Mallory took long, deep breaths, filling her lungs with the spicy male scent of her lovers and the musk of sex filling the room. The bed sank and rebounded as Lincoln slipped off to deposit his condom. Gabe’s hand combed through her hair, helping to calm her as she battled for control.
He pressed a kiss to her cheek and another below her ear before he whispered, low and seductive, “You don’t think you’re done, do you?”
Shaky, she picked her head up from his chest, looking down into Gabe’s eyes. His overly confident lead man bravado shone through, the smile on his lips wicked, curling her insides. “I’m not done yet.”
He swirled his pelvis, his still-hard cock circling inside her. His palms stroked her hips, glided along her stomach until they reached her pussy. He brushed her clit, her cunt clenching around him, rekindling her need. But after only a brief touch, he retreated, leaving her wanting.
“I think it’s time you do some of the work.” He gripped her thighs, hoisting her farther over his torso.
Mallory giggled, the sound morphing into a moan as she pushed up and dropped back down on Gabe’s lap. His hands smoothed up her stomach, captured her breasts, and tugged on her nipples as she rode him. She gasped at the pinch, his thick shaft pulsing inside her, buried in her to the very limit.
“That’s it, love,” he encouraged through gritted teeth. He gripped her ass, propelling her movements. His nails scored her flesh, inciting her. She bit her lip, her hands clutching Gabe’s shoulders as she increased her speed, riding him fast and hard.
Mallory would have thought, with each progressive orgasm, climax would become harder to achieve. Yet her body reacted the opposite way. Pleasure already threatened to overwhelm her again, only minutes after her previous orgasm.
Beneath her Gabe groaned. His eyes slid closed in pleasure, his hands gripping her thighs. His fingers clenched her tight, his touch forceful enough to make her pussy ripple.
“Yes,” he moaned, holding her steady as he pushed his hips off the mattress, slamming into her.
Her body spasmed, overwhelming her with pleasure until she fell to the bed, exhausted.
Her rock-and-roll fantasy had to come to an end on a sizzling high note.
Her chest tightened at thought as she slid away from Gabe, suddenly in need of space, a moment to regain her control. She hadn’t allowed herself to consider before what would happen after New Year’s was over, but now she couldn’t stop thinking about the lonely future before her. Her time between these men was over. There wouldn’t be a second night or a long extended weekend. There was no relationship beyond this road stop.
Mallory took a deep breath, memorizing and mourning the loss. Her experience, pinned between these men, was already starting to fade. Like a dream, or a vision, which had never been real at all.
She’d never thought she’d be here, sandwiched between two men who knew how to please her, who cared for her. She’d never prepared herself for what she’d feel, for how she’d want to stay.
She’d made a resolution to get laid, to have some fun, but she’d never anticipated the sadness and distance that now overwhelmed her. Her mind tangled in thoughts and emotions she shouldn’t have, she had no right to feel, that would only hurt her more the longer she allowed them to continue.
Gabe rolled her onto his side, wrapping around her body like a mitten around a chilly hand, not allowing her to escape from her throbbing heart. Lincoln returned to the bed, enfolding her from the other side. Her two men held her as her restless mind drifted off to an exhausted slumber.
Chapter Seven
“Three-fifty, ma’am,” the glum tollbooth operator stated from her glassed-in stall. Mallory couldn’t blame her for her terse words. Running a tollbooth at 5:00 a.m. on New Year’s Day must be on the list of world’s worst jobs.
Mallory riffled through her bag, pushing aside receipts, her cell phone, and ticket stubs, searching for her wallet. She tried to remember if she’d shoved the leather contraption into her purse during her predawn cleanup, but the entire episode was a haze of uncertainty and panic Lincoln and Gabe would wake up before she’d escaped. If she’d somehow left it behind, she might have to stay here and work this booth until she paid her toll. She wasn’t going back there for anything.
The vehemence of her thoughts surprised Mallory. She’d never been one of those girls to get all sentimental and upset that a man only wanted one night with her. That’s just how some men were. After years of one-night stands, she’d become used to moving on. She’d never had a problem before returning to the scene of a one-night stand, especially for something as vital as her wallet.
But this time was different. She wouldn’t do it. She couldn’t do it. If she had to, she’d replace every credit card and identification in her wallet. But she wasn’t going back to that bus.
Her fingers crested a mangled piece of paper she didn’t recognize, smoother and softer than the cheap paper Mallory usually used for notes. Pulling the sheet out from the dark confines of her purse, she looked down at the soft green paper covered with shiny ornaments and sparkling snowflakes.
Though it had only been a few weeks ago, she’d almost forgotten about the gathering of her friends just before Christmas. It had been a long time since she’d been so comfortable and unguarded. Seeing all her friends from back in her teaching days, combined with great food and a good wine, had made her feel like herself again. Not the prickly, lonely woman she was forced to be on the road.
Plus, the gathering had given her a chance to pull at her uptight friend Giselle’s tautly tuned strings a few times. It was always so easy to irk Giselle. The fun of seeing her face go red and her ears stick out in anger hadn’t worn off in their many years of friendship.
Though she’d mocked Giselle’s for her belief that writing down what she wanted in a man on the elaborate holiday paper would bring that same man to her, she’d still written a list along with her friends. After all, it was worth a try, and it had been kind of fun to fantasize.
She must have thrown the list in her purse after that. She hadn’t thought of it since. What was the point?
“Ma’am.” The tollbooth operator’s irritated voice grated on her already fragile nerves. “It’s three fifty to go through the toll.”
“Of course.” Mallory continued to scrounge through her purse, her fingers cresting over leather behind the crumbled holiday list. Mallory bit her lip to keep back her scream of triumph at the find. She slipped four crisp bills from her wallet and handed them over to the woman in the tollbooth.
Her fingers still gripped the pricy card stock between her fingers, though she couldn’t explain why. The stupid paper shouldn’t mean anything. It was just a silly game played between girlfriends. She should just toss away the list with the same concern as novelty party hats from last night.
The rounded barricade in front of her car shook as it rose. Mallory tossed the frilly Christmas paper into the passenger seat beside her, using her other hand to wind up her window. She drove slowly through the stop, forcing herself to focus on the road. The suddenly itchy sheet covering her eyes distorted the road before her.
She made it less than a mile before she pulled over to the shoulder. The car jerked as she quickly shifted into park. She plucked the flamboyant holiday paper from the cloth bucket seat beside her, reading over the traits listed, detailing her dream man. Each item on the list echoed through her mind, evaluated against Lincoln and Gabe. She couldn’t have written a more perfect list to describe the two of them, not one or the other, but the two of them together.
Mallory’s chest suddenly felt tight, her breath difficult to hold. She bit her lip and swallowed, hoping to dislodge the thick film covering her throat, fighting back against the emotions trying to climb out. She was stronger than those feelings. She had to be.
She blinked, trying to clear the moisture evading her sight as she pulled her cell phone from her purse, flipped it open, and dialed the numbers automatically.
Pressing i
t to her ear, she heard the click of the other end picking up, but before they could speak, Mallory whispered into the phone, “Will you meet me?”
* * * *
Lincoln swallowed, rubbing his face into his pillow. The light fragrance of Mallory dappled the fabric, the aroma of oranges and cinnamon combined with a heady dose of sex lingered across the silk. His body responded instantly, the scent alone enough to make him hard again.
Lincoln reached his hand out for Mallory’s soft body. But only smooth sheet caressed his fingertips. All signs of the woman he and his best friend had spent all night pleasuring absent from the bed.
She couldn’t be gone. Lincoln spread his arms farther into the silk. She must be here. She couldn’t have skipped out on them after the most amazing night of sex in their lives. She wouldn’t have left them, not after everything they’d shared, everything they wanted to give to her.
“Linc, you can stop feeling up the bed. She left.”
Lincoln opened his eyes to see Gabe leaning against the doorway between the bedroom and living area of the bus. He held his guitar in his hands, as if he’d just finished playing, though Lincoln couldn’t recall hearing any music. His hair was disheveled from sleep, his chest bare. “What do you mean she left?” Lincoln rubbed his eyes, as if the morning blur would change the truth he’d awoken to.
She wasn’t the first woman to slip out on them in the middle of the night, but Mallory was different. Being together, the three of them, had been incredible beyond words. Better than any roaring crowd or Top Forty hit. She gave herself to them so freely, demanding and wanting with the same intensity and abandon they felt for her.
They could make more hits, play more engagements, earn more money. A woman like her was once in a lifetime.
“She was gone when I got up.”
Lincoln could hear the pain in his friend’s voice, and detested it. Almost as much as he hated the ache in the center of his own chest. How could she give away everything they’d found together, all the passion, and even love, they offered? It was the only explanation for why he suddenly felt so empty. His heartbeat reverberated in his chest, like a sad, mournful echo in a vacant stadium.
“I was waiting for you to wake up before we went after her.” Gabe’s voice interrupted, rough and raw, like old, rusty metal.
Lincoln sat up in bed, pushing back against the headboard. He pulled the sheets up to his torso. His gaze focused down. He couldn’t stand to look up at Gabe’s warm, hopeful eyes. The pain in his chest was like a deep aching hole he didn’t wish to burden his friend with. She’d left them. The woman he was sure they both wanted to spend their lives with. The one woman who had ever made them think this arrangement could be permanent.
“We are going after her, right, Linc?” Gabe’s voice was stern. The sound of the strings reverberating and the clunk of the body hitting the floor alerted Lincoln that he’d placed his guitar against the back wall, as if preparing to fight.
Lincoln released an exasperated breath. He wanted to go after her. More than anything in their bizarre rock-and-roll world, being with Mallory made sense. But he couldn’t be sure she wanted them, too. She’d walked away from them. She’d stolen out on them in the middle of the night. She’d left them without a note or good-bye, as if they didn’t matter to her at all.
Could she be interested in pursuing a relationship with the two of them? Their situation would never be normal or average. That didn’t bother him or Gabe. They’d passed normal two platinum records ago.
But if she had left because she wanted something normal, like what everyone else had, how could they deny her that? She may lead a different lifestyle, living on the road, interviewing bands, spending more time in tour buses and hotel rooms than her own home, but maybe they were wrong to believe she’d be open to a relationship like theirs would be.
Lincoln had always known it would be hard when he and Gabe finally found their match. Until now he hadn’t realized it would be hardest on Mallory. She might have to give up the people she loved, the future she dreamed of. They couldn’t force her to do that.
The pain in his chest was tender now, but would only get worse if they followed after her to be rejected again. He’d seen firsthand how painful it could be to hear the truth from the person you loved. His own father had been destroyed by his mother’s truths. Could he and Gabe bear to listen to all the reasons they couldn’t be together from her soft lips? Would it ruin everything between them to know the truth?
If she didn’t want to be with them, he and Gabe weren’t about to coerce her, even if it would kill them to let her go. Lincoln might have a controlling and demanding side in the bedroom, but he wasn’t the same outside of it. He needed her to want them, to come to them, to love them, of her own free will.
Lincoln flashed back to last night, reassessing Mallory’s every look and moan. She’d loved every minute with them. He’d stake his next record advance on it. What he didn’t understand was why she’d left, why she’d turn her back on so much pleasure, walking away from two men who loved her.
They’d waited for her. One long year of waiting, and maybe it hadn’t been enough. Maybe she never would have been ready to be with them. But either way, they’d lost her. Lincoln refused to become a broken shell of a man by searching for something that was never his to begin with, and he would never allow that to happen to himself or Gabe.
“She left us, Gabe, not the other way around. If she wanted to be with us, she would be. What’s the point in chasing after her?”
“You wanker,” Gabe screamed, slamming his hand into the felt-covered walls in frustration. Lincoln looked up at his friend’s harsh tone, meeting the fire in Gabe’s eyes. Gabe was usually so even-tempered that the anger staring back at him startled Lincoln. “I waited a year for her because of you. For you. Because you were my best mate.
“Do you have any idea how many times I was close to just taking her?” Gabe’s accusing glare followed him, pinning Lincoln to the bed. “When she touched my hand while we ordered drinks at the Alternative Beats award party, I could have kissed her. She looked up at me with those sparkling eyes and pouty lips and I knew she’d let me, but I didn’t, because you said she wasn’t ready. When we danced at the Stamp Out Hunger Fundraiser, I could have taken her home that night. She would have come. I know it. But I waited, because you said it wasn’t the right time.
“Don’t you understand, Lincoln, this whole time I’ve been waiting for you, not her. Mallory would have come with us any time, and yes it may have taken more work to keep her or convince her we loved her. But that’s not what we’ve been waiting for. You’re the one who wasn’t ready, mate.”
Gabe picked up his prize Strat from the floor, the strings vibrating slightly with his rough treatment. The soft tingle of notes was the only sound in an otherwise silent room. Holding the guitar to his chest, reminiscent of a child holding a security blanket, Gabe turned back to his friend. His chest rose in large angry breaths.
“I’ve put up with a lot from you over the years, Linc, and you’ve done the same with me. I’ve accepted your slow, methodical need to be perfect and right all the time, and you’ve gotten me out of more scrapes than I can think of because I acted before I thought.
“But this is different. I’m not sure I can forgive this. Not after a year of waiting. Not after last night.”
Gabe turned the corner, fleeing from the small intimate bedroom that still smelled of Mallory. Lincoln opened his mouth to respond, but before he could say anything Gabe spit four last hateful words towards him. “You don’t deserve her.”
His footsteps echoed through the bus from the other end as Gabe pounded to the door. The hinges squeaked as he yanked it open, quickly slamming it behind him. In the silence of the bus, Lincoln’s heart thudded in his ears. Breath was almost impossible to gasp, as if a thousand-pound weight sat on his chest. What was he supposed to do now?
* * * *
“You look like hell.”
Mallory picked
up her head from the cool diner table, glaring at the speaker. “Nice to see you, too, Krista.”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t happy to see you, Mal.” Krista slid into the booth opposite Mallory. Her sunset brunette hair was twirled on top of her head and secured into place with a heart-studded butterfly clip, her smile understanding. “Hard night?”
“You have no idea.” Even Mallory was having trouble processing how she’d ushered in the New Year filled by two men. Krista had always been a great friend to her, the understanding and supportive sounding board she needed, but she still had no idea how to describe everything she’d done last night. All the dirty, tangled bus floor sex and screaming orgasms Gabe and Lincoln had given her. The emotional highs, and ensuing panic, that had forced her to leave in the middle of the night, before either of her lovers had woken up. Mallory had definitely earned her rock star rep last night.
“How was your New Year?” Mallory took a sip of her coffee, hoping either the caffeine or the heat would defog her cluttered mind.
“Good,” Krista responded with a wicked smile. It was the kind of smile that smelled of trouble. The sweaty, hot, sexy variety. It was always fun to see that wicked streak in Krista come out. With her baby pinks and innocent eyes, you never saw her coming. “So good James is home recovering. He’ll probably sleep all day.”
Mallory smiled before swallowing another gulp, the bitter taste burning down her throat. She wondered if her men were tuckered out as well. Lord knows they’d exhausted her, but there had been two of them and only one of her. Maybe they’d managed to preserve their strength.
Krista’s eyes flared as the waiter arrived with her cup. She didn’t touch the coffee, pushing the mug slightly away, her gaze never leaving Mallory’s heated face. Krista pressed her hands to the table as if to hold herself back from launching at Mallory, desperate for information. “Is that what happened to you? Did you meet a guy?”
Edwards, Willa - Midnight Mirage (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 8