by Ever Coming
“She’s telling us.” Curtis’s voice was firm.
“He’s right,” I agreed. “It took me three months of Roxanne living here for me to tell her it was my spot.” For good reason. She still teased me over it from time to time. Not that I feared the guys ever would tease me. They didn’t seem the type to do that kind of jab. Neither of them.
“So, we should feel honored.” Parker beamed.
“Something like that.” Or exactly like that. “Besides, from here I can put my legs on both of your laps.” A win I just noticed. This was going to be the best movie viewing ever.
“The woman is a genius.” Curtis handed Parker the popcorn before pulling my legs up and onto their laps and retrieving the buttery snack.
“That she is.”
With a click of the remote, the movie began, the familiar story and warmth of their bodies against my legs and side, lulling me into a place more comfortable than I could imagine for a date, especially one so early on and such an unconventional one at that. There was just something about them. Something amazing.
“Maddie?” My head snapped up, the story on the screen further advanced than the last time I remembered. Stinks. I was asleep.
“Yeah?” Even my voice sounded sleepy. Coffee. Coffee instead of beer next date, it was.
“You’re falling asleep. We should go.” Curtis’s words made logical sense, but I didn’t want logical. I wanted them.
“But I like having you here.”
“We can come back.”
I shook my head at Parker’s suggestion.
“We will come back.”
“Or you can stay.” I wasn’t even thinking sex, my body beyond exhausted after a week of little sleep and double work.
“Today is too soon.” Parker took my ankles and eased them off him as he rose. “You don’t even know the important things about us yet.”
“I know you are kind, super sexy, and, from what Roxanne and her hubby say, good people even when you aren’t trying to woo me,” I counter argued. No, I didn’t know everything about them—that would take years—but I knew the important things.
“She’s got a point.”
Huh? I never expected Curtis to be the one to start to wobble first. Nice.
“No. Good night, our sweet.” Parker moved my legs all the way to the floor, offering Curtis his hand. “We will see you soon. Tomorrow, if you allow.”
If I allow. As if I would turn that down. And when did he become the responsible one?
“Tomorrow would be perfect.” I rose, following them to the door. They were leaving, and I tried not to look all pouty about it even though that was 100 percent how I felt. Pouty.
“Then, tomorrow it is. Shall we pick you up for breakfast?”
“You spoil me.”
“We try,” Curtis added far too seriously, as if I wouldn’t see it in their actions and needed to hear it in his voice as well. It was endearing, yet something I wanted to fix. We all needed to feel confident in this for it to work, not just me or them. All of us.
“Be careful. A girl could get used to that kind of treatment.”
They were hovering around the door, probably wanting to leave as much as I wanted them to. Not. At. All.
“And gentlemen don’t change their treatment of their woman because they think they have her, so get used to it.”
Damn. Parker could be downright sexy. Their woman, like I was a possession. My panties were going to need changing the second they left, it was now official.
“Should we not say that?”
Crap. I said at least part of that out loud.
“No, I kinda of like it. Is it weird that I’m so on board with this in its weirdness?”
“If it is weird, we are, too.” And somehow Curtis deciphered my word salad.
“So—weird together?”
They both nodded.
“I can live with that.”
“How much did Roxy tell you about her relationship?” What did that have to do with anything and why did it make Curtis so insta-serious?
“Just that he is her second half, and they are happy happy, and he thinks he’s funny but is so not.” That was them in a nutshell although I agreed with Barry on his humor. I did think he was funny.
“That is so very true.” Parker scoffed, taking Roxanne’s side in her hubby’s humor analysis.
“Did she tell you why they moved?”
“For work.” His, not hers. Although she found a job their quickly enough at one of our sister agencies before they decided for her to stay home to have all the babies.
“Maybe you should talk to her about that. It might help you understand us a bit more.” Curtis bit his lip after he spoke. It was sexy, but I had a sick feeling in my stomach that it was out of nervousness. What could Roxanne possibly have to say about her relationship that would hurt mine, or the one that was currently potentially mine?
“Riddles. Is that what this evening has evolved into?” I stepped into them both, needing to feel their warmth, and their arms immediately wrapped around me ensconcing me. From what, I had yet to determine.
“I’m sorry.” Curtis spoke directly into my ear, causing a shiver to run down my spine and my knees to weaken.
“You so are not, but don’t worry about it. I never give up an opportunity to call her.” If there was anything bad I needed to know, she would’ve told me last time we talked. She wasn’t one to hide need-to-know information. Not her style.
“Good night it is.” Parker kissed my cheek before pulling away.
“Yeah.”
“But we get a whole day together tomorrow.” Curtis copied Parker’s moves, ending with them both standing by the now open door and me alone and suddenly cold.
“Bright side.” I shrugged.
“May we kiss you good night?” The formality of Parker’s request broke through any trepidation I might have. Heck yeah, they could kiss me.
“At the same time?” How would that even work? I was completely game, but how?
“I was thinking more taking turns.” He smirked. Duh. Of course he was.
“Good because I wasn’t sure how to do that without—awkwardness occurring. Besides, this way, I can see you both kissing again.” I doubted that was his original plan, but a girl’s gotta ask for what she wants, and if I was going to spend the night alone, I might as well get some memories to hold onto until morning.
“You weren’t kidding about that.” Why did Curtis sound so shocked? I had been drooling, after all.
“Heck to the no. That was hot, and my brain has spent too much of the night thinking about it, making sure I memorized it correctly.”
“Damn. You’re the perfect woman.” Parker swooped in, kissing me soundly, stealing my breath before breaking away and doing the same to Curtis.
I watched their kiss intently and, when it finally broke, I flung myself shamelessly at Curtis, exploring his mouth and savoring the taste of Parker on him. By the time they left, my engines were on full throttle. Naked adult play time with them was going to be freaking awesome. I was so going to dream about that tonight. After I called Roxanne, anyway.
Chapter Ten
’Fess up. Why did you really move?
The door had barely clicked closed before I grabbed my phone and started texting away, the sleepiness I’d felt only a half hour before completely gone. What did they know about Roxanne that I didn’t? And, more importantly, what did it have to do with them and the future I was beginning to forge with them?
It’s eleven p.m. Why you are bugging me?
The response came quite a few minutes after I sent it, which could be legitimate since she is pregnant and spends far more time in the restroom than normal, but the way she talked around my question told me she knew something I needed to know, which was not her, not at all. My stomach started to sour.
Nice try, it’s eleven here, not where you live. You’re deflecting. Now ’fess up.
Two seconds later, my phone began to ring with my video
chat ringtone. What the heck?
“Hello. Who’s calling?” I stuck my tongue out at her, trying to lighten the mood because of the heavy feeling in my core.”
“Har har.” She mimicked my gesture. Maybe it wasn’t going to be so bad. “What’s bringing this up?” He sweet girl was sound asleep on her lap, or at least what was left of her lap now that baby number two was so close to arriving.
“The guys wanted to know if I knew.” I shrugged in an effort to appear far more nonchalant than I felt.
“The guys or your guys.”
Wasn’t that the ten-thousand-dollar question. I felt more comfortable with both of them than I ever had with any other guys this new in our relationship. Shit—ever really. They had a way of making me feel as if I belonged with them even though to the outside world that notion was ridiculous. Most importantly, it felt like there was something missing when they were gone, as if I was less complete with them across the country. Yeah, they were mine.
“I think the second.” More like I knew it, but they needed to be the first to know. They had been nothing but upfront with me about their feelings, and I owed it to them to return the favor.
“Good on you.” She sounded like Barry, and it was all I could do not to tease her about when they would be that couple who even started to dress alike when they went out to play bocce ball. “Okay. To answer your question, the hubster had family obligations.”
“Thanks for the non-informative answer. Those are always swell.”
“I wasn’t done. Pipe down.” Her daughter stretched in her arms, and Roxanne settled her on the couch beside her, allowing her phone to capture the perfection that was her sweet sleeping face. “As I was saying, hubster had some family obligations. When his dad got sick, he had to take over.”
“Isn’t your father-in-law a dentist?”
“That wasn’t what he had to take over.” The phone was still focused on her sleeping daughter, and I wondered what she didn’t want me to see. She wasn’t lying to me. This I knew from her lack of stuttering. She would suck at poker from that trait alone. What other family obligation could there be? She’d have mentioned a sick or elderly relative needing care or a family business which only left…
“Shit. Are you married to the mob?”
“You watch too much television.” She barked out in laughter as she finally turned the phone back on herself.
“So, no?” Of course, he wasn’t. Barry was many thing, but a criminal mastermind wasn’t one of them.
“No.”
“Then what?” Her non-answers were beginning to get to me, more so than normal thanks to a combination of exhaustion and nerves.
“He’s sort of in charge of the people in his family group.”
And, like any rational person would, I groaned before getting up and pacing the small distance between my couch and the kitchen counter.
“Roxy, the rate you’re going, she’s going to be old by the time you get to it.” How long had Barry been listening, not that I wasn’t grateful, given his desire to speed things along. “Turn your phone around.”
She did, and I found myself looking at Barry who wore a smile he usually reserved for when he thought he was funny. This could get interesting.
“Hey, Maddie. Watch this.”
And with that, he pulled his shirt over his head and began to unbutton his pants, the view quickly moving up his body thanks to my quick-thinking friend holding the phone.
“Ewwww, your husband is getting naked. Please tell me he’s not a stripper.” So not the kind of family business I expected, and double ewww on her father-in-law.
“Focus, Maddie. Focus.” Because focusing on my best friend’s naked husband was always a good idea. The man was officially off his rocker. “And Roxy, for the love of Pete, keep the camera off my junk.”
“I like your junk.” Which she had thankfully already kept for her eyes only.
“I don’t need to see his junk.” I affirmed that junk seeing was not on the menu. At least, not his. I could think of a couple of others I’d be happy to check out.
I must have blinked too fast because before me stood a freaking lion. In her living room, where her sweet child lay asleep, with no screaming was to be heard. No freaking way.
“Holy fuck. He’s…he’s…he’s…”
“The best-looking lion around.” Her calm, albeit proud proclamation told me all I needed to know. Shit. She was married to a lion. A ginormous, full-on maned, big-toothed lion.
“How is that possible?”
“Really? You come from a family with people who speak to the dead, can move small things with their minds, and play the stock market a little too well, and you are asking how it’s possible?”
She had a point. I did come from a family of weirdos and a couple of drunks, which was why I lived in the city and not my hometown. I had no idea how they could do any of those things and was thankful on more than one occasion that I couldn’t do any of them, especially the dead people gig because, nope, I like to communicate with live people thank you very much and quite often not even them.
“But I can’t do any of those things.” My point was weak. My not being able to do those things didn’t mean spit in this context.
“And I can’t change into the king of beasts,” Roxanne added and had me thinking, could her daughter? The trouble she could get into once she sprouted fur. Oh my!
“He’s gorgeous,” I murmured as he shook his head, his eyes catching the light just so.
“Thanks.” And then Barry was back. Or, at least, human Barry. Technically, Barry had always been there. Or did the lion take over? Processing all of it was going to take a while. “Roxy, camera up, please.”
“Sorry, dear. Good call on the in-your-face method. I’d still be talking clans without using the words.” She was going on and on as if I were no longer there or there-ish, given I was only there via technology.
“She has a freaking necromancer in her family, and you were worried about her not understanding shifters.” He was mostly right.
“I do not have a necromancer in the family,” At least not that I knew of. Grandpa Joe was referred to as dark a lot, so who the heck knew anymore. If people could turn into animals, maybe Grandpa Joe could raise the dead. I officially lived in a world gone mad. “My mom just talks to dead people. Not the same at all.”
“Dead is dead. I gotta go.” He grabbed his shirt off the floor before kissing Roxanne on the cheek and caressing his daughter’s head. “Meeting. Say hi to the guys. You could do worse.”
Not the best endorsement ever, but I didn’t need one. My heart had already decided. I was just waiting for my brain to catch up.
“Bye?” I called out as he left the view of the camera.
“You know meeting meant watching the game.”
I hadn’t, but that sounded about right. “You’re married to a lion.” Because I was tired and bushes no longer needed to be beaten around. “Tell me all things.”
And tell me she did.
Chapter Eleven
I spend over an hour talking to Roxanne about her lion mate and how he was the alpha of their clan. It was then I learned my guys were also members of said clan and shit got real. I mean, accepting Barry was a lion was easy enough, but knowing Curtis and Parker were as well felt like too much.
It was three in the morning before I figured out why. It wasn’t that they got furry or that they could eat me in the less than fun way. No, all of that felt almost normal given my upbringing. It was the mating thing that had me on edge. Was that what they wanted from me? A mate? It was so much, so fast, and yet I knew in my gut that that was what we were meant to be. Waiting until a decent hour to go visit them near killed me.
I found myself knocking on their hotel room far earlier than was considered polite.
“Hello, beautiful. This is a surprise. We were just about to head your way.” Parker whisked me into a hug. Oh yes, he was glad to see me, from the pressure pushing against my middle. Good man.<
br />
“I was up early.” It wasn’t a lie. I got in a good two hours of sleep. It wasn’t even nerves, it was excitement. Like Christmas when you’re eight and waiting for Santa excitement, only, instead of presents, I was going to get to see my two lions and all the secrets would be out in the open instead of between us. It was going to be a good day.
“Excited about today?” Curtis asked as he pulled me from Parker long enough to embrace me in a bear hug—or was it a lion hug?
“I was.” I stepped back, taking them both in. Damn, I was a lucky woman. “I’m figuring today is the day you are going to show me your lions.”
It was a solid thirty seconds before either responded, my words not what they were expecting to hear from the reactions on their face. Good. Served them right for letting Barry be the first lion I saw.
“Ahh, so she told you, and you believe her, and you’re still here so that’s good sign?” Parker’s eyes never left mine.
“I wish you’d told me.”
“We were scared.” Curtis took my hand and squeezed it gently.
I mean, sure, if I just ran into a lion in the streets screaming and running and peeing myself would’ve been a thing, but how could he think I could be scared of them or that this was somehow a deal breaker.
“That I would run—break it off?”
“Yes. That.” Parker took my other hand. I was now sandwiched between the two of them, and it was perfect even if the conversation was one of the weirdest of my life.
“My family isn’t exactly what you would call normal.”
They both simultaneously leaned into the crook of my neck, inhaling deeply looking for what I had no idea, but it felt more information seeking than sexy to be sure.
“You don’t smell shifter,” Parker finally stated as Curtis nodded in agreement.
“Different kind of weird. Mom talks to the dead, uncle knows things before he should, that kind of thing.”
“Is that all?” Parker chuckled as if I just gave him the craziest list ever.
“Grams can move small things when she’s pissed. Without touching them.” That was the only one of the “gifts” I ever wanted while growing up, but since it wore her out to the point of exhaustion, I let that fantasy go before I hit puberty.