by Sarah Bailey
“I gather from your contrite expression you stayed with Xavier last night.”
He was trying to put me on the back foot and I honestly couldn’t blame him after telling him it was over between us last night.
“Did you expect me to crawl into your bed after everything we said?”
That made his face fall into a frown.
“No.”
I rubbed my arm with my hand, unsure of how to tell him how I really felt.
“I don’t want this to be over,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.
“That’s not what you said last night.”
“I told you I wanted more, not that I didn’t want you at all.”
He stared at me for what seemed like an eternity before he took a step towards me and dropped his arms from his chest.
“I’ve thought a lot about what you said.”
I blinked. His tone was soft which was unexpected. He took another step, almost closing the distance between us. I tipped my head back slightly to meet his eyes.
“I’m sorry if I made you feel like a possession, little girl.”
I couldn’t help the way my bottom lip trembled at his term of endearment. Somehow it always got to me. He had a way of making me melt for him and I was in serious trouble of that happening right now.
“I want to make this right.” He reached out and took my hand in both of his, looking down at it as he ran his thumb over my palm. “I need you despite how out of control you make me feel. I don’t allow anyone in… except the boys, so this, right here, between us… it’s hard for me. What I’m asking is for you to be patient and I’ll try to give you what you need from me.”
My heart slammed against my ribcage. It was everything I’d wanted to hear last night. Would it have changed what I did afterwards? If I was honest with myself, it would have, but only in that it’d have delayed the inevitable. I still had these feelings towards the rest of them. They weren’t going away no matter what I said or did. And now I had kissed Xav, I knew being with him was just as right as being with Quinn.
He took another step before raising one of his hands to my cheek and stroking my face. He leant down, making his intentions very clear. I was stuck because I really wanted him to kiss me but I had to tell him the truth. He was inches from my face when I finally found my voice.
“Quinn… I need to—”
“Shh, little girl.”
I turned my face away so he only caught my cheek and I knew I’d displeased him as his hand on my face tightened.
“I need to tell you something.”
He pulled back and stared down at me, his eyes hardening a little. I felt so damn small, but if I wasn’t honest now, then things would get infinitely more complicated. As if they weren’t already.
“What is it?”
“I don’t want you to be angry with me,” I whispered.
“Why would I be?”
Because I kissed your friend and I want him and I know you’re going to hate that.
My hand was still in his so I tightened my fingers around his.
“I’ve been feeling things… things which confused me at first. I didn’t want to cause any problems so I didn’t act on them. But after everything which happened last night, I don’t want to pretend any more. I don’t want anyone to dictate my life for me like Papa has always done.”
This was all coming out the wrong way, but I didn’t know how to say it right.
“So I acted on how I’ve been feeling… with Xav. I mean I’d explained it before and he understood, but then we kissed last night and—”
Quinn abruptly dropped my hand, cutting me off. Before I had a chance to stop him, he was striding out of the room. I ran after him because I knew exactly how this would go if I didn’t catch up to him so I could explain. Xav was still sitting in the kitchen, but he got up when he saw Quinn.
“You fucking bastard.”
Xav didn’t give Quinn the chance to get anywhere near him. He retreated around the counter and put his hands up.
“Quinn…”
“I told you to fucking stay away from her, but no, you couldn’t help yourself, could you!”
I raced towards Quinn and held him by the arm before he could move around the counter towards Xav.
“You didn’t let me explain.”
He didn’t even look at me as he tried to shake me off his arm and pointed at Xav.
“I’m going to fucking kill you.”
“Come on, man, there’s no need for this,” Xav said. “I was respecting Ash’s wishes. She wants this.”
I’d made this mess and I really had to fix it.
“Let me explain, please. It’s not his fault.”
Quinn looked down at me, his dark eyes blazing with anger.
“Not his fucking fault? He’s been after you since the fucking beginning and the moment he sees you all vulnerable after you told me it was over, he fucking pounces on you. I’d hardly call that not being at fault.”
I shook my head.
“That’s not what happened! If you’d just listen to me for one minute.”
“Oh, you want me to listen to you after I’d been worried fucking sick about you all night, I tell you I want to make it right and then I find out you’ve fucked Xavier behind my back.”
I flinched but held my ground. This conversation would never have gone well no matter what I’d said, but this was ridiculous. My heart lurched at him saying he’d been worried about me. Why had I been so stupid as to think he didn’t care enough to want something more with me?
“We didn’t have sex.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I didn’t fuck her. Jesus, Quinn, she said no because of you and I respected that,” Xav interjected. “She wanted to talk to you first, but clearly you can’t even give her the time of fucking day to let her explain anything properly.”
Quinn’s head whipped around to Xav, his eyes narrowed.
“You can shut the fuck up.”
I wanted everything to just stop because this was getting us nowhere. Reaching up, I turned Quinn’s face back to mine and made him look at me.
“I didn’t have sex with him. We did other stuff, yes, but that’s beside the point.”
He was about to speak but I put my hand over his mouth. He was going to hear me out whether he liked it or not.
“I want you. I still want you, but I want Xav too. If I’m honest, I want all of you.”
Quinn blinked but he didn’t move my hand from his mouth.
“There’s no wanting someone more than the other. There’s no competition. It is what it is. I didn’t understand how I could feel this way at first or why, but I can’t pretend I don’t have these feelings. And if I’m ever going to understand it, I have to explore it. Xav understands that. He respects it. He’s willing to share me. I know I’m asking a hell of a lot of you right now. I know this is probably hard to understand or even wrap your head around. Trust me, I’m still so fucking confused, but I can’t lie about how I feel.”
My heart physically ached because explaining this to him was taking every ounce of myself control not to cry and beg him not to hate me for it.
“Please don’t go after Xav for it. It’s on me. All of it is on me. If you want to punish me, that’s okay. I’ll let you do whatever it is you need because I need you. I need this. Us. I’m your little girl, Quinn. I’m yours and mine and his too. So please, please don’t dismiss this out of hand. Please try to understand. Please…” my voice cracked. “I’m still yours. I’ll always be yours.”
Chapter 5
There were so many thoughts running through my mind, but not one of them had a solid thread for me to hold on to. Almost as if everything was in free fall and I was scrambling for a safe place but never gaining purchase.
Every part of me wanted to protest what she’d told me. Wanted to take my fist to my best friend’s face for touching her. And Rory’s words from earli
er before he left the kitchen kept blaring in my ears over and over again.
“Listen to her, Quinn. Listen to what she wants. She cares for you far more than you realise and I know you care about her too.”
Listening to her only confused me more. How could she want me and him at the same time? Hell, she fucking well said she wanted all of us. That meant all four of us. I’d made a stupid offhand comment about her wanting to fuck four men at once when she’d first got here, but I hadn’t meant it. I’d wanted to see her riled up. Had I put the fucking idea in her head in the first place?
Her hand was still over my mouth and I did nothing to move it. Stringing a sentence together about how I felt was impossible. I didn’t know how to fucking well feel. None of this made any sense. None. Zero. Zilch.
Normally I’d tell someone to go fuck themselves if they told me something I didn’t want to hear. Or I’d take what I wanted anyway. But this was different. This was Ash. A girl who’d completely torn down all of my defences. She’d ripped everything apart to get to me and I had kept her from realising just how much power she had over me. I didn’t want her to use it against me. But here she was doing it anyway.
If I walked away now, I’d be walking away from the woman who’d dug her way under my skin and made me feel. It would be like cutting my own face off to spite myself. At least that’s how I saw it. As fucked up as this entire situation was, she meant more to me than any other woman had before. She meant the fucking world. She was the whole entire goddamn universe. And somehow, some-fucking-how this tiny, little girl had brought me to my knees.
Did that mean I had to accept what she was asking so she’d stay by my side? Did it fucking mean I had to be okay with her being with my friends? The three people I trusted with my life? I wasn’t sure I could be okay with that no matter how much I loved them. Eric, Xav and Rory were my family. We’d been a part of each other’s lives for so long I don’t think we could function if we weren’t together.
The way she was looking at me broke me. I wanted to take her in my arms and kiss away the anguish in her expression. Kiss away her pain. All the anger I felt towards her and Xav melted away, leaving me conflicted.
“Please don’t leave me,” she whispered as a single, solitary tear traced a line down her cheek.
Then she dropped her hand from my mouth and somehow that was my cue to do something. To say something. But nothing was forthcoming. No answers. No questions. Nothing.
She was breaking me. Destroying me with the rapid rise and fall of her chest. The desperation and pleading in her eyes. The way her body trembled, her hands shaking at her sides. So even though I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing, I couldn’t watch her like this. I couldn’t stand it. It was like a fucking explosion of pain going off inside my chest, expanding with each passing moment.
I stopped thinking, stopped contemplating and just did.
Grabbing her face, I crashed my lips to hers and kissed her with such desperation, it bordered on fucking madness. Ash clung to me, kissing me back with as much passion and ferocity as I was giving her. Every part of me protested, wanting to take her to task and punish her, but this wasn’t about me. This was about her. About what she needed from me.
She pulled away slightly, resting her forehead against mine as she stared up at me.
“Quinn,” she breathed.
“Little girl,” I murmured.
And just like that… I felt as if I was home.
“You need to punish me.”
“Yes.”
“I want you to, sir.”
Leaning down, I cupped her arse and picked her up. She wrapped her legs around me, clinging to me instinctively. I was about to take her out of the room when I remembered we weren’t alone. And Ash did too as she turned her head towards Xav. He didn’t look particularly uncomfortable about the display in front of him. In fact, he was leaning against the counter with a smirk on his face.
“If you’re going to punish her, then I’m going to be there.”
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to object to that or not. Ash looked at me, her blue eyes wide and I knew exactly what I had to do.
This is for her. Not you. Her.
“We’re not doing it in your room.”
His smile widened.
“Not doing it in yours either.”
“Fine. Guest room then.”
“You have a guest room?” Ash asked. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I wanted you in my bed only.”
“We should really give it to her,” Xav said. “Since she’s staying, aren’t you, angel?”
She looked between us.
“I don’t want to go back to Papa.”
I had no idea what to say to that. Right now all I wanted was her bent over a fucking bed so I could paint her arse red with my palm. So I didn’t speak, I just walked out of the kitchen with her in my arms. Xav followed us as I stalked along the hallway and upstairs. This whole thing was fucking insane, but I was well past caring. I needed to have her so I could calm the fuck down and make up my mind about her revelation.
We stopped outside the guest bedroom door. I realised I needed something from my own bedroom before we did this so I handed her to Xav. Ash looked between us with confusion.
“I want her stripped and bent over the edge of the bed.”
I didn’t even stop to see if either of them had listened to what I’d said as I walked away to my bedroom. It was as if I was on autopilot so I didn’t have to think about the fact that I was going to punish Ash and then fuck her in front of one of my best friends. If I thought about it too hard, I wouldn’t go through with it.
This is about her.
I snagged a bottle of lube from my bedside table. It was time she gave me what I’d been preparing her for. If she expected me to be remotely on board with any of this shit, then she’d fucking well do as I told her. She’d take it.
When I reached the guest bedroom, I found her naked and waiting with Xav sitting by her head. I shut the door and flipped the lock so we wouldn’t have any interruptions.
What the fuck are we doing right now?
Shoving my thoughts and concerns about the whole situation to the side, I stalked towards her. I set the bottle on the bed and looked down at my beautiful little girl laying there waiting for me. Then I looked up and met Xav’s eyes. He gave me a nod. I don’t know why that made this okay, but it did.
“Are you ready, little girl?”
“Yes, sir, please punish me.”
“I’m going to give you forty strikes. Do you understand why that is?”
“I’ve been a very bad girl, sir.”
Fuck yes you have. You’ve asked me to be okay with sharing you and I’m not fucking well okay with it.
I took a breath. I had to lock down my own fucked up emotional state.
Then I laid into her, not giving her any warning or mercy. So even though it hurt my own hand to spank her this hard, I didn’t give a shit. She whimpered and shifted as I struck her again and again. Her fingers gripped the sheets in an iron hold, her knuckles going white. I could see how much pain she was in even if she wanted this and something inside me snapped.
“Kiss her.”
The words were out of my mouth before I even knew what the fuck I was saying.
Xav’s eyebrows shot up, “Are you sur—”
“Fucking kiss her.”
I watched him lean down, tilt Ash’s face up and plant his mouth on hers. My rhythm didn’t stop. My palm kept hitting her soft skin, making her arse and thighs blossom the most delightful shade of red. My chest tightened at the sight of Xav kissing her, but the strangest thing about it was I didn’t feel uneasy. She needed something to distract her from the pain and he could give that to her.
Her fingers uncurled from the covers and tangled in his hair. A small moan of pleasure erupted from her lips. That sound made me harder than I already was. My cock ached with the need
to be inside her, but I hadn’t finished punishing my little girl yet.
Just ten more strikes and you can bury your cock in her.
I made them count. My palm was stinging all over by the time I was done. I panted and fell forward, keeping one hand planted on the bed to stop myself from crushing her. She let go of Xav and let out a low moan of pain. When she looked back at me, her face was tear-streaked and her blue eyes were full of emotions.
“Thank you, sir.”
I reached out and tugged her face up to mine, not giving a shit she’d kissed him as I crashed my mouth to hers. She’d been pushed to her limits and I needed her to know it was okay. That she was a good fucking girl for taking it so well.
“You’ve been so good, little girl,” I whispered before I pulled away.
Her smile was radiant. She needed praise. My praise.
Then I looked at Xav. He had a sly smile on his face.
“If I take my dick out, you’re not going to get any fucked up ideas about what’s happening here.”
He put his hands up.
“Hey, I have zero interest in your dick, man. If I’m with a guy, it’s because I want to fuck him not the other way around.”
It’s not like I’d ever asked Xav what exactly he was into. We didn’t talk about that shit. The only person I’d ever really discussed sex in detail with was Rory and that was due to us sharing the same interests.
Ash looked back at me, the bewilderment clear as day on her face.
“Are… are you going to fuck me in front of him?”
Did I want to fuck Ash in front of Xav? Not particularly. This was something we had to do. I didn’t know why. It just was.
“Does it look like he’s going anywhere?”
“I… Oh… I didn’t expect…”
“Spread your legs.”
She did as I said immediately even though she still looked more than a little confused. Hell, I was fucking confused myself. None of this made any sense. Nothing about this was something I’d ever consider doing in my life.