by Jess Dee
Declan had lived to make his parents proud. The ultimate compliment to him was not to hear those three words, I love you, but to see a flash of pride in their expressions.
The last time Dec had seen that flash of pride was when he’d told them he and Tori were engaged.
“Our manners were flawless, our clothes were flawless, our school results were flawless and our beliefs were flawless.” Declan shrugged. “They had to be. They were the same beliefs my parents held. Conservative, old-fashioned and prejudiced.”
“Prejudiced?” Violet asked.
“Louis and Margaret have very definite ideas of what is right and wrong. Following in their footsteps, finding the perfect wife, getting married and producing perfect children is right. Experimenting sexually is not. Growing up gay is not. Homosexuality is a sin. It goes against nature.” Declan laughed, but the sound was as hollow as the spot in his heart he’d once reserved for his parents. “As for growing up liking both men and women? I have no idea what they’d say about their son sleeping with both sexes, because I’ve never cared to tell them about my sexual preferences.”
Declan had spent most of his teenage years tormented by those preferences. How could he, the son of Louis and Margaret Muirfield, desire guys? It was morally wrong. A sin. And guys and girls? Unmentionable.
Which left the adolescent Declan with little choice but to deny his desires. He managed to pretend they didn’t exist all the way through the conservative, private, preppy high school he’d attended.
Had it made him happy? Hell, no. He’d spent five years tormented by his physical urges. Suppressing such an essential part of himself had led to two problems. Declan began hating himself, and he began resenting his parents and their expectations. To this day he’d never found enough inside himself to like, and he’d never quite gotten over his resentment of the couple who’d brought him into this world.
University had been an eye-opener. Surrounded by thousands of strangers with differing beliefs, morals and ethics, Declan had finally acknowledged what he’d tried so hard to smother. His sexual preferences weren’t going to change because his parents decreed them immoral.
Tired of denying them, Declan had gone ahead and done the unthinkable. He’d indulged in his first gay experience. And his second. And third… Long before his first year at uni ended, he’d had enough physical encounters with men that he’d lost count.
In his second year, he’d broadened his horizons, including women in his sexual ventures whenever possible. Numbers hadn’t mattered. As long as there were members of both sexes present, Declan was happy.
In his third year, when Declan had finally satisfied himself and his sexual curiosity, he’d come to an interesting realization. He was happiest and most content with not one person, but two.
When he had a man and a woman in his life, Declan felt complete.
His parents never found out about his sexual escapades. As much as Declan had gloried in them, he’d never shoved them in his parents’ faces. The respect they’d always demanded was too deeply ingrained for Declan to embarrass or humiliate them by coming out of the closet, so to speak.
Then he’d met Noah, and Declan’s life had changed. He’d fallen for him. Fallen hard, and he’d given up his dreams of a threesome. For the longest time, Noah had been enough.
“So your parents don’t know about you and Noah?” Violet asked. “They don’t know you’re in love with him?”
“They know him. They know he’s a friend and business partner. They know we’re close.” He looked at Noah, and the warmth in his chest expanded. “Do they know we’ve been more than that?”
Noah shook his head. There was no censure to the gesture, but Declan felt like a coward nevertheless. He’d never said anything. Never made their relationship public.
“No,” Declan confirmed. “I never told them. They’d be mortified. Horrified. It would go against everything they stand for. My father’s one of the Liberal Party’s most ardent opponents of gay marriage.”
Though Louis never used politically incorrect terms in public, Declan had heard his father talking about fags in the privacy of their home more often than he cared to remember. His mother had her special expression when the conversation turned to those people. Her mouth pursed in disapproval, her forehead bunched and she looked as though she’d been forced to chew on a lemon.
Declan looked at Noah. “Can you imagine how my father would react if I told him about you? He’d have a heart attack on the spot. And my mother? She’d convince me it was a case of temporary insanity and suggest immediate therapy.” He snorted. “Or an extended visit to a lock-up ward at a psychiatric facility.” Whichever one would hide her son’s deviance more effectively.
Was it any wonder he resented his parents and everything they stood for?
He resented his brother, Brian, too. The kid who’d once been his childhood ally had turned into the perfect, narrow-minded replica of the couple who’d raised them. He’d followed in his father’s footsteps, entering politics so he too could fight for the beliefs his parents held so fervently.
As much as Declan disliked Brian, he envied him too. Brian had what Declan had strived to gain his whole life: their parents’ respect. With every announcement Brian made about his career and his life, his parents glowed with the approval Declan always longed for.
Admitting his jealousy almost killed him. He’d never say it out loud, but fuck, watching Brian blossom under his parents’ admiration cut deep. No matter how far Declan had progressed in his life, and no matter how much he’d achieved, the child inside him still craved his parents’ pride.
Declan’s envy had come to a head three years ago, on the day Brian announced his engagement to his perfect girlfriend.
Like a switch had been flipped, making all his childhood yearnings coalesce into one single desire, Declan had suddenly wanted to step back into favor with his parents. He ached to be the good son again.
The simplest way to achieve that objective? Find his own perfect woman to marry.
Which meant he’d had to call off his relationship with Noah.
It took over a year for Declan to find her. Over a year of pretending his sexual preferences no longer mattered. And then he’d met Tori and seen his parents’ dreams for their younger son reflected in her face.
A muscle ticced in Noah’s cheek. “I told you before, Dec. I don’t give a continental fuck how your parents react. They have no importance in my life.”
“Yeah. But they have importance in mine. They’re my parents.” Damn it. Would he always be the little kid seeking approval? Wasn’t it time to grow up and shirk that childish need?
Violet’s eyes were dark with empathy, and though Declan hadn’t voiced his childish need to be admired out loud, it was almost as if Violet sensed it. “That’s why you found Tori so appealing. Socially, she was everything your parents demanded you achieve in life. She would have fitted in with their expectations flawlessly.”
“Tori was…” Jesus, talking about her made his stomach cramp. Declan hated how much he’d hurt her. He hadn’t been fair to her. Not on any level. He’d wooed her, courted her and grown close to her. He’d even convinced her she loved him. He’d proposed because Tori was everything Declan had been taught to desire. The kind of woman his parents had approved of. “Tori is the loveliest woman I know. She’s caring and funny and pretty and intelligent, and she was born to be a mother and wife. What man wouldn’t want to marry her?”
“A man who was in love with his friend and business partner?” Violet suggested.
Declan hung his head in shame. “I couldn’t be with Noah. He was never the person I was expected to spend my life with. Tori was.”
“But Tori’s no longer a part of your life,” Violet pointed out quietly. “And no matter how perfect a wife she might make, she’ll never be the perfect partner for you.”
“Noah made that blatantly clear three days before I was supposed to marry her.”
“You did?”
Violet asked of the giant behind her.
Noah shrugged. “Dec was wound so tight it didn’t matter who pushed him on the issue, he would have shattered. He needed someone to shake him up, to open his eyes to the fact he’d made the wrong choice. As it happened, I was there, so I did the shaking.”
“You never realized, Dec, before Noah pushed, that Tori was all wrong for you?”
“I did,” Declan confessed. “But for months I was happy with her. And I figured I could reach that point again. I tried.” Fuck knew he’d tried. “I pretended we were good. I figured we could make it work. Hell, who couldn’t make a relationship work with a woman like Tori?”
A total failure of a man, that’s who.
“A man who loves someone else?” Violet suggested again. “A man who, regardless of his parents’ expectations, does not wish to be married to the perfect woman?”
“You ever try admitting that to yourself?” Declan asked, his voice hoarse with the self-hatred he tried to hide. “Admitting that you’re the fuckup of the family? The one who can’t achieve the basic goals your parents set for you?” He doubted either Violet or Noah had ever had to fight to gain their parents’ pride or affection.
“You ever try admitting to yourself that maybe you’re not the fuckup?” Violet answered without hesitation. “Did it occur to you that maybe it’s your parents’ belief system that’s fucked up and not yours?”
“I questioned their values for years. Went against everything they believed in because I thought they were wrong. But in the end, I realized I want what they want. I want the wife and the kids and the proverbial picket fence. I want the easy life, where I don’t have to fight societal norms to be happy.”
“The easy life never worked for you. Societal norms don’t make you happy,” Noah said.
“You can’t live a life that isn’t right for you just because it’s right for your parents,” Violet agreed.
“I know that now.” He’d learned the hard way. But that lesson hadn’t given him the freedom to live the life he desired. After the way he’d hurt Tori, Declan believed—deep in his soul—he had no right to that kind of happiness.
“Then I have to ask you again. Now that you’ve tried to live up to your parents’ expectations and realized you can’t, why not just acknowledge out loud what we all already know? You love Noah. He’s the only one for you.”
It was Noah’s turn to laugh a hollow laugh. “He can’t acknowledge it, Vi. It wouldn’t be the truth.”
“He doesn’t love you?” Violet shook her head, negating his words immediately. “He does. You admitted as much a few minutes ago.”
“Oh, he loves me. But the bottom line is…I’m not the only one for Dec. I never have been.”
“That’s rubbish,” Vi argued vehemently. “I see how he feels every time he looks at you. You can’t tell me I’m wrong.”
“Yeah, baby, I can.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“You don’t?” Noah ran his hands down Violet’s arms. “Then how do you explain your presence here today? If Declan were content to spend the rest of his life alone with me, how do you explain the blowjob you gave him—while I fucked you?”
Chapter Eight
Violet faltered, unsure how to answer. “I, uh, I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Dec and I weren’t alone earlier. You were right there with us, the entire time. There were three of us involved, not two. You felt it. You were aware of how good it was with three. You said it yourself, Vi, when Declan walked away. You couldn’t do it without him.”
“He left us.” She glared at Declan, remembering the ecstasy and the agony of being seduced by him, opened up by him, brought to the edge of heaven by him—and then deserted by him. “You left us.”
“He did,” Noah agreed. “But he came back. Because we, you and I, are what Declan wants. Alone, I’m not enough for him. He loves me, but he needs more. You’re the more. Together we can give Declan everything he needs.”
Violet blinked several times, absorbing Noah’s words. “Is that true?”
Declan didn’t answer.
“Uh-uh.” She threw herself forward and whacked Declan’s arm. “Don’t you wimp out on me now. Tell me if Noah’s telling the truth.”
Declan closed his eyes and let out a long, resigned sigh. “Noah’s telling the truth. I crave more than he can give me. I always have.”
This was all too confusing for Violet. “So you don’t love him?”
Again Declan didn’t respond.
“Answer me.” She whacked him again.
“I never said I don’t love him.”
Did the man have a PhD in avoidance? “So you do love him?”
“Jesus, Vi, what do you want from me?”
“I want the truth.” Refusing to let him get away with anything less, she jumped up, straddled his hips and pinned his shoulders to the ground, trapping him. “Say it out loud. Tell me you love him.”
“I love him,” Dec said, so softly she almost didn’t hear.
“Say it again,” she demanded, needing Noah to hear what Declan had just said. “Louder this time.”
“I love him,” Dec said, louder this time.
“You love who?” she demanded.
“I love Noah.”
Good. Almost good enough…but not quite. “Then say it to him. Tell him how you feel.”
“Vi—” It was Noah who tried to calm her down.
But Violet was determined to see this through. Determined to work out exactly what was happening here. Between Declan and Noah, and between Declan, Noah and her. The bit where she was included was too much of a mindfuck to make her way through just yet, so she put the bit that involved her aside and focused only on the two men. “Tell him, Dec. Stop hiding from the truth and tell him.”
Pain flashed through Declan’s eyes, and Violet immediately lessened the pressure with which she held him. But the hurt remained in his gaze, telling Violet it had nothing to do with her touch.
“Let go of your parents’ expectations. Start living the life you want to lead. Tell Noah how you feel about him.”
“I love him,” Declan said.
“I know you do. Now tell him.” She leaned to the side so Declan could see Noah.
Declan turned his gaze to Noah. “I love you, man. I fucking love you.”
Noah’s swift intake of breath was audible. “I love you too, Dec. Always have.”
For long moments neither man spoke. Violet released Declan’s shoulders and sat back, shaking. The emotion in the air around her took the breath from her lungs.
Noah leaned in and kissed Dec. A soft, intimate kiss that ended almost before it had begun.
“I love you,” Dec said again. “I have for a long time. But you have to understand—”
“I do,” Noah cut him off. “I didn’t before, but I do now. It took a while, but I finally get it.” Quite deliberately, Noah lifted Violet’s hand from where she’d rested it on Declan’s stomach and linked his fingers through hers. “I understand, Dec…and I want it too.”
Declan stared at him for a long moment. His gaze then moved from Noah to Violet and Noah’s linked hands and back to Noah again. “You do get it, don’t you?”
“I do,” Noah said, his voice grainy with emotion.
“So you’re okay if I…” Dec lifted an arm off the ground and gestured to the universe in general.
“Yeah, I’m very okay.”
Wait. What was Noah okay with?
“And you’d do it too?”
“In a heartbeat.”
Violet blinked, lost in a conversation filled with half sentences and an intimacy she wished she were part of.
“Prove it.”
Noah grinned—and kissed her. Just caught her lips with his and kissed her until Violet whimpered into his mouth and leaned her suddenly boneless body against his chest, in case she crumpled in a pile on Declan’s stomach.
His lips stole her breath and his tongue stole her vision as he
r eyes shut under the deluge of pleasure. His kiss was sweeter than the wine she’d just consumed.
Wait. Weren’t they talking about Noah and Declan, not Noah and her?
Hadn’t Violet been trying to get Dec to confess he loved Noah? And hadn’t he done just that?
So why was Noah kissing her as though he’d just invested every last one of his dreams in her? And why was Violet loving every second of it—and secretly hoping she could make every one of those dreams come true?
It was in that moment that Violet realized something.
The emotions she’d denied for eighteen months had broken free from the shackles of their restraints. For too long, she’d buried those feelings. Even while they’d flirted, she’d told herself her heart didn’t ache for Noah.
Now she could deny it no longer. The feelings were there and her heart did ache for him. Once again, she’d fallen very hard for the giant of a man who kissed her as though she were the most treasured person on earth.
Noah kissed her for a long, enchanting moment. And when finally he pulled his delicious mouth away, Violet could do nothing but stare into his beautiful hazel eyes and breathe.
“Noah…” His name emerged as a whisper and nothing more.
He smiled at her, a smile so genuine, so loving it brought a lump to her throat.
“Hey, baby.”
Baby. She could get used to the name.
Violet smiled back and lost herself in his gaze.
“My turn.”
Declan.
Noah was not the only one she’d fallen for a second time. All those emotions she’d held in her heart for Declan were back too, stronger than ever. Just like her heart ached for Noah, so it ached for Declan.
Dec muttered something unintelligible a second before he caught Violet’s hand, tugged hard and brought her crashing down on top of him. Then he flipped them both, so Violet lay on her back and Declan lay on top of her.