Perry and Her Princes

by Serena Akeroyd

  He hid a laugh as he drank down his draught beer. On the rare occasions Perry did let loose, he never drank too much. She was a lightweight, and he usually enjoyed the entertainment she provided when drunk.

  At this moment, her rather loudly declared statement had invited the attention of the three tables around them. A testament to how loud she could be considering there was a DJ playing chill-out tracks behind them as they slumped on the low, squashy sofas.

  “What about it?” he asked, when she started squinting at the still fizzing crème de menthe pre-hangover cure. “Is it supposed to do that?”

  “I don’t know,” she told him. “It tastes weird.”

  “It’s crème de menthe—of course, it tastes weird. I’m surprised they even had it here.”

  She huffed. “I read it online.”

  “So, it must be true.”

  “The other stuff online is true.”

  “What like?”

  She peered around, managing to look more Pink Panther than spy extraordinaire, and dug out her phone. He watched her open an app, tap in a few words—that took far longer considering her fingers were all over the place—and when she passed him it, he felt his cock harden, his brain melt, and everything that he thought he’d known about Perry tilt on its head.

  “What’s this?” he asked woodenly, trying hard not to start scrolling through the images before him.

  “It’s a blog site,” she retorted, managing to be helpfully unhelpful.

  “I can see that. Why are you searching for this stuff?” He sighed again when she raised her finger to her lips and blew out a shushing sound. “Why is it a secret?”

  “Because it’s two men. And one woman.” Her eyes were big again. “At the same time.”

  He swallowed thickly. “If anyone’s eyes aren’t working here, it’s yours. I know what I’m looking at.”

  “You do?” Her mouth gaped. “You’ve seen it before?”

  He curled his lips inward. “Maybe,” he hedged. “What made you search for it?”

  “I read something about it.”

  “Where? Cosmo?”

  She snorted. “Since when do I read Cosmo?”

  “I don’t know, Perry. Since when do you look at porn GIFS of threesomes?”

  Perry hissed out a breath. “Omigod, you said that so loud!” she moaned, glancing around and dramatically clapping her hands to her cheeks. “Everyone heard.”

  “No one heard,” he dismissed. “Tell me, Perry. When did you start looking at stuff like this?”

  She bit her lip. “When I found this book on Amazon.”

  “What kind of book?”

  “It had lots of men on the cover.”

  “So?”

  “It’s this new thing.”

  Impatiently, he gritted out, “What new thing?”

  “OMGee,” she wailed. “You’re mad at me. Are you ashamed to be my friend?”

  He scowled. “Never.” When she carried on wailing and slurping crème de menthe down, he grabbed her hand and snatched the drink from her fingers—this conversation was way too important to be blurred by more alcohol and aspirin poisoning. He didn’t approve of the concoction but hell, he’d drunk worse in his glory days. “Perry, focus. I’m not ashamed. I’m curious.”

  “You are?”

  “Yes.” He sought patience, but it was hard. This felt like… Okay, so a dream might sound exaggerated. But this was starting to feel heaven sent. “Now, what’s the new thing you’ve been reading?”

  “It’s where a woman has lots of men as lovers and partners. It’s not just about the sex though.”

  His nostrils flared. He’d bet it wasn’t about the sex—ha. “Where does it say that it’s bad if it’s about the sex?”

  She squinted at him again. “I can’t tell if you’re being a prude or not.”

  George laughed. “I’m not a prude, Perry.”

  “You’re not? I don’t think I am,” she declared. “But I might be.”

  “Would you like to be one of the women in those books?” he asked, trying not to sound too eager.

  “I think so. But it seems complicated. I’d just like an orgasm,” she screeched out of nowhere, and this time, definitely gained the attention of the tables around them. “George, is that so much to ask? Maybe if I have a whole team of guys they’d get me off. I mean, it can’t be so hard, can it?”

  Of course, he’d chosen that moment to take a sip of lager and he sprayed the table at her declaration. Coughing, he reached for his handkerchief and dabbed at his mouth. “I’m sure if you had a few men tending to your needs, you wouldn’t have a problem,” he soothed.

  She gulped. “Some women don’t need to be tag teamed to have an orgasm,” she mumbled peevishly.

  “No,” he said consideringly. “But each to their own.” As her words salsaed around his head, he had to ask, “Perry, have you never orgasmed before?”

  His best friend clapped her hands over her face. “No,” she said, wailing the word again.

  For a second, he just gawked at her, then, as he processed that, he clicked his fingers to gain the attention of the waiter nearby. “Vodka shots, please. Bring the bottle.” He passed the crème de menthe disaster back to the server. “You can take this away too, thanks.”

  Perry pouted. “I liked that drink.”

  “You didn’t a minute ago. And that wasn’t a drink. It was poison waiting to happen.”

  “I don’t like vodka.”

  “You will in the morning,” he promised her, watching as she scowled at that logic. Did she but know it, the last thing Perry would appreciate in the morning was any recollection of this conversation.

  She’d die of mortification if she even remembered a smidgen of it.

  As her best friend, it was his duty to get her drunker to deaden a few brain cells.

  As the man who’d loved her for too many fucking years, as the man who’d been pining for what could never be, well, it was time to get to work…

  The work, of course, had been months in the making. But he was so close now. So fucking close, he could feel it.

  Perry was almost his. Orgasms were almost hers. And those naughty little desires she’d been troubled about, were on the brink of coming to fruition…

  George rubbed his chin as he squinted out onto his bedroom; a room that hadn’t changed since he’d redecorated at fifteen. He hadn’t bothered to alter it since though he’d stayed here often before moving to America after finishing his undergraduate studies at Cambridge, but now as he peered around, he found it hard to believe he was back. And with Perry in tow.

  Choosing a college in America had been a decision based more on personal reasoning than for his career. As the spare heir, not a lot was expected of him. He could have been a playboy if he’d wanted, so long as he went to enough events and galas and helped buoy the DeSauvier name rather than help it drown in anti-royalist muck.

  His MBA hadn’t been necessary. Not technically. But personally, it had been imperative.

  Separating himself from Edward, putting an end to their odd… He winced at the word fetish, though he knew many would call it that.

  How was it a fetish though? He didn’t get off on being with his brother. It wasn’t incestuous. Not one bit.

  It turned him on to share a woman with Edward. To see her totally overwhelmed, gluttonous on a pleasure that turned her insensate, a pleasure that he and Edward could give her by focusing all their time and effort on her.

  For men, sex was usually a selfish act. About them getting their rocks off. For he and Edward, it was the exact opposite.

  Denying that for all these years had been…Well, hard was understating the issue.

  He’d left when Edward had married. Knowing his brother wouldn’t share his wife, as well as the fact George didn’t want to share Arabella who’d made the South Pole look warm in comparison, had made it easier to decide on Harvard for his MBA.

  Then, when he’d met Perry…

  Down the rabb
it hole he’d fallen once more.

  He’d opened the drapes last night before he’d crashed in bed. That was the only reason why the morning sun was piercing his retinas. Normally the staff closed them at night, so that had to explain it.

  Staggering out from between the silk sheets, he peered down at himself and saw he was in his briefs—he really didn’t remember stripping off.

  Grabbing the top sheet from his bed, he wrapped himself up in it, covering his shoulders too as he hunched over and headed for the windows.

  As he approached though, he decided he didn’t want to go back to bed.

  He wanted to see Perry.

  Barefoot, he headed for the door and though it would be frowned upon for him to leave his quarters dressed inappropriately, he also knew his parents weren’t going to scold him. Not after so many years away.

  Taking full advantage of that, he stayed huddled in the sheet and headed into the hall.

  Because he didn’t give a shit about being caught, naturally, the hall was empty. Had he cared, his mother would have walked down the corridor… Murphy’s law sucked sometimes.

  Rolling his eyes, he headed two doors down for the bedroom where they’d stashed Perry.

  Yesterday, before they’d been shown to their quarters, he’d rearranged the sleeping plan. His mother had put her in a guest suite outside their private quarters. But Perry wasn’t a guest.

  She was his family.

  Had become that after the years they’d shared together in Boston. He wanted more, of course. But that link would never die. He’d never let it.

  He knocked on the door and didn’t bother waiting. If she was half-dressed, then he’d get an eyeful—good. If she was in her PJs, it wasn’t like he hadn’t seen her that way before either.

  It was probably a jerk move, but though he didn’t care if he got caught dressed like a hobbit out in the corridor, he’d prefer not to get a bollocking.

  Stepping inside and quickly closing the door behind him, he turned to face the ‘tulip’ room and reared back at the sight before him.

  Eyes widening, his mouth worked when he saw a dozing Perry cuddled up beside his cousin Xavier.

  Outrage flushed through him.

  She was his.

  Fuck, didn’t she know that?

  He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up further—not that he cared. All his plans were… felled. At the final hurdle, it seemed. Had Edward been on the bed, he’d have been happy. But Xavier? He loved the bastard, but… he wasn’t supposed to be a part of this.

  Perry was supposed to be his and Edward’s. And Xavier was just enough of a geek to be exactly Perry’s type. She’d fall for him.

  He could see it all. His wishes and desires, hopes and needs, unravelling before his very eyes.

  When…? How…?

  Xavier hadn’t even been expected to attend! He’d have introduced them otherwise.

  George hadn’t strayed from her side all evening, save for at the end… he’d left her to talk to a few politicians. She’d glowered at him but had seemed to understand his position. The Prime Minister, Luc Montfort, had wanted to speak in Veronian, even though it was the height of rudeness, and he’d felt compelled to appease the man who was usually a thorn in his father’s side.

  Montfort was anti-royalist and hated the royal family. But, the DeSauviers were beloved by the people so Montfort had to grit his teeth and bear it.

  The family made it a point to always accommodate him, even if he was irritating as fuck.

  When he’d gone back for her, Perry had been nowhere in sight and he’d figured she’d returned to her rooms. When he’d been dragged off by another politician intent on bending his ear about a financial situation in the stock markets, his thoughts had drifted off.

  It would seem she had come back to her bedroom.

  With Xavier.

  Tears pricked his eyes. That was how hard the knowledge Perry had slept with Xavier hit him. It was like a punch to the gut. The horror, the hurt.

  He sucked in a deep breath, trying to quell the stupid emotions from dancing around his veins.

  He wasn’t the type to cry but he’d…

  He closed his eyes.

  George had pinned everything on Perry. He’d known she’d get to Edward. Had known, if anyone could do it, Perry would make it happen… He and Edward could fulfill the fantasies that both liberated and imprisoned them, all through her.

  Was it fair to put so much on her small shoulders?

  No. Of course not. But George knew Perry.

  He knew her in ways some husbands didn’t know their wives. He knew the little and the large, the embarrassing and the amusing… She would flourish in their care. He knew it like he knew his fucking face in the mirror.

  Xavier stirred on the bed, dragging George’s attention to him.

  They were both semi-naked. Perry’s legs were splayed, her beautiful body half covered by the dress he’d handpicked for her—all her new clothes had been chosen personally by him. Did she but know it. The gown’s skirts were tugged up around her waist, the bodice lowered to reveal the luscious swells of breasts he’d wanked over in the shower.

  A shaky breath escaped him, then as he looked away from his cousin’s bare ass, his gaze was caught by Xavier’s.

  His cousin had been laying on his belly. A position that told George he’d practically fallen asleep on top of Perry after climaxing.

  Xavier frowned at the sight of him. “George?”

  His voice was low, and Perry didn’t stir.

  George swallowed, his gaze switching to Perry. Xavier shifted, covering her slightly. The gentlemanly move had him clenching his jaw.

  At least Xavier wasn’t a playboy. If she had to fuck anyone, it was someone who wouldn’t hurt her. His cousin was more likely to forget about her thanks to some weird botanical experiment he was holding in his greenhouses back on his estate… not through cheating on her.

  Breath soughed from his lungs.

  It was why he and Perry would be perfect for one another.

  She was a scientist too. Xavier and she could discuss…

  “George?” Xavier said a little louder this time, jerking his attention back to his cousin. “What are you doing here?”

  Perry wriggled on the bed, letting out a sleepy, pleasured sigh that had George cringing. She snuggled into Xavier.

  “Why are you talking to George?” she asked sleepily.

  “Because he’s in your bedroom,” Xavier commented wryly, his own voice still gruff from slumber.

  She stiffened, then relaxed. “Don’t be silly,” she giggled, turning her face into Xavier’s arm.

  The move nearly broke George’s heart.

  “I’m not,” Xavier retorted.

  “He’s not,” George said grimly.

  The time to leave the room had gone the moment he’d closed the door. He could have sneaked out, neither of them would have known he’d caught them together.

  But that time was long gone…What was he doing?

  Why hadn’t he left? He didn’t know the answer to either question, just knew he couldn’t move. Couldn’t take his eyes away from this tableau of sensuality.

  Perry sat up, revealing her surprisingly long spine. For someone so short, it seemed disproportionate, but hell, he’d still spread kisses down each nodule if he could. Disproportionate be damned.

  Over her shoulder, she peered at him. Her eyes flared wide in distress when they met his.

  “George? What are you doing here?”

  It interested him that she didn’t try to cover up—even though he couldn’t see anything from this angle, a fact she had to be aware of but still…

  “I was going to order breakfast in bed for us,” he said a little gruffly, his voice strained with emotion.

  Xavier cleared his throat. “Are you okay?”

  He clenched his jaw. What did he say to that? No. You just fucked up a plan that has been nearly six years in the making?

  In a flash, he c
ould see everything derailing, and for the life of him, he couldn’t allow it.

  Edward was nowhere near ready to deal with this, Perry wasn’t either. He’d never prepared her. Never mentioned his predilections to her… never even mentioned that he thought of her as more than just a friend.

  He was the only one in way over his head here.

  “Perry, I need to talk to you.” He cut his cousin a glance. “Alone.”

  A scowl flashed across Xavier’s brow, but Perry spoke first, “George. Now is not the time.”

  He shook his head. “I know. But that doesn’t change things. I need to speak with you. Five minutes.”

  The plea in his voice stunned even him, and it had Perry’s eyes widening further in her distress.

  It didn’t escape his notice that Xavier didn’t offer to leave—this was no coyote ugly for his cousin, it would seem. He had no intention of sneaking off after a cheeky one-night stand.

  Gnawing at his cheek, he repeated, “Just five minutes. In the dressing room.”

  She sighed, turned back to facing forward and did a little shimmy. He’d have wondered what she was doing but he saw her fasten the bodice of her dress and realized she was making herself presentable.

  The last thing he wanted was her to be that.

  Not wanting to embarrass her in front of Xavier, more than he already had at any rate, he strode on ahead, passing the small seating area with its spindly gilded framing and heavily embroidered upholstery to the dressing area of the quarters.

  Opening the door, he strode in and waited for her to join him.

  He kept his back to the door, choosing to look onto the empty rows within the walk-in closet—the capsule wardrobe he’d bought her was tiny in comparison to the cavernous area. He’d handpicked each piece though he knew she believed he’d passed off the task to his PA. Had dreamed of watching her slip into some of the items that would cling to her skin rather than drape over her lush form in baggy swells.

  When he heard the door close behind her, he remained with his back turned, his gaze glued to one dress that had been the recent star of some of his wet dreams.

  “What’s going on, George? Jeez, this is so embarrassing.” She sounded flustered, and he disliked himself for having caused that, but… She needed to know this.