Fourplay: Ever After Duet, Book 1

by Jayne Rylon

  Kari wasn’t sure if he sounded more excited about delivery or seeing her, but he sure did seem eager for her to arrive.

  “Give me that hour, okay? I promise it will be worth it.” She figured it would be close, but she could make it a little faster than that if she hustled. Assuming she could figure out where to put all those straps on the lingerie Andi had procured for her. Twist. Unravel.

  “I like the way that sounds,” Brady said. “We’ll see you soon. Thanks again. And I promise we’ll make it up to you this weekend, if you let us.”

  Kari shivered. She liked the sound of that. “Deal. Now let me go so I can get there quicker.”

  Brady made a noise that sounded like a kiss. He disconnected, but not before she heard Ford and Josh giving him shit for it.

  Kari dropped her phone into her purse, tidied up her desk one last time, then headed out of the company’s headquarters. She tipped her face up toward the setting sun and soaked in the rays. The orange and pink hues chasing each other across the sky had her in awe of nature and life and all the amazing things in it.

  Including her three men. And bringing them some much-needed food. She missed looking after them. Which was exactly why she had to keep refusing their offers of raises and extra time off and whatever else they tried to use to bribe her into returning to their firm.

  She wanted to lose herself in them so badly that she knew she couldn’t allow herself to go all in like that. If things didn’t work out…she’d be crushed. And have lost everything at once. No, keeping her professional life separate made her secure enough to take more risks on the personal front.

  And this was personal.

  So very personal.

  Kari swung her purse as she strolled along, grinning like a crazy woman at the thought of her blossoming relationship with Ford, Brady, and Josh. They were everything she’d ever wanted and never imagined she’d find in a single guy. Well, because they weren’t a single guy, she supposed.

  Ford was responsible, a protector. Brady was romantic and sweet. Josh, fun and daring.

  Together, they were perfect. Balanced. Complete.

  Tonight was her chance to be what they needed. To nourish them, to replenish their energy so they could keep working through the night. Maybe she could give them massages or think of another way to relieve some of their tension.

  Lost in her daydreams about what they might get up to later, she wasn’t paying close attention to the smattering of people crisscrossing the sidewalk and streets surrounding her. She sidestepped to avoid a young man who stopped to talk into his action cam, probably vlogging about his day in their gorgeous city.

  Most everyone in the business district had already headed home, but there were still enough people around that at first it didn’t seem unusual that the footsteps behind her were so close and yet so perfectly in sync with hers.

  Until she heard it. “Kari.”

  Ice immediately replaced the warmth of the sunset on her skin and the glow of her blossoming love—yes, she thought it—for Ford, Brady, and Josh in her heart.

  She knew that voice.

  It was him.

  Marty.

  But was it real or just another phantom of her wounded mind, like it had been when she’d imagined his face through the window at dinner with Ford?

  Kari refused to let her dark past black out her bright future.

  She straightened her spine and strode toward the crosswalk that would lead her to the safety of her apartment. Locked inside, she’d be able to shake this ominous sensation and the anxiety that was probably caused by knowing she was about to get a hell of a lot more intimate with the special men in her life.

  “Hey! Don’t ignore me. What? Are you too good for me now?”

  That time she was sure the snarled command wasn’t a figment of her twisted imagination.

  Kari whipped around, putting herself off balance as she reached the curb. Traffic whizzed by, oblivious to the panic that exploded inside her. She glanced over her shoulder. A steady stream of cars flew at her back. Marty planted himself directly in front of her.

  There was nowhere to run.

  She should have screamed. Except when she opened her mouth, no sound would come out of her constricted throat.

  Marty looked like he hadn’t bathed since he’d been fired. His eyes were wild and his too-long, greasy hair flopped into them as he lunged toward her. “Was it fucking me that turned you on to lawyers?”

  There was so much to object to in his statement that she couldn’t decide which thing to refute first. Instead, he rambled on.

  “I always knew you were asking for it. If I’d known the problem was that you wanted more than one guy, I’d have brought some friends to the party.” He sniffed, then swiped his hand over his nose. Was he on drugs?

  As if sober Marty hadn’t been bad enough. This was terrifying.

  Kari took a step back and another, but quickly ran out of sidewalk.

  “What’s a matter? Don’t act like you’re not into it. I’ve seen you with them. Come with me and I’ll take care of you right now. Otherwise…” He sniffed again, then grabbed for her arm.

  Instinctively, Kari jerked to avoid contact with him.

  No way was he ever going to touch her again.

  Her foot repositioned to keep her steady. Instead of cement, it found only air when she put it back down.

  Then she was falling. Stumbling, really, trying to stay upright by propelling herself into the street. With absolutely no other option, she flung her hand out toward Marty.

  “Too late, bitch.” Instead of grabbing it and hauling her to safety, he jammed his own arm toward her. His palm was flat where it connected with her sternum. Pressure from his shove propelled her farther into the street.

  Her bags went flying. And so did she.

  Marty kept walking as if nothing had happened.

  The blare of a horn was the last thing she heard. Pain radiated from her hip as she crashed onto the hood of a car and tumbled.

  The world went crazy. People screamed.

  Moments stretched into an eternity.

  Someone was asking if she was okay. She might have laughed at that if she could.

  As her eyelids slammed shut against the riot of colors, sounds, and hurt, she imagined Ford, Brady, and Josh as they’d looked the night they’d given her so much pleasure. She hugged the memory tight to ward off her horror and agony.

  Reality slipped away.

  Dreams of happily ever after evaporated as nightmares descended.

  * * *

  ____

  * * *

  Kari, Ford, Brady, and Josh’s story concludes in book two of the Ever After Duet, Fourkeeps, available here.

  If you missed out on the 4-Ever series, start with 4-Ever Theirs to find out how Andi hooked up with her three roommates in the first place.

  One woman. Three dudes. No regrets.

  College was supposed to be Andi Miller’s training ground for the real world. Instead, it’s her final Saturday night in her college-grade apartment, and she’s still sheltered as hell. Why? Because of her three adorable roommates—Reed, Cooper and Simon.

  Determined to have one date where the overprotective trio doesn’t scare the guy off, Andi sneaks out for the night. And almost lives to regret it.

  When Reed, Cooper and Simon rescue Andi from a bad situation in the basement of a sex club, they decide it’s time for the kid gloves to come off. Since their early college days, they’ve been not-so-secretly fighting amongst themselves to spark her next smile, her next laugh.

  They’ve already done a lot of surviving together, and now it’s time to thrive. At the risk of ruining a beautiful friendship, the men set out to turn their hands-off live-in arrangement into a weeklong learning experience where they become Andi’s sex education teachers.

  Except none of them realize their new found intimacy will make it impossible to say goodbye on graduation day.

  An Excerpt From 4-Ever Theirs:

 
“Stop. Stop. I’m going to pee my pants.” Andi Miller gasped between bouts of hysterical laughter. She swiped tears from her cheeks as her three obnoxiously adorable roommates demonstrated their best attempts at twerking from various places around their kitchen.

  Sadly, Simon could definitely shake his ass better than she could. He put on quite a show from his perch atop their rickety table, threatening to turn it into kindling with sharp swings of his hips. The guy could easily have paid his portion of the rent and then some if he’d gotten a job as a go-go dancer.

  “We’re only trying to help.” Cooper punched Simon in the leg then grappled him to the floor. If she didn’t act fast, this could deteriorate into another of their infamous wrestling matches. The last one of those had resulted in the annihilation of a beanbag chair. She was still discovering tiny foam beads scattered throughout their apartment months later.

  “I mean, it’s not like you’ve come out of your room long enough to pick up any of our moves in the past four years, with all that studying you insisted on doing. You don’t want to get embarrassed on the floor tonight, do you?” Reed asked as he simulated humping a cabinet.

  Well, that wouldn’t be a problem, seeing as she hadn’t quite told them the truth about her destination for the evening. Dance club, hook-up spot—same difference, right?

  Their over-protectiveness made her white lie necessary.

  Besides, she owed them the same courtesy they showed her when it came to keeping their sex lives separate from their home lives.

  The guys never brought women to the apartment. Or at least they hadn’t in ages. Not since early in the first semester of their freshman year when one of their one-night stands—to this day, they wouldn’t tell her which of them had slept with the poor girl—had tried to make herself some morning-after breakfast and ended up with a black eye courtesy of Andi’s fist.

  Hey, how was she supposed to have known it wasn’t an intruder out there whipping up a frittata before absconding into the night with their meager college-grade possessions? Milk crate furniture might be hot on the black market for all Andi knew. If some of the oomph propelling her swing had actually been fueled by jealousy instead of fear, she’d hidden that pathetic fact as best she could from both herself and her roommates.

  Ruining their friendships wasn’t on her agenda. She wasn’t the sort of girl who knew how to screw around then act like sex had been no big deal. Though she had chemistry with each of her roommates, how awkward would it have been to have followed through on it and slept with one of them?

  Takeout and movie nights with the others would never have been the same.

  Andi admitted it. She was sheltered as fuck. Though her vocabulary had gotten a hell of a lot more colorful as a result of her co-habbing with this trio of idiots for the past four years, she hadn’t done a lot of exploring relationship-wise. After all, she spent most of her free time with Cooper, Reed and Simon. Who would approach her with those three hovering over her, snarling and baring their teeth at any guy who got too close?

  God, she was going to miss them.

  The thought of giving up their second-to-last Saturday night together had her rethinking her plans. Except this might be her last chance to eliminate her regrets about not having a single fling during her college experience. It would help round out her academic studies and the rewarding social experiment living with three dudes had turned out to be.

  This was supposed to be her training ground for the real world.

  Now that she’d accomplished the majority of her goals—by graduating at the top of her class and scoring a prime position in her field—maybe she could make some time to fill the emptiness growing inside her as she accepted that she’d be forging out on her own soon. The lack of a relationship hadn’t bothered her so much when she’d had school and her roommates’ friendship to occupy her.

  All of that was changing.

  So was she.

  Andi wanted to be ready for what came next.

  “Was it that good for you?” Simon flashed a wicked smile as he teased her.

  “Huh?” She snapped herself out of her daze.

  “Our dancing.”

  “Oh, yeah. Definitely. It was so hot I need to go take a shower.” She rolled her eyes and giggled some more as she abandoned the kitchen for their shared bathroom. If she was sweating a little, it was surely from nerves over what she was about to do, not because they’d affected her.

  Sure.

  She scrubbed herself then spent a while drying and curling her hair before applying what dashes of makeup she owned—a bit of mascara and some nude lip gloss. The whole time, she kept wondering what tonight might be like if she could spend it with someone she knew and trusted instead of gambling on a blind date set up by her well-meaning chemistry lab partner.

  Andi bit her lip then harrumphed and fixed the damage, at least mentally reminding herself not to rub her eyes before she could wreck them too. She sighed then rested her forehead on the door, praying for some direction. Was she making a mistake? Or would it be an even bigger one to pursue the foolish ideas tempting her to feel out her roommates about her proposition?

  Before she could make up her mind, a rap on the door rattled her brains.

  “Ouch. Fuck.” She stumbled back.

  “Yo, Andi. Quit hogging. I drank three beers with dinner, and I gotta piss,” Reed groaned. “I forgot what it’s like to wait on someone trying to be girly.”

  Aaaaaaaaand… That sealed the deal.

  They were too much like brothers to ever see her as a woman. Which was exactly how she’d wanted things while they lived together. She grinned as she opened the door. Reed squashed past her in the doorway, wedging them together when he froze. “Damn.

  Uh, you look…great.”

  “The magic of wearing something other than sweats and one of your roommates’ old shirts sans a bra.” She shrugged.

  “I kind of prefer the no-bra part.” Simon waggled his brows from where he scarfed another helping of now-cold pizza for second dinner.

  When she turned to him with a smile, he paused mid-bite.

  “What?” Andi finger-combed her hair as she stepped from the bathroom so Reed could relieve himself in peace. Not that the guys didn’t invade her privacy often when she was in the shower, or vice versa. The trials of a single bathroom for four people had absolutely played a part in her collegiate years.

  “I told you,” Reed shouted through the door.

  “They’re right. You’re hot.” Cooper took her hand and spun her around. “I’m not sure we should let you go out like this, young lady.”

  “Whatever, Dad.” She chuckled until he finished twirling her, though it hadn’t entirely been a joke. With her parents both gone, these guys had stepped up and filled a huge, painful void as best they could. They were, and always would be, her family.

  In the heels Andi had borrowed, she was closer to Cooper’s height. Meeting his warm stare, she caught the spark of something serious there.

  Could he actually be attracted to her?

  She knew each of them appealed to her in various ways—Cooper’s gentlemanliness and tact, Simon’s playfulness and daring, Reed’s sense of responsibility and control.

  As if a sliver of possibility was the only prompt her subconscious required, she blurted the thoughts that had been haunting her for the past hour. Okay, longer than that. At least since she’d agreed to this outing. Probably since the day she co-signed their lease.

  “Maybe you guys should come out too?” She prided herself on the fact that she only stammered a little when she said, “Or I could stay home and we could have a private party instead.”

  Simon blinked at her, the pizza still lodged half-inside his mouth.

  Cooper’s fingers tightened around hers. His other hand landed at her waist to steady her. But he didn’t say anything.

  The door opening behind her broke the moment, forcing them apart.

  Reed emerged as the toilet finished flushing in the backgrou
nd. It was as if her silly dreams circled the bowl then vanished down their clanky pipes when he grimaced. “What’s that? Don’t back out now. You’ve been looking forward to tonight all week. It’s about time you cut loose. On your own. You’ve earned this.”

  “Oh. Okay.” If they noticed the tremble in her faux smile, they didn’t call her on it.

  Andi decided to quit fucking around. Playing a game where she didn’t know the rules was a sure way to lose. Reed was right. She had to learn to stand on her own, without leaning on them. Because in a matter of days, they wouldn’t be part of her everyday existence anymore.

  Graduation was a week away.

  Her new life, the one where she’d be a lab tech in a prestigious pharmaceutical research firm—one that didn’t include her roommates—was calling.

  “Go ahead. Have fun,” Simon said around a mouthful of pepperoni. “Besides, we’ve already—”

  Cooper cleared his throat, but it was too late. She realized they must have dates. Of course they did.

  “Hey, you’ll be fine,” he promised. He looked away before adding, “You don’t need us.”

  Andi swallowed around the lump in her throat. She took a step forward and then another before grabbing her wristlet and keys out of the bowl at the end of the countertop.

  If she was going to do this, she couldn’t linger. Otherwise, she’d never convince herself to leave.

  “Be safe!” Reed shouted as she closed the door softly behind her, determined not to let the stinging of her eyes turn into real tears and screw up her mascara.

  To keep reading 4-Ever Theirs, click here.

  Want More Menage?

  If you liked reading about this steamy non-traditional relationship, you should check out Nice & Naughty, another of Jayne’s menage stories.

  Can one man satisfy Alexa’s appetites? Or will it take two?

  After a disastrous lesson in heartache, Alexa Jones confines her adrenaline rushes to intense boardroom negotiations. Her legendary control cracks and she indulges in a high-octane encounter on the hood of her sports car. She never planned to see the enticing stranger again. When she finds herself across the boardroom table from him, there’s suddenly more at stake than just her career.