THE RULE OF THREE: A.C.H.E., MOTO, and TRINITY

by Never , M.

  I turn the corner in the stairwell once I reach my floor, and when I see Tage leaning against my front door, all the happy fluttering in my stomach turns to sinking stones.

  Fucker. This is the very last thing I need.

  I haven’t heard a peep from Tage since he invited himself to lunch. I could have stabbed him in the ear with a knife for the way he was acting. I don’t know what gets into him sometimes. He’s been an enigma since the moment I met him. He’s impossible to read, moody, standoffish, and totally secretive. The only time he was ever open with me was when I was locked away in my tower like fucking Rapunzel. That was the only time he ever felt real. The circumstances were royally fucked up, but nothing in my life had ever felt more palpable. More tangible. I trusted him with everything I had, and he turned on me the first chance he got. I hated him for years. I still sort of hate him. As much as I wish he would just disappear for good, he made it crystal clear that would never happen. Not while there was still breath left in his lungs. His words. What I don’t get is why? I’m stable, living on my own, have a job, an apartment, and an income. He did help with a few of those things, but I’m driving solely on my own now, so what the fuck gives?

  Cut the damn cord already and let me live my fucking life. Maybe he’s the reason I’ve had such a hard time moving forward because he is the anchor to my past. He’s the part I didn’t want to let go of. He hindered me from discovering who I am, from flourishing into adulthood because the child inside me ached for him.

  He broke my fucking heart, and in the same instance my fucking soul.

  But I’ve been piecing it back together, little by little, year after year, and I finally feel like somewhat of a whole woman. Yes, a woman. No longer a girl. No longer a child. A woman who is standing her ground and making her mark. A woman who is no longer going to ache for a man who doesn’t want her. Who made his choice.

  The time has finally come for me to make mine.

  “Houdini makes yet another appearance.” I agitatedly pull my keys out to open the door.

  Tage stands next to me silently, his head down, body language tense, blond, wavy hair long and wild. I insert the key and just as the lock clicks, he shoots his arm out to stop me from entering my apartment.

  I stop short, irritated as hell. “What is your problem?”

  “Are you in love with him?” he asks straightforwardly.

  Seriously?

  “What if I am? What does it matter to you?” I bite. “It’s none of your fucking business.”

  “You are my fucking business.” He looks up, his hair falling into his hard eyes.

  “I’m not a child anymore, Tage. Just let me go. Give me peace,” my voice softens. I want to be free.

  “I can’t.”

  “Why? I’m fine. I don’t need you to watch over me anymore.”

  “Because you have Alec?” he snarks.

  I roll my eyes. “No, because I have learned to stand on my own two feet.”

  “I know you have.”

  “Then what the fuck is the problem?”

  “I can’t let go of you that easily.”

  “You let go of me years ago,” I seethe.

  “I never let go. I just did what was right. When it comes to you, I have always tried to do what was right.”

  “Well, you didn’t. You made promises you didn’t keep, you pushed me away, and you broke my fucking heart. And now you’re here trying to take my happiness, too.”

  “I would never take your happiness,” he protests. “The only thing I have ever wanted is for you to be happy.”

  “Then go away.” Tears burn my eyes.

  “I can’t.” His tone is rough.

  “Why?” I demand.

  Tage pulls out a folded piece of paper from the back of his jeans pocket and hands it to me.

  I take it warily and unfold it. I nearly choke as I look at what’s scribbled on the page.

  “Why are you doing this? Why now? After all this fucking time.” Tears stream out like a faucet from my eyes.

  “I’ve wanted to tell you. I just didn’t know how.”

  I break down right in the hallway, clutching the paper to my chest. The memories are unbearable. I wrote this note as a teenager. As a dependent child in love with a man she didn’t even know. A heart and an arrow with “you” under the arrow, “me” over the heart. “4ever”. I believed those words. I believed we’d be together forever. I was naïve. Clueless.

  “Don’t do this. Not now.” I punch the paper into his chest. “Not when—”

  My sentence is long gone under his abrupt kiss. He steals my words and breath the exact same way he did all those years ago. I fight at first, but we both know it’s no use. The feelings are there, flooding over us like a tidal wave. I cry through the soul-crushing kiss as I wrap my arms around his neck and hold on for dear life. Tage crushes me against the door, his tongue reacquainting itself with my mouth. He kisses exactly the same. Dominantly, passionately, recklessly. My emotions split right in two as I succumb.

  I have ached for him to touch me this way. I have ached to hear the sound of his voice in the dark of night, feel the warmth of his skin, experience the press of his lips. Ached for him to engulf my mind and my senses, like he once had. Ached to become lost in him, and him to become lost in me. I’ve ached to not be alone, if only for a painful moment. Because moments were all I had. All I was capable of. All I could bear.

  Until now.

  Reason is completely stripped away as Tage pushes us into my apartment. We barely make it inside before Tage is propping me up against the wall. I wrap my legs around his waist and attack his mouth as forcefully as he’s attacking mine, our hips grinding, and our breathing ragged.

  Is this really happening? A subconscious thought flits through my manic haze.

  I feel the rigid length of his cock press right up against my clit and I confirm that it is. This is really happening, and I want it to. I want it to happen so bad I may spontaneously combust.

  I don’t even remember making it into the bedroom. I just remember falling back onto the mattress. I remember Tage ripping off his clothes and then mine.

  Then there’s just us, naked, desperate, and years of lost time from the past crashing over us.

  There’s no foreplay. No warm up, no nothing. Just Tage thrusting inside me. I scream, I see stars, I claw at his back as we fuck. It’s passion elevated to another Earthly plane. It’s pent-up aggression punching through the surface and shattering the glass ceiling.

  I cry even more while he’s inside me. It’s painful and cathartic all at the same time. My body responds exactly how it did all those years ago. It aches, and throbs, and quivers. The walls of my pussy clamping down onto his cock for dear life.

  “Don’t disappear,” I plead incoherently. “Please don’t disappear.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” he promises. “You’re mine. I’m yours,” he heaves. “It’s always been that way.”

  “Oh, God.” My limbs lock up, a climax is coming, and it’s going to be soul-shattering. “Tage,” I expel. “Tage, please.” He continues to punch his hips. I continue to claw at his back.

  I can barely stand the buildup. I’m totally terrified of it.

  Then it happens. He buries himself so deep I lose myself. I lose all concept of time and space and reality.

  I come so hard I literally feel the rush of moisture saturate my inner thighs.

  It’s one big giant mess, my climax, my emotions, my life.

  Tage comes violently, his orgasm matching the intensity of mine. He roars through the moment, and I know every single thing he’s feeling.

  A dynasty has fallen. Crashed. Burned. Disintegrated. And it’s our turn to rebuild in the aftermath.

  15

  Tage

  I’m an asshole and I know it.

  I, also, don’t fucking care.

  The only thing that matters at all is that Everly is back in her rightful place—in my arms. Naked, sated, and secure agai
nst my heated body.

  She’s sleeping soundlessly, her head resting upon my bare chest.

  I run my fingers through her tangled hair, planning my thought process so I’m prepared when she wakes.

  I went about it all wrong. The whole damn thing. The time. The place. The way. I ambushed her, but I felt backed into a corner. For eight damn years, I drowned in the taste of her innocence. I dreamt about what it felt like to lay beside her. She was my glimmer in the darkness, and I wanted it all back. Her taste, her touch, her virtue, her devotion.

  She was slipping through my fingers, so I acted. There was no way in hell I was going to lose her again. Not a chance I was going to give her up again.

  I thought I was doing the right thing all those years ago. I thought setting her free would liberate us both, but all it did was bind us together in an unbearable way.

  I never wanted to condemn Everly by allowing her to love me. My situation is complicated. My life is nomadic. My career is dangerous. And my heart is split between love and risk.

  But this, right here, right now, I can’t give up. I tighten my arm around her.

  There’s a saying I once came across about the sun loving the moon so much he died every night just so she could breathe. That’s the only way I can compare the last eight years, I died every day so Everly could live. The only problem was she didn’t live. She died of heartbreak every fucking day, and it was all because of me. It was all my fault. I was a fool, but not anymore.

  I wanted better for Everly. I wanted more. More than what I thought I could offer her, but now I see, no one can offer her more because all she’s ever wanted was me. My love. So I plan to give it to her. Hand it over in spades so every day she can live and every night she can breathe.

  16

  Everly

  I am officially fucked up.

  I open my eyes to sunlight and the profile of a sleeping man. As I look at Tage, the events of the last night creep in like a living nightmare.

  I should feel happy. I should be ecstatic that the man I have ached for the last eight years has let me back in, but I’m not. I’m a fucking mess, because my heart is filled with love for someone else just as much as it is filled with love for Tage.

  The biggest problem with loving Tage is that it comes with strings attached. It comes with no guarantee. He has drifted in and out of my life for so long it’s hard to decipher if he’s even real. Hard to believe if his intentions are sincere. Truth be told, I don’t know the man I went to bed with last night. I only know the memory of who he was when we were together. That’s who I cling to. He looks the same, he speaks the same, he makes love the same, but is he the same? Is that person I fell madly in love with years ago still inside? Is he sleeping next to me now? There’s too many questions to ponder before coffee. Before I’m even fully awake.

  And on top of it all, there’s Alec.

  The guilt begins to eat me alive. I care about him. A lot. I know what heartbreak feels like, and I would never wish it on another human being, especially one, dare I say, I might love. Maybe I was better off alone? Maybe the universe was trying to tell me something. Solitude is safe.

  I glance at the clock. It’s nearly six-thirty. I can’t stay here, but I dread going to work. I can’t look Alec in the eyes. Not yet.

  Maybe I should just run away?

  A ridiculous solution, but appealing, nonetheless.

  I try to slide out of bed as stealthy as possible, but Tage’s arm shoots out and snatches my wrist before I make it six centimeters.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” He smiles with his eyes closed.

  “It’s Friday. Work.”

  His eyebrows crease, but his lids remain shut. “Blow it off. Spend the day in bed with me. We have a lot to catch up on.”

  For some reason, that request infuriates me. He expects me to just drop everything just because he’s graced my sheets with his presence.

  “I can’t. That’s not how adulting works.” I yank my wrist from his grasp.

  “I’m sensing some hostility.” Tage pops his eyes open, and the brown ringing his pupils illuminates in the sun.

  “What the fuck gave it away?”

  “You’re mad? Why?”

  Why? Why? We just created a monumental mess of my life. Am I supposed to be happy?

  “Ugh.” I toss the covers off and escape into the bathroom, locking the door behind me to gain some space. My apartment isn't all that big, but I’m grateful for the multiple rooms.

  I wash my face, do my business, and skip the shower. I just need to go.

  “Everly.” Tage voices my name while sitting up in my bed. How many times have I dreamed of this exact moment? This exact situation. Countless, for years and years, and when I finally give up the fantasy, it becomes a nightmarish reality.

  The worst-possible timed encounter in my entire life.

  I grab some work clothes from the closet and throw them on. Tie my hair back in a ponytail in record time, and don’t even bother with makeup. If anyone asks, I had a restless night’s sleep. It’s not so far from the truth. “We need to talk.”

  “No, we don’t,” I shut him down. “I just need to go.”

  “Don’t go,” he pushes.

  “I have to. I can’t do this. Not right now.” I start to make my escape, but Tage is up and blocking the door faster than I can blink. I try not to notice that he is still gloriously naked, tattooed, and toned. I look away. Temptation is the last thing I need.

  “Why can’t you do this now?”

  My heart wilts. “It's too hard.”

  “Why?” He steps closer and touches my face. My eyes become watery. Please don’t.

  “How can we go through this again? You broke my heart.” All the years of suppressed pain shoot to the surface. “I trusted you. I loved you. I needed you.” Tears fall.

  “I was here.”

  “No, you weren’t.” I look up into his hazel eyes. “Not the way you promised you’d be.”

  “I thought I was doing the right thing—”

  “Well, you didn’t.” I push past him.

  “Ever,” Tage calls after me, but he doesn’t follow me into the living room.

  Just as I make it to the front door, I notice the crumpled-up pink paper on the floor. I scoop it up, stick it in my pocket, and leave.

  My emotions fracturing from the pain of the past, the felicity of the present, and uncertainty of the future.

  17

  Alec

  I’ve texted Everly twice this morning with no reply.

  I had to go straight to the courthouse, so I wasn't able to catch her in the office, which totally sucks since I’ve grown accustomed to her greeting me straight out of the elevators every morning.

  I hurry down the stone courthouse stairs and to one of the firm’s Town Cars waiting on Worth Street. I hop into the back seat and find a surprise. The woman who had stopped me on the street a few days ago is perched comfortably behind the front seat.

  “Hello again, Mr. Prescott.”

  “What the fuck —”

  “Everyone has a price. The driver is taking a walk,” she smirks darkly. “So we could have some privacy.”

  I leer. That driver is so fired.

  “You have three seconds to get out of this car.”

  “Or what? You’re going to scream? Yell fire?” She pokes fun at me.

  “I’m not sure you know who I am —”

  “Oh, I know exactly who you are, Mr. Prescott. A poor boy from upstate New York who worked his ass off to pay for an Ivy League education and land a high-profile job in New York. It’s like a fairytale. The pauper has become the prince. Your parents must be so proud.”

  “They are.” I snarl. “Now what the fuck do you want?”

  “You, Mr. Prescott. You have come to be extremely valuable to me.”

  “Valuable how?”

  “You are very close to someone. Someone I need to get close to.”

  “Everly.” I already know t
he answer.

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Not your concern. But I need you to deliver her.”

  “Deliver her? She’s not a goddamn package.”

  “She’s important to both of us.”

  “I highly doubt that. I won’t do a goddamn thing until you tell me what you want from her.”

  “That’s between me and her.”

  “Well, then, you’re going to have to find another way to contact her. Get out—”

  “Mr. Prescott, you care for Everly, do you not?”

  I pause, biting my tongue. Of course, I love her. “We have a working relationship.”

  The woman scoffs. “Is that what you’re calling it? To save face? Or your job?”

  I remain silent.

  “Mr. Prescott, this can be as easy or as hard as you make it. Deliver Everly to me, when and where I text you.”

  “Never gonna happen.”

  “Fine.” She shrugs aloofly. “It’ll be a pity when your firm finds out you were having an affair with a secretary.” Her tone is mild yet threatening.

  “Are you trying to blackmail me?” I snort. “Go ahead. Tell them. Let the whole world know. I don’t give a fuck.”

  Her brown stare sharpens. “Okay, then, how do you think they’ll feel when they find out you’ve been taking kickbacks from clients, and tampering with evidence, and having an affair with a fellow employee?”

  My blood pressure skyrockets. “Those first two things aren’t true.”

  “Your firm doesn't know that. I have some very powerful people in my pocket, Mr. Prescott. You’re not the only one with connections. I can make things very difficult. I can take away your career. Your fairytale. I can ruin your life.”

  “You’re bluffing.”

  “Am I?” She pulls on the handle and the door pops open. “I don't want this to get ugly or violent, Mr. Prescott. But I’m willing to do what I must to get what I want. And Everly has something I want.”