother of his children is no better than some common doxy, merely because one time, you were celebrating a little bit too much with your best friends, and revealed he was Long Dong Silver?!”

“Of course not!” Maggey insisted. “Miles may be a little mortified initially that the secret of his oversized trouser snake became known at first, but Mr. Stuffy Prosecutor is still a man! Trust me, he’d get over it eventually, and then totally be a cocky peacock over this! After all, it’s not as if you pointed out his ah…shortcomings, right? He thinks the world of you, Franny! That will never change!”

“None of us should be judged as some sort of loose-moral women because we choose to share stories beyond diaper duties,” Maya said kindly. “Dishing about silly, sometimes private, things in the name of girl talk is just harmless fun between friends, Franziska. Gossiping about their husbands is how women have been bonding since the beginning of time!”

“Yeah, it’s not like you blogged about it and put up a picture!” Ema exclaimed. “Now that would be a case where sharing is scaring! However, I swear to you girl, this will be the last we mention of it, ever, we promise! And we’ll never breathe a word of it to another soul!”

Franziska flashed a grateful smile then. “Danke, fräulein. I still can’t help but feel a tad embarrassed though…”

“Would it help you feel better at all, if perhaps we,” Maya gestured to herself and the others. “As in, the rest of gal, all revealed some silly, embarrassing thing, about our partners, to you? In strictest confidence of course! Which we will all take a blood oath will never go past anyone at this table,” she added quickly.

“That’s a great idea!” Adrian chimed in. “I’m game if everyone else is!”

The others all nodded, keen to make amends.

“While this is most kind, I must admit, this is a most…unusual act of peacekeeping,” Franziska tittered, her now dry eyes bright with curiosity as she beamed then. “So, who would like to go first?”

There was a pregnant pause at the table.

Mystic Ami help me! Maya moaned to herself. Not again! There’s only so much necromancy I am capable of if this party dies another death! Time to take one for the team even if it is in absentia…Larry, Iris…please forgive me for what I’m about to do…

“This one’s from Iris,” she blurted out before she could stop herself. “But apparently, Larry cries after every orgasm! Like, full-blown bawling. Each and every time.”

There was a momentary stunned silence at the table…right before all five women simultaneously exploded with laughter.

“Hoo boy! Why does this not surprise me in the least?” Maggey gasped, taking off her glasses because she was crying tears of mirth. “That Butz always was a gigantic sissy crybaby wasn’t he?”

“More of a bawling infant than that man-baby stripper could ever be!” Adrian jibed.

“My poor cousin!” Maya guffawed. “7 years and three kids later, Iris is used to it now. But the first time they made love and it happened, she thought he’d broken something and completely panicked! How was the poor girl supposed to know he was sobbing tears of exuberant gratitude?!”

The ball was completely free-rolling now, and with more velocity and vigor than the giant boulder from the Indiana Jones movie.

“Lana told me that Jake never, ever takes off his cowboy hat,” Ema inserted. “Like, ever, even during the deed! We are talking two decades of her having to be a ride-em cowboy kinda girl for the most part!”

“Yee-haw! Give it to Grandma!” Maya howled.

“Well, am sure that Stetson makes it easier if they’re role-playing,” Maggey quipped. “Even if it does make old Jake rather type-cast!”

“He also tends to thank my sister, post giddyap, every single time!” Ema added. “Lana’s like, ‘I don’t know if I should be gratified for gratifying him, or feel like a hooker who’s done him a favor?’ As she pointed out, it’s hardly a chore, right? She kinda likes it too! Enough to give him two girls, on two separate occasions!”

“The harlot and the cowboy…sounds like makings for some amusing role play!” Franziska laughed, finally getting into the swing of things.

“Don’t even get me started on role-playing!” Adrian groaned. “Simon takes that to a whole new dimension; to the point where he wants to practice being in character before he’s ready for the Iaijutsu of his katana to wield it for action! We are talking method methodical here … he’ll bark… ‘SILENCE, Andrian-dono! THAT IS NOT YOUR LINE!’ Like,  fully costumed and written script scenarios here, ladies!”

“Well, we always knew those samurais were a disciplined lot!” Maya twittered. “I guess Simon would take things seriously in every sense, even it means acting, scripting, and directing his own love scenes so there are minimal outtakes!”

“Scenes? Try a whole skin flick! If I ever give up managing Lordly Tailor, I could be the biggest porn queen since Jemma Jameson!” Adrian sighed. “Do you know we have a hidden library collection of our various movie plots since he also insists on recording these… performances?!”

“This would be a very different kind of Steel Samurai, sword unsheathing video than the kind you and Miles so enjoyed, wouldn’t it, Maya?” Franziska giggled maniacally.

“The best part is, my Twisted Samurai ultimately isn’t that disciplined!” Adrian smirked. “No matter what role he’s playing, Simon still insists on keeping that feather in his mouth! Do you even know how much that blasted thing tickles?!”

“At least feathers are still erotic!” Maggey snickered.

“Erotic is when you use a feather!” Maya clarified, nearly doubling over. “Kinky is when you use the whole hawk!”

“Oh dear God!” Adrian dropped her head on the table, her slender shoulders shaking with laughter.

“Me next!” Ema begged. “My confession is that my former rock star, Klavier…literally sings when I offer him…lip service! However, his private concert crooning is nothing like he does on stage though! We are talking noise polluting, tone-deaf warbling, in contrast to his normally swoon-worthy serenading self! Ugh, I’m tempted to cover my ears with my hands or secretly put in earplugs, it’s so bad! Not to mention that it seriously throws off my groove with Herr Mike!”

“Herr Mike?” Franziska took a break from tittering then, her brow furrowed in confusion.

Ema shrugged sheepishly. “Herr, as in Mister Mike. Um, that’s what we named…it. Mike…as in microphone.”

“Hee!” Maggey clapped a hand over her mouth. “Once a performer, always a performer! Sounds like Klavier and Simon’s ultimate roles are playing a couple of hams!”

“Yes, am sure it’s a total shocker that my glimmerous fop busts out the flamboyant moves both in and out of the sack!” Ema grinned mischievously. “One time, to break up the monotony, I decided to surprise him by moving my mouthy ministrations to …unchartered paths! You should have heard him! Instead of ‘Achtung baby!’ he was like, ‘Ack! Tongue, Baby!’ ”

Franziska was sure her sides would split open from laughing so hard. Encouraged, Maya looked at the amused faces around her, then flushed when she realized that the four sets of inquisitive eyes were now on her.

“So…I guess I’m next.” The spirit medium’s cheeks reddened. “Well…you all know Nick is Mr. Unbreakable, right, and feels no discomfort no matter what you do to him?” Everyone nodded eagerly. “Well…the thing is, my husband is sort of into pain. Like not S & M stuff but…” she lowered her voice. “He likes it when I bite him!”

“Mein Gott!” Franziska’s eyes widened. “Did this hidden deviance become unleashed due to all those times I whipped him in court back in the day?!”

“For Chrissake, I don’t bite him there!” Maya muttered. “We’re just talking um, love bites…that sometimes leave behind some evidence beyond the typical hickey since Nick has a freakishly higher pain tolerance than most people is all…”

“Scientifically speaking, the only other kind of evidence resulting from this sort of tongue and teeth action beyond surface bruising and discoloration of the epidermis is…” Ema’s eyes grew to the size of saucers then. “Wait! You don’t mean…”

The Master nodded.  “Nick was wearing shorts one day, and they kind of rode up while he was horsing around with Ace. And our overly astute, very concerned daughter inquired about the bite marks on his inner thigh and asked how Daddy got hurt!” Maya clapped a hand over her eyes as she confessed. “He had to tell Mia Daddy had an encounter with a big, mean dog in People Park!”

“I always had you pegged as more a Chihuahua than Pitbull, Maya!” Maggey teased.

“Very funny!” Maya crossed her arms and stared at the former Goddess of Misfortune. “I do believe it’s your turn with the scandal talking stick, Madam. So tell us, does Gumshoe do anything … weird?”

Maggey turned crimson and downed the remains of her drink in one swallow.

“Dick, farts.”

“WHAT?!” The other four women exclaimed in unison. “DICK FARTS?”

“After every…release.” Maggey slunk lower in her seat. “Dick gets so relaxed that he literally…has sex farts. It’s so bad that I’ve been contemplating buying a rubber hood just so I can cover my nose…”

“Ngh! Waiter!” Franziska raised her hand at the passing server. “I think I need another drink now!”

“Well, it’s pretty obvious where Jeff the fart logger gets it from!” Maya was laughing so hard she nearly fell off her chair.

“And also, every single time afterward…after he releases both gas and essence…” Maggey clapped a hand over her mouth to smother her guffaw. “He giggles.”

“On top of everything else, are you seriously telling us that the former scruffy detective giggles after…lovemaking?” Franziska echoed, her eyes dancing with merriment. “Ah…is he ticklish?”

“No!” Maggey chuckled. “Not in the least. Kind of unnerving and distracting too, let me tell you, depending on what I’m doing at the time.”

“I cannot believe you managed to conceive two kids!” Adrian shook her head.

“Neither do I!”

“Bonus one from Athena,” Ema ventured. “Even though he’s Mr. Chords of Steel in the courtroom, Apollo is pretty quiet in the bedroom. The only sounds he makes are cute little squeaks, like a happy little chipmunk!”

“Should we privately dub him Alvin, Simon, or Theodore?” Maya joked.

“Like you, Maya, he’s quite the sharp-toothed little critter indeed, and gets quite into the role!” Ema added, clapping a hand to her mouth. “He chewed a hole through her undies once – and no they weren’t the edible kind!”

“That’s one way to get yourself a free pair of crotch-less panties!” Maggey rasped, clutching her sides.

“You ladies are scandalous, silly, and sublime!” Franziska snickered, shook her head, and smiled fondly at them. “And I adore every one of you!  This has been the greatest birthday I think I’ve ever had!”

“See, Franny, sharing isn’t so bad,” Ema smiled. “It’s all good-natured fun!”

“You’re right,” Franziska agreed, taking a long sip of her new drink, hilariously named The Angry German. “Which is why I’m prompted to tell you all something wonderfully maddening about my fastidiously, fixated on cleanliness husband. Ema, do you recall last weekend how you and Klavier watched the children while Miles took me out for a romantic dinner?”

“How could I forget?” Ema rolled her eyes comically. “We’re still scrubbing the crayon marks off our walls from the little artists in training!”

“Well, after dinner, I had Miles rush us home,” Franziska confided. “I desperately yearned for one passionate night of frantic lovemaking with complete abandon; for Miles to just ravage me, there and then! Take me right in that living room, or even on the floor, because I’d hoped my sexy new lacy red bra and panties set that I was wearing under my dress would get him so worked up he wouldn’t be able to make it to the bedroom!”

“Ooh, sounds hot!” Maya leaned forward, delighted her conservative friend had at last loosened her tongue – only about a half dozen or so drinks later! “Sooo….what happened?!”

“I married the fussiest, and the fustiest man in America is what happened!” Franziska griped. “He insisted on first wiping down the couches and then getting the extra sheets from the linen closet and laying them down on the furniture before he would allow us to become joined upon them with our bare flesh!”

“At least he didn’t use any type of disinfectant on you both beforehand, right?” Adrian hooted.

“No, he did not.” Franziska’s lips twitched into a wry smile. “Although we were together six months before I raised an objection to his incessant need to immediately go wash his nether regions immediately post-copulation!”

“Bwah-ha-ha-ha!” Ema was howling. “Does Miles not know that unless sex is dirty, he’s not doing it right?”

“If you want clean, that’s what showers are for!” Maggey added.

“Oh, we had that!” A dreamy smile crossed Franziska’s face at the memory. “That was right after the sofa…but before I said to hell with the sheets and made him take me right on the rug in front of the fireplace. Maya, why do you think he was wearing long pants tonight? To hide the rug burn battle wounds on his knees, of course!”

“You go, girl! Show him how it’s done!” Maya gave her friend a high five. “Cleanliness and finicky semantics be damned!”

“Well Maya, I suppose you and Phoenix are the reason he was so neurotic about our bare flesh on those prized Italian leather couches of his!”

Maya’s face flamed. She knew where this was going.

“It’s their fault?” Ema asked, perplexed. “How so?”

“Oh, from the time we loaned them our condo as their private love shack!” Franziska smirked as Maya moaned in mortification and slunk down in her seat. “Hendricks told me it took him nearly three months to get those sweaty, oily butt prints buffed out of the cushions!”

“Just…kill…me…now…” Maya honestly wondered if it was possible to die from humiliation as her friends all nearly went into cardiac arrest around her. She scowled, hoping they’d laugh so hard they’d wet their pants!

Luckily, she was spared further ribbing as the MC then announced the next dancer on stage.

“Ladies…give it up for Zorro!”

A handsome, tanned Hispanic man came out then, complete with the mask and cape and a rose in his teeth, which, while he whipped off his hat and threw it aside, he tossed right at the completely enthralled looking Maggey and then continued his striptease to some pulsating Latin beats.

“Oh, come to mama…” she breathed, her alcohol-glazed-over eyes glowing behind her glasses.

“Come now, don’t tell me you somehow find this arousing?” Franziska scorned, gesturing to the women who were already on the stage, bumping and grinding with the stripper as he shook his admittedly ridiculous-looking sequined thong booty at them. “Surely, Maggey you have more class than to be flaunting your body and dirty dancing like  the rest of those disgraceful shameless hussies up there?!”

“Hey, I thought you’d agreed to loosen up a bit after that last confession session, birthday girl?” Adrian joked.

“Yes, looser with my lips, and only amongst meine damen, not with my hips, like some miststück in heat!” Franziska crossed her arms. “Also, you shan’t see me putting money down a man’s pants! It’s dirty, it’s immoral, it’s degrading…”

Suddenly, Zorro jumped off from the stage and whipped off his sequined thong, revealing an even teeny-tinier underwear underneath – which could only be described as a C-string! He came right up to Maggey and rubbed the discarded glittery loincloth over the top of her hair, then proceeded to grind his pelvis against the back of her head. Her eyes widened in shock and fear.

Maggey began to look more and more uncomfortable as the dancer spun her around in her seat and then proceeded to wave his crotch against her face, taking her stiff hands and putting them over his glistening pecs and bare ass. Obviously, she’d been content to look, but had no desire to touch! And the dancer was relentless, grabbing her by the waist and doing some kind of slithery dancing move up and down the front of her body while she unsuccessfully tried to shimmy free, but to no avail. It was like dancing with an eel. She looked desperately at her friends for rescue.

“Shouldn’t we do something?” Maya asked awkwardly, noting the “help me!” Maggey was mouthing at them but not knowing what to do.

“I dunno, she did say ‘come to Mama’…” Adrian shrugged helplessly. “Maybe he heard her?”

“Well, regardless, if she isn’t keen, she shouldn’t have to be bullied by some filthy brute!” Franziska declared in annoyance. “Besides, she’s a respectable married woman! Hey!” She shouted as loudly as she could over the loud music. “Hey, Zorro! Alto! Déjala! ¡Ándale! Ella es una mujer casada!”

Zorro looked at Franziska, now standing up at their table with her hands on her hips, a frown of disapproval on her face then shrugged and went back to grinding on Maggey, who was looking beyond overwhelmed and trapped.

“I don’t think he cares she’s a married woman, Franziska,” Ema noted. “And he seems to have no intention of stopping!”

Zorro grabbed Maggey’s resisting hand and placed it on his bulging arousal, ignoring her yelp of indignation.

That did it!

“Well, it’s obvious she’s not interested and the fool insists on hanging around like a bad smell! He must learn some manners!” Franziska yelled, and raced up to the bachelorette table next to theirs, grabbing the giant, inflatable penis they had in the corner. Without preamble, she picked it up like a baseball bat and commenced hitting Zorro over the head with it!

“Ay Caramba!” Zorro yelled, loosening his grip on Maggey and putting his hands protectively over his head. “Gringa loca!”

“Good Lord, what was in that last drink she had?” Maya’s eyes were wide with shock…and a hint of admiration.

“I thought I’d ordered her an Angry German!” Ema snorted as Zorro continued to yelp like a wounded Chihuahua. “But maybe it was a Screaming Nazi?”

The incensed Franziska was still whacking the dancer about his head and shoulders with the gigantic, phallic-shaped object, with poor Zorro all the while squealing: “señora lo siento! Alto! Por Favor!”

She wasn’t hitting him hard enough to hurt him, obviously – it was, after all, an inflatable penis–but insistently. The look of real fear on Zorro’s face as he was running away from her was something the sniggering women would never forget. Even the newly freed Maggey had gotten over her trauma long enough to snap some memorable photos of the dancer fleeing the scene with her cell phone camera!

The crowd was rooting for Franziska. Maybe the patrons thought it was part of the act, or perhaps too drunk to care, or just had a thing for improv slapstick feminist comedy, but they burst into loud applause when the panting German woman, at last, ceased with the novelty item, tossed it back to the bridesmaids at the next table, and took a bow.

Eager to move on, the MC announced the next dancer hastily, who was named Magic Ike, and amid the swooning sound of Celine Dion’s “The Power of Love,” the newest dancer came out.

Franziska spun around to face the stage as she heard her wedding dance song and watched as though mesmerized,  as the suave, debonair man in a black tuxedo, white shirt unbuttoned to the navel to show off a sculpted, tanned chest locked eyes with her.

The German woman’s eyes blinked rapidly as her appreciative gaze remained transfixed on the dark-haired man, whose smoldering eyes and long dark bangs made Maya reminiscent of a younger Miles Edgeworth.

Apparently, she wasn’t the only one to think so.

The ladies all watched as Franziska melted into a pile of quivering, titillated, aroused goo right before their eyes.

Magic Ike smiled mysteriously at the striking woman as he leaned down from the stage, still fully dressed, and offered Franziska one white-gloved hand. She took it without blinking, as though in a trance, and before Maya, Adrian, Ema, and Maggey’s stunned eyes, allowed the handsome man to pull her not only on stage but begin a graceful, spell-binding dance with her. He held her hand in his, a muscled arm around her back, as he fluidly moved into a smooth waltz with her.

Franziska was a flawless dancer, and matched his moves expertly, completely under the spell of her partner. Then, as the music suddenly changed to a faster beat, she matched his lead perfectly as he changed the movements to a tango, spinning her away,  then grabbing her whip from its holster and expertly using it to wrap around her and pull her right back into his strong arms! Breathing heavily against her collarbone, the dancer, who appeared to be panting as heavily as the woman he held, bent Franziska back into a graceful dip.

Although both man and woman were fully clothed and doing nothing more than dancing, it was the most sensual, erotic performance anyone in that club had seen that night. There wasn’t a woman in that club who didn’t wish they were in Franziska’s place, including each of her friends!

“Damn what I’d give to be Franny right now!” Adrian gaped. “I’m feeling a little jealous of my bestie right now!”

“OK, am I the only one who’s kind of jealous of Miles?” Maggey breathed. “That woman has moves unlike any I’ve ever seen!”

The music changed again, and so did the dance. To the loud beats of Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me,” Magic Ike effortlessly lifted Franziska and wrapped her legs around his waist so she was essentially frontal riding him now! She pressed her lithe body against him, before expertly arching herself backward,  hands nearly trailing overhead and behind her on the stage, with eyes closed blissfully as he moved rhythmically with her and grazed his nose from her cleavage to the top of her throat.

The picturesque poetry in motion image was shattered in the next moment as the birthday girl suddenly shot herself right back up, locked her legs even tighter around the stripper’s waist, and then, the most prudish, moralist, uptight German woman on earth belted out a loud, unmistakable, “Yee-Haw! Give it to Franziska!”

Maya nearly choked on her drink in shock.

Maggey’s jaw fell to the floor.

Adrian smirked and looked over her shoulder at Ema.

“Girl, please tell me you’re getting all this delicious future blackmail material?!”

The forensic scientist winked, her hand never once wavering from the video record mode on her iPhone.

“Waaay ahead of you!”