by Pam Godwin
His distress was a knife through Ricky’s heart.
“Are you okay?” She reached for Martin.
“Yeah.” He let her touch his jaw, and the contact seemed to chase his demons back to wherever they came from. The shadows in his eyes receded, and the cords in his neck relaxed.
No wonder he was celibate. He was navigating around a switch inside him. When it flipped on, it went full throttle, barreling him into a vicious sexual rage.
Ricky wanted him rough, ruthless, and out of control, but not if it caused Martin pain. He needed to figure out how to ease Martin forward without taking too many agonizing steps back.
“I know you said you don’t have an issue with touching.” She leaned up on an elbow, her brows knitted as she searched Martin’s face. “But you have a past like mine, don’t you? It helps to talk about—”
“No.” Martin glared at her.
She drew back, her shoulders hitching toward her ears.
Ricky shot Martin a disapproving look. “It’s not you, Tula. He hasn’t told me anything about his life before I met him. He keeps that shit locked down.”
“Until he’s in an intimate situation.” Her eyes darted through the room before returning to Martin. “Does it affect all your sexual relationships? Or is it just us?”
Martin’s nostrils flared, and Ricky held his breath.
“I’m sorry.” She cringed. “That was too personal.”
“Don’t be sorry.” Martin softened his expression and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “It’s not you. But there’s definitely something about you. I don’t know what it is…” He stared at her as if utterly gobsmacked. “I haven’t had sex in seven years, and I can’t for the life of me figure out why I just told you that.”
Compassion soaked her quiet eyes, her face a portrait of unguarded trust.
“That’s why.” He trailed a finger along her cheekbone and looked up at Ricky. “You see what I see?”
“Yeah, I see her.”
She was too trusting. While it was a trait that made overprotective guys like him and Martin want to throat-punch any man who looked at her, it didn’t belong in a place like this.
Trusting the wrong person in Jaulaso would get her killed, and she put a helluva lot of trust in Hector La Rocha.
“See what?” Her voice lowered with suspicion. “What do you see?”
“You’re an inherently good person.” Ricky stroked her hair. “Because of that, you see goodness in others, even when it doesn’t exist.”
Her eyes flared. “That’s another way of calling me naive.”
She sat up and started to scramble out from between them.
Martin gripped her leg and yanked her down to her back as Ricky bent over her.
“Don’t overreact.” He nipped at her lips.
“I’m not,” she growled, twisting her hips in Martin’s hold.
“You’re overreacting.” Ricky curled a hand beneath her jaw. “No one said you’re naive. I’ll reserve that label for our conversation about Hector’s sex trafficking operation.”
Anger sparked in her eyes, and her mouth opened. He silenced her with a finger against her lips.
“Not tonight.” He slid his hand down her neck and traced the hollow of her throat. “Tonight, we’re going to give you what you want.”
Her swallow bobbed against his touch. “You think you can subdue me with kisses?”
“Totally.”
She flung a questioning look at Martin.
“My money’s on Ricky,” Martin said.
“Do you even have any money?” She cocked a brow.
They had millions in the bank because of Van, but that was a detail they couldn’t share.
Martin answered her with a mysterious smile. He didn’t share those smiles often, so when one appeared, it was disarming.
She sighed beneath it. “I don’t understand how the two most attractive men on the planet ended up here, in prison, with me. It defies the laws of the universe. Can you explain it to me?”
She would lose her mind if she saw all the Freedom Fighters together.
Van Quiso and Liv Reed had handpicked every single one of them based on the slave buyers’ specifications. Physical beauty was always a requirement.
Ricky didn’t give a fuck what he looked like, but he appreciated her compliment and showed her as much by stealing a kiss.
The featherlight touch of lips gave way to another, then another, until the flames lit and the slide of their mouths caught fire.
Martin settled in beside them, his face inches away. When Ricky leaned back, Martin moved in and twisted a hand in her hair.
Watching Tula and Martin together was a feast for the eyes. They stared at each other, their lips not quite touching as their tongues reached and slid together in the space between their open mouths. She angled her head to take him deeply, and he dove in, their hands clawing and gripping with equal urgency.
When Martin’s breathing lost rhythm, and his biting became too aggressive, Ricky crowded in and took his place.
Back and forth they went. Kissing her. Kissing each other. Three mouths vying for affection. Three pairs of legs tangling together. Hands grasping and wandering over clothes, and the sounds of panting groans rising into a crescendo.
Martin worked them into a feverish frenzy, and Ricky slowed them down, drew it out.
Between stretches of breathless kissing, they talked and laughed about nothing and everything.
When their lips fell still, they curled up in the cozy silences, content with their thoughts.
Hours later, the clock on her phone struck three in the morning. She still wanted that shower.
Ricky led them through the dark, eerily vacant corridors to the communal bathroom on the ground level.
He and Martin took up posts by the door, listening to her clothing fall on the floor followed by the sound of water sluicing over her naked body. He only needed to take two steps into the bathroom, and he would have a direct view of her around the corner.
“Don’t even think about it.” Martin crossed his arms over his chest and held up the wall with his back.
“Don’t act like you’re not tempted.”
“I’ve had enough temptations for one night.” Martin’s gaze dropped to Ricky’s mouth and shifted toward the sound of splashing water. “She’s…”
Exquisitely sweet. Sharp as a whip. Sexy as fuck.
“The whole package.” Ricky dropped his head back against the doorframe.
“Yeah.” Martin lowered his voice. “The next three months are going to fly by.”
“And she has three years after we leave.”
They couldn’t lengthen their sentences or shorten hers. It was an impossible situation with a nebulous outcome.
If she changed her plea to guilty, she might be able to transfer to a prison in the States. She would be safer there. But would she be willing to carry a guilty conviction for the rest of her life?
It was too soon to predict how her priorities might change or where the three of them would go from here. He didn’t know how deep her cartel loyalties ran or if she would be able to leave those ties behind after prison. What if she couldn’t escape Hector’s control?
Bottom line, he and Martin were here for one reason, and they needed her help.
Once they convinced her Hector was rotten to the soul, they would have her spy for them, whether it be listening to conversations, digging through documents in Hector’s private quarters, or using her sweet personality to coax information directly from Hector’s mouth.
She didn’t know it yet, but she was going to help them bring down La Rocha’s sex trafficking operation.
Involving her, however, put her life at more risk than it already was. In Jaulaso, working against the cartel was more dangerous than working for it.
But that was where he and Martin drew the line. They would never join La Rocha. Sure, it would make their time here easier—fewer bruises and bloodied knuckles. Becoming a me
mber, however, went against everything they fought for.
As cartel soldiers, they would be required to sell drugs, trade guns, collect money, and kill traitors. All of that shit contributed to a despicable machine that sold women and children into slavery.
He and Martin didn’t plant themselves in prison to make La Rocha Cartel stronger. They were here to demolish it.
“I needed that.” She stepped around the corner, her long black hair dripping down her tattooed arms, dampening her clean yellow shirt. “If you want to take a shower, this is the best time. There’s no one around if you drop the soap.”
With a nod, Martin breezed past her, yanking off his shirt as he headed toward the showers. “I don’t want you out of our sight.”
“I’ll wait by the door.” She combed her fingers through her wet hair.
Ricky shook his head. “You don’t have to watch us, but we need to be able to see you.” He pointed at the bend in the bathroom. “Stand there. It’ll give you a line of sight to us and the door.”
“Why do I need to wait around at all?” She glanced at the exit. “It’s late.”
“You’re sleeping with us from now on.” He stepped into her space and pressed his lips to hers. A small touch with a significant message. “The moment we kissed you, you became ours. Our girl. Our responsibility. Ours to protect.”
Her eyes softened, and she slipped her hands into her back pockets. “That’s a nice thing to say.” She turned her face away, her voice thready. “It would really suck if you guys are playing me.”
“That goes both ways.”
The shower sounded around the corner. In a few seconds, he would rest his eyes on Martin’s naked body in a way he’d never been able to before.
Focus, Ricardo.
She raised her chin and gave him direct eye contact. “Do you have an alliance with another cartel or gang?”
The Freedom Fighters weren’t just aligned with the Restrepo Cartel. They were married to it, literally, by way of their leader, Camila Dias-Restrepo.
A pang of guilt pinched his stomach. He hated keeping secrets from her, but one thing he wouldn’t do was fill her head with lies.
“I can feed you reassuring words.” He hooked his thumbs under the front of his waistband, deliberately keeping his hands to himself. “I can kiss you until you melt. Touch you until you scream my name. Or God’s name. Same thing.” He winked. “But I can’t force you to trust me. That requires a valiant act of heroism, and I’m fresh out of those at the moment.” He shrugged. “So this—you and me and Martin—this trust we need to build between us? It’s going to take time. You know what they say in prison?”
“We have nothing but time.”
She believed they had at least three years together. It broke his fucking heart.
“Put your ass where I can see you.” He smacked a kiss on her mouth. “And don’t move.”
She tried to shape those fuckable lips into a scowl, but a smile broke through. “What am I going to do with you?”
He pulled off his shirt and stared down at the fly of his jeans. “You can start with—”
“Stop right there.” She held up a hand and stepped to the spot he’d directed her.
“I was going to say…” He tossed his shirt at her. “Bury your nose in that and get used to my scent. You’re going to be covered in it from now on.”
“Overly optimistic, aren’t you?”
“Confident, querida.” He approached the showers, and his breath ran away from him.
Martin stood under the spray of water, his palms flat against the wall in front of him and defined arms bracing his upper body.
Rivers of water followed the carved grooves in his torso and trickled over the flanks of his tight ass.
“I can feel you staring.” Martin lifted his head.
Their gazes collided, and he had to remind himself to breathe.
Distractions were out of the question. No flirty eye contact. No thinking about hand jobs in the bathroom. Even at three in the morning, this was a dangerous place for a man to get caught with his pants down.
He glanced back at Tula.
She stood stiffly against the wall, her body angled slightly away. With her eyes on the door, she held his wadded shirt against her chest.
If anything happened to her…
He couldn’t let his mind go there.
Stripping his clothes, he joined Martin under the warm spray.
A bar of soap served as shampoo and body wash. He lathered and rinsed quickly, trying his damnedest to ignore the heated glances from the man beside him.
His cock, however, ate up the attention, swelling with blood and rising toward his abs.
“Your timing sucks.” He scrubbed his hands over his whiskered face. “You’ve had years to look, man.”
“I did look. I devoured every inch of you when you weren’t paying attention.”
His dick throbbed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t want to lead you on.” Martin shifted to stand in front of him, keeping Tula in their periphery. “But now… I don’t know. The rules are different here.”
The rules changed because of a beautiful woman. Between her and the kiss she dared them to share, there was no turning back.
“Finish up.” Martin leaned closer and put his mouth at Ricky’s ear. “And keep your hands off your cock.”
Martin slammed a palm against Ricky’s ass, echoing a smack through the room and shooting shockwaves through his body.
“Killing me,” he muttered and finished the shower in record time.
Back in their cell, he lit the scented candle to battle the sewage smell and shut off the light.
The flame cast shadows over her and Martin, where they lay diagonally across the two mattresses. She burrowed into the den of Martin’s body, her arms around him, and her eyes already closed in sleep.
Crawling in behind her, Ricky folded an arm around her waist and rested his hand against Martin’s chest.
Those glittering green eyes found him across the space above her head. Hooded and warm, they looked content, happy even.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Ricky whispered. “To be held. To be needed.”
“Yeah.” Martin rested his mouth against her head.
“I’ve always needed you.”
“I know.”
The silence that followed churned with their wants, their fears, and everything in between.
They had to earn her trust, navigate Martin’s demons, steal Hector’s secrets, and try not to get raped or killed in the process.
But right now, they had this. Skin, heartbeats, and breaths aligned in an unbroken moment. A moment to fight for.
The next week dragged Ricky through the nine circles of hell. Between bone-bruising fights with inmates, lusting after the two people in his bed, and his guilt over hiding secrets from Tula, he felt as though he were running backward in a race against time.
Adding to that was the festering misery of prison life. The despair, the restlessness, the destruction of bodies that the inmates never seemed to grow sick of—there was an abundance of self-hatred in Jaulaso.
But for all the violence, guilt, and torment in limbo, there were glimpses of heaven. They dwelled in the slide of soft lips and hungry tongues.
Christ, the kissing. He’d never devoted so much time and attention to another person’s mouth, but holy fuck, that was where it was at.
All those years of dating, countless lovers, Van’s sexual training… How had he not discovered the sinful pleasure in a kiss?
He was addicted to it now. Good thing, because after a week of sharing a bed with Tula and Martin, kissing was all they’d done.
Martin had intimacy issues. Tula was hellbent on them joining La Rocha Cartel, and Ricky was left with a crumbling plan, two blue balls, and a black eye.
His busted face was a gift from a four-hundred-pound inmate in the common area two days ago. Martin had managed to escape that particular fight unscathed.
The other times, however, he hadn’t been so lucky.
Since they only ventured out among the prisoners while Tula was in meetings, she hadn’t watched them get their asses kicked over and over. But she was always there to clean them up afterward.
“She’s been gone too long.” Martin bent over the sink in their cell, scraping a razor against the stubble on his jaw.
She met with Hector a lot. Sometimes it was a meeting with his advisers. Other times, she slipped away, saying she needed to check in with him.
She swore up and down he never touched her, never hurt her in any way. Didn’t stop Ricky from chewing a hole in his cheek. He fucking hated every second she wasn’t within eyeshot.
The reclusive cartel boss rarely left his private quarters. In the ten days they’d been here, they’d only spotted the old man twice. When they passed him in the hall, he was surrounded by guards and didn’t spare them a single glance.
But he knew they were there. Tula didn’t spend all that time with him without talking about the men she shared a bed with every night.
Was she talking about them right now?
Ricky lowered onto the mattress. “With any luck, we planted a seed of doubt in her head, enough to make her question every interaction she has with him.”
“She’s smart. If she’s suspicious of him, she’ll dig, ask questions, and find her way to the truth.”
“That could work against us, too. If Hector doesn’t trust us—”
“That’s a given.” Martin set the razor aside and rinsed his face.
“Then he’s putting the doubts about us in her head.”
If she discovered their loyalty to Restrepo, she would feel betrayed. Not just because they worked for a sworn enemy, but because they’d kept it from her.
The sooner they got her on their side, the better.
“You need to seal the deal.” Martin inspected his face in the mirror, searching for stubble he’d missed.
“Meaning?”
“Fuck her, Ricky.” He turned and folded his arms across his chest. “A woman like that doesn’t have sex with a man she doesn’t trust. If you open her legs, you’ll open her heart.”
“That sounds like a great plan. Love her then leave her in three months.”