by Sharan Daire
A tidal wave rolled through his dark eyes. Grief. Shame. Rage. All the horrible things people had said to us played on an infinite loop in our heads. Chris knew better than anyone that those words were even more damaging when they were from someone who was supposed to love and protect you.
These men had already grabbed the record off the turntable playing in my head and busted it into a million pieces. They were giving me better words to replace the hurtful ones I’d told myself while being so miserable, but unable to make myself leave. Fear had held me back for so long. Fear of the unknown. Fear of not making it on my own. Of having to make all the decisions, both for myself and the kids.
I saw fear in Chris’ eyes too. Fear that I would be hurt by him. That I wouldn’t love him like his other friends. That I would find him as intolerable as my ex. That he would be the one who drove me to flee to a better life somewhere else.
I had the power to take some of that fear out of his eyes. If I only dared.
27
Shelby
“So…” I glanced over at Everett, who straightened at whatever he saw on my face. “How exactly does this work?”
“This?” He drawled, letting his lips curl in a slow, sensual smile. “Do you want to describe how we work to her, Chris?”
Chris let out a low grunt. “He fucks. I watch.”
I swallowed and looked back at him, braced to see lust laid bare in his eyes. Oddly, his eyes were shuttered, as if he’d locked down everything inside him in preparation for a hurricane. “That’s it?”
He barked out a harsh laugh. “Always.”
Um. I guessed I was going to have to get more specific and hope I didn’t blush too much. “So you don’t cum at all?”
He blinked, as if I’d managed to surprise him. “I do. Discreetly.”
Everett snorted. “Yeah right. We’re just usually making too much noise to hear you.”
A muscle ticked across Chris’ jaw, but he didn’t say anything in response.
“Is it only watching Everett that turns you on?”
“Fuck no,” Chris growled. “Or I’d just watch him jerk off in the shower, rather than try to find a woman who was interested in us both.”
“No thanks.” Everett shuddered. “I like doing the show, knowing that he’s watching what I’m doing to her, to you, and thinking about doing it himself.”
“Then why don’t you?” I asked slowly.
“It’s impossible,” Chris said flatly, his tone clearly discouraging any further discussion.
But I glanced at Everett and he winked at me, his lips quirking. He thought it was certainly possible. More than possible. In fact, he was daring me to try and prod Chris into crossing that boundary he’d set for himself. “Why?”
“Why?” Chris huffed, avoiding my gaze. “Because I said so. Because it’s for the best. It’s safer that way. I’m safer that way.”
Gathering my courage, I pushed away from the table and slowly walked toward the grand master bedroom they’d shown to me earlier. I paused in the doorway, looking back over my shoulder. Both men stared at me, tracking my movements like a hunting dog marking a bird’s location for the man with the gun. “Aren’t you coming?”
Chairs scraped across the floor and Everett stepped closer. He took my hand and pressed a kiss in my palm. “It would be our pleasure.”
Maybe the vision of that red-velvet dress still clung to me. Old broke-down Shelby wouldn’t have dared invite two men to bed, especially knowing that there was going to be some non-standard sex involved. My curiosity was piqued, though. New Shelby was willing to try anything at least once. I didn’t doubt that Everett would be as talented as both Derek and Kaleb in that regard. Having Chris watch only added a little spice to the mix.
And yeah, I was already hoping I could tempt him to do more. I wanted to blast some of that darkness from his eyes. He’d done so much for us all, but especially his friends all these years. It seemed impossibly cruel that he’d force himself to only watch while denying himself any pleasure.
It’d be different if that was the only way he could climax, but that didn’t sound like why he only watched. He was afraid he wasn’t safe.
In other words, he was afraid he’d hurt me.
Memories from the photoshoots flashed through my mind. His hand on my throat. His body hard and menacing and dangerous against me. My breathing quickened. My nipples hardened. If we weren’t already planning to strip our clothes off, I’d need to change my underwear. I was embarrassingly wet already, and we hadn’t even started.
Still holding my hand, Everett drew me around to the far side of the bed. Someone had lowered the blinds, adding to the cozy intimacy of the room, without making it too dark for Chris to see. “Do you usually leave the lights on?”
Everett lifted my hand to his shoulder and pulled me closer as if we were slow dancing to music only he could hear. “Sometimes. But I think Chris has built-in night vision goggles.”
I turned my head, looking for Chris, and found him sitting in a chair perfectly placed to see anything that happened on the bed, while giving us a semblance of privacy. Sweat darkened his shirt, his eyes burning pits of lust, but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t bark orders like he did at the photoshoot. Which seemed odd. I’d definitely pegged him as a dominant guy in bed, even if he was coaching from the sidelines, so to speak.
I snickered a little, and Everett smiled, swirling me around gently. “What’s so funny?”
“I was surprised that Chris wasn’t coaching from the sidelines.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “Football metaphors almost always work for us. That’s one I never thought of, but you’re right. He definitely likes to scream plays from the sidelines.”
“Fuck you,” Chris muttered darkly.
“No, I’m going to fuck her,” Everett said lightly. “While you sit there and watch.”
I was a bit surprised, honestly. It seemed cruel to me to point out that Chris was excluded. But since he’d done it to himself, maybe it didn’t matter. They often teased each other, but the tight look around Chris’ eyes suggested that he didn’t think his friend was being very funny.
“Are you going to dance all day, or take some clothes off?” Chris snapped.
“I like this song.” He lifted my hand, twirling me around like a ballerina, and then pulled me up against him for some Dirty Dancing swaying that made me clutch his waist, fisting my hand in his shirt.
“Ev…” Chris growled.
“Mr. Blakely,” Everett replied. “You haven’t asked me nicely.”
I was pretty sure Chris was starting to froth at the mouth from the choked curses I heard from the direction of the chair. I pressed closer to Everett and whispered in his ear. “Is he okay? Is it always like this?”
“I like to torment him,” Everett whispered back, though not nearly as quietly as me, making sure the other man heard every word.
“Fucking sadist.”
Everett laughed again, smoothing his other hand up my back. “I do like to see you sweat.”
So it was all part of their banter back and forth. A twisted sort of foreplay. But I was done with the teasing. I had other things on my mind.
I reached up and started unbuttoning Everett’s shirt. He ceased the dancing movements immediately, though he kept running his hands up and down my back, along my arms and shoulders, up to my face. Tangling his fingers in my hair. Stroking my neck. Nothing intimate, but so damned erotic. He had the talented fingers of a musician, and he played me like he was a maestro.
I tugged the tails of his shirt free and pushed it off his shoulders. He wasn’t as beefy as Derek or Kaleb, but he had the muscles of a former champion football player who still worked out excessively. Cut abs, wide shoulders, tall and lean and fast. A sprinkling of dark hair ran down his breastbone. Just enough to tempt my fingers to stroke and tickle his stomach all the way down into his pants.
I smoothed my palms over his pectorals, stroking him like he stroked
me. Learning the texture of his skin. Tracing the hills and valleys across his chest and stomach. My fingers fumbled a little with his belt buckle. I was used to the hole and prong kind, but I couldn’t figure out how to get the clasp open.
I heard heavy breathing, but it wasn’t Everett.
It was Chris.
Finally, Everett put us all out of misery and undid the buckle for me. He pulled a couple of condoms out of his pocket and tossed them on the bed, while I unbuttoned his pants. With the weight of his phone in the pocket, his pants fell quickly to the floor, leaving him in black silken boxers. Well tented for sure, but I wasn’t sure how he’d compare to Derek yet.
I slid my fingers under the waistband, but he snagged my hand.
“My turn.” Then he gently turned me around.
To face Chris.
My stomach quivered, my cheeks heating. It was one thing for the man touching me to see me naked, but I’d never had a man sit in a chair and just look at me. Look at me like he was dying of thirst, and I was the first clear, clean water he’d seen after crawling through the desert for days.
Everett brushed his lips against my ear as he slid his palm beneath my shirt, fingers splayed on my stomach. “This part is always so much fun. Look at him, Shelby. Watch the way his eyes change as I finally give him what he wants.”
I couldn’t look away from Chris, though Everett delayed the inevitable as long as possible. He curled one arm around my waist, gently hugging me to him as he swayed to that silent music once more. His fingers wrapped around my wrist, lifting my arm back over my shoulder so I could curl my fingers around his nape. I leaned against him, sinking into the rhythm of his body. He wasn’t hurried or frantic, even though I had the impression it’d been a long time for all of them before I’d come to the lodge.
He stroked my cheek. My lips. Rubbed his thumb back and forth over my bottom lip, softening my mouth. Teasing me. So I returned the favor and wrapped my lips around his thumb.
“Fucking hell,” Chris muttered.
“Language, Mr. Blakely.” Everett chuckled in my ear, rubbing his face in my hair. “In case you didn’t notice, the more turned on he is, the more he curses. Watch this.”
He hooked his other thumb beneath the waistband of my sweatshirt, lifting it up enough to show a little of my skin. Inch by tantalizing inch, he uncovereded more of my upper body to reveal the black silk bra that I’d accidentally stolen from the photoshoot. Thankfully I’d thought to wear it today rather than one of my old ratty bras. That would have been embarrassing, trying to do a sexy tease with a dingy saggy bra that was a decade old.
“Motherfucker.”
“My, my, my,” Everett whispered. “He really likes his lingerie on you, Shelby. Me thinks he’ll be designing a whole line of lingerie next.”
His thumb rubbed against a swollen nipple, making me twitch and gasp. “You made the bra and panties too?”
Chris was practically wheezing. “Yeah. Of course. Nothing but the best for you.”
Everett finally pulled the sweatshirt over my head and tossed it to the side, and he was right. Chris’ eyes flickered with crashing thunderstorms. No longer tight and irritated. No longer afraid of whatever secrets he harbored in his past. He couldn’t hide his raging need any longer.
Everett cupped my breasts in both hands, lifting them up, rubbing his thumbs on my sensitive nipples until I moaned.
And Chris clamped his hands down on the armrests, gripping so hard that something cracked.
That sound loosened something in Everett too. He didn’t bother teasing his friend with a slow reveal to get my jeans off. He jerked the button open and shoved the material down my thighs, while I twisted my hips to help. He got the denim down to my knees and then pushed his fingers into my panties.
Cupping my pussy, he groaned like someone had shot him.
“Fucking cocksucker.” Chris ground out. The chair cracked again, an ominous sound that promised an explosion of epic proportions.
“Sorry,” Everett panted in my ear, sliding his fingers deeper. Those magical fingers sank into me. The base of his palm rubbed against my pubic bone, a delicious pressure that only made me want his whole body smashed against me. “She’s so fucking wet, Chris. I can’t wait any longer.”
“It’s about fucking time!”
EVERETT
I usually tried to draw out the striptease to make sure Chris got as much enjoyment out of it as possible. He could bluster and curse until he was blue in the face, but we both knew the truth.
He loved the tension. He loved the torment. If he had to sit and not touch, then he wanted the reveal to go as slowly as possible.
Though maybe this time we could get him to break the no-touch rule. If anyone could, Shelby would.
Holding her was like trying to catch a blazing wildfire ripping across the plains. It killed me that she didn’t believe that she was the hottest fucking woman I’d ever met. Her sensual, natural movements, swaying in my arms. The way her lips softened and her eyes glowed whenever she looked at one of us or her kids. The fall of her luscious hair around her shoulders and down her back. The dip of her waist and the glorious weight of her breasts. A heart that blazed like a noonday sun, calling us to ever tighter orbits until we collided, unable to resist that pull.
I didn’t understand how Chris could possibly sit and look at such a beautiful bounty, know she wanted him, all of us. Everything that entailed.
And then deny her, and himself, and us.
I lifted her up on the bed and tugged her shoes off. Dragged her jeans down her calves. The soaking-wet panties—that I made sure to toss on Chris’ lap. As I knelt on the bed, she started to turn toward me, but I caught her, keeping her toward Chris, near the edge of the bed.
That was key. If this was going to work at all.
On my knees behind her, I cupped her pussy again, letting her heat fill my palm, keeping her body at a delicious hum. I kissed and sucked on her neck, working my way up toward her ear. “I could tell him what to do, but I think he’d like it a lot more if you told him what you want.”
“Get inside me first.”
My dick tried to tear its way out of my boxers, more than eager to leap to her command. I hadn’t expected such confidence, not from the woman we’d so carefully coaxed and wooed the last few days, but I absolutely loved it. She’d blossomed here with us, coming into her own power as a gorgeous, desirable woman. She was starting to believe what we’d been telling her all along, and it was a beautiful thing to behold. But not as beautiful as her.
I shoved my boxers down and ripped open a condom. The sound electrified us all, but especially Chris. The chair creaked as he shifted desperately, whether to force himself to stay put, or simply trying to make a little room in his jeans.
“Open your pants,” she whispered. “I want to see it.”
“See what?” Chris ground out, challenging her to join him in the colorful metaphor game. Or at least the dirty sex-talk game.
I wasn’t sure how she’d respond. I hadn’t heard Shelby curse, but maybe that’d been because her kids might overhear. I suspected she was a little more reserved in that regard.
“I want to see how fucking big your dick is.”
His lips twisted in a fierce snarl as he jerked his jeans open. He touched himself only enough to get his dick out and then gripped the armrests again. From the sounds the chair was making, we’d need to invest in a new one. Immediately. It might not even make it through this scene.
Her breath sighed out on a soft little gasp that would have made me furious if that sound had been for anyone not in our brotherhood. We were all blessed in that department, but Chris, yet again, had received the bulk of those riches. Not in length so much, but in girth.
She reached back over her shoulder, wrapping her fingers around my nape as before. “Ev?”
The short nickname Chris always called me—on her lips—made me choke up. “Yeah, baby?”
“I want you both inside me at the same ti
me.”
“Hmm,” I breathed in her ear, sliding my fingers deeper into her, making her moan. “Let’s see what we can do about that.”
“Don’t be a fucking idiot,” Chris retorted.
Ignoring him, I leaned against her, using my weight to slowly push her chest down toward the bed. Lifting that tempting ass up in the air. I dragged my dick up and down through her juices, priming us both. Drawing another guttural cry from her lips that practically had Chris sitting on his ass on the floor with kindling around him.
I started to slide into her, intending to ease in bit by bit. Draw that torture out for all of us. But Shelby had other ideas. She pushed her hips back, rocking me deeper inside her.
Balls deep with her body folded up beneath me, I knew real temptation for the first time in our unique relationship. The desire to keep her covered beneath me. To feel her back against my chest, the way she heaved and moved beneath me. It was glorious.
And also not a very good exhibition for our partner. He wouldn’t complain at all. Knowing him, he’d probably even be grateful for the few crumbs we’d already given him. He’d still be able to find relief.
But it wouldn’t be the all-consuming lust that he’d feel if he could see the way her breasts moved each time I thrust into her. Or the way her face tightened or softened as she climaxed. If we had any hope of luring him into joining us, he needed the full display.
Straightening, I pulled her back upright, even though it changed the angle so much I couldn’t really thrust any longer. I was still inside her, and she was still enjoying it, if the sounds she made were any indication. I ran my hands over her body, letting Chris think about his hands on her skin. Her breasts. The hardness of her nipples. The ample curves of her hips and stomach. The sleek column of her throat as her head tipped to the side. The way her skin tasted as I licked the hollow behind her ear.
I worked my teeth on her neck, not biting exactly, just giving that pressure and sensation against the sensitive nerves and cords of her throat.