by Lily Harlem
The waiter smiled politely and topped up mine and Liam’s glasses. Quinn waved his hand over the top of his.
When the waiter stepped out of earshot I tightened my hand around Liam’s fingers and reached beneath the table to rest my palm on Quinn’s thigh. “There’s something we need to talk about,” I said quietly.
Both men dropped their brows. Quinn’s leg stiffened beneath my touch and Liam pressed his top teeth on his bottom lip until it went white.
“Sounds serious,” Quinn said. I noticed him clench the stem of his glass.
“It is.”
“So tell us, baby, what’s worrying you?” Liam asked, leaning right forward in his chair.
“I think we’ve forgotten something pretty major.” I took a slug of my drink. “And I’m not saying it’s anyone’s fault, I’m as guilty as you two, but still, we ought to talk about it, about the what-ifs.”
“Ariane, you’re talking in riddles,” Quinn said with a note of both irritation and worry in his voice.
“We haven’t once used a condom,” I said. “And I’m not on birth control. I’ve had no reason to be, not for the last few years.”
I looked from Liam to Quinn and then back to Liam. “I’m not worried about me having given you anything,” I added. “You know, STDs. I’m perfectly healthy, plus, it’s been so long for me and…” I paused.
“What?” Liam ducked his head to look into my eyes. “And what?”
“There was only ever Geraint, and we were young, so young, we were virgins when we got together all those years ago.”
The table went quiet for a long, drawn-out moment. I sensed minds clicking as they realized just how fast and how far they’d taken our relationship. What they’d put me through, what I’d coped with, hell, more than coped with, enjoyed, adored, instigated even.
“We’re clean,” Quinn said on a deep breath. “Liam has regular medicals and so do I.”
“It’s been a while for us, too,” Liam said in a soft voice. “I haven’t had a date that’s ended up in bed for well over a year and Quinn…”
Quinn’s lips flattened, he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in his chair.
“And Quinn…” Liam said, his eyes widening across the table at his friend.
“Okay, okay,” Quinn conceded with a frown, replacing his arm around the back of my chair. “I haven’t, at all, not since Gaby.” His brows dropped low, so low they touched his top lashes.
I squeezed my hand on his thigh. “I kind of figured it had been a while.”
“You did?” Quinn turned to me. “You could tell?”
“No, I couldn’t tell, but you told me when we first met you rarely got to dessert when you went on a date, so I couldn’t imagine you’d made it to the bedroom very often.”
He snorted out an unamused huff. “Pathetic, isn’t it?”
“Of course not.” I lifted my hand and brushed my thumb over his five o’clock shadow, which was rapidly reaching the density of his nine o’clock shadow. “I think it’s made it all the more special that we’ve found each other, it proves how well we fit into each other’s lives.” I reached across and kissed him gently on the lips. “In every way imaginable.”
“You’re so accepting of me,” he whispered onto my mouth.
I looked into his eyes, there was a hint of a sparkle in their black depths, his emotions were rising.
“That’s what love is all about,” I whispered. “Acceptance.”
He swallowed, turned and took a generous swig of his drink.
“So that brings us to the other matter,” I said, sounding braver than I felt. “Pregnancy.”
“Well, I’m shooting blanks,” Liam said with a shrug as if that was all he needed to say.
“You don’t know that,” Quinn said quickly.
“Come on, you filled me up with enough poisonous crap to turn a tomato into a fucking cucumber, my little swimmers were hardly going to survive that. Shit, I barely did.” Liam’s jaw clenched and a muscle flexed in his cheek, his hand tightened over mine.
“Hey, I told you to go and offload some for the freezer, you said what was the point, remember, you said you’d be dead so you wouldn’t need them.”
“Yeah, that was a bad week.” Liam shoved his other hand through his hair, I watched him rub at one of his scars. “That was a real low point.”
The table went quiet.
“I take it yours are good to go,” I directed at Quinn.
“As far as I know, but it’s never been proved, I haven’t got a secret love child hanging about or anything.”
“Okay,” I said, trying to stay rational. “So there’s a chance I could be pregnant.”
The waiter came over and abruptly halted our conversation as he set down five plates of sumptuous-looking entrees. The fragrant aroma of fresh garlic and pepper, tomatoes and tarragon suddenly filled the air between us.
“Depends what part of your cycle you’re on,” Quinn said when the waiter had left. He stabbed a garlic prawn onto his fork and popped it in his mouth.
“I would say smack bang in the middle.”
“What does that mean?” Liam asked, tucking into spicy sausage omelet.
“It means there’s an ovum about, she could easily get pregnant, be pregnant, right now.”
Both men carried on shoving food into their mouths. I placed down my still clean fork with a heavy clatter. “This fact doesn’t seem to concern you,” I said incredulously.
“Does it you?” Quinn asked, glancing my way.
“Yes, bloody hell, of course, I…but, I don’t understand.”
“I thought we’d already established we’re perfect for one another,” Liam said, helping himself to two prawns. “So if you get pregnant and have Quinn’s baby—”
“Our baby,” Quinn interrupted.
“If you have ‘our’ baby.” Liam dipped his head at Quinn. “Then we’ll look after you and the baby. Problem solved.”
“We can get married if that makes you feel better,” Quinn said with a nod.
“But…” I tried to think straight but my mind was buzzing. Words were tripping over one another. “This baby is at present hypothetical,” I said. “So let’s just nip back to the ‘m’ word, Quinn, which sounded a lot more definite.”
“’M’ word?” Quinn looked confused.
“Marriage,” Liam said, pointing his fork at Quinn. “You brought that up, not me. I thought we’d agreed not to be too eager to get rings on fingers.”
“You’d agreed,” I said. “Don’t I get a say?” I could feel my frown creasing and my stomach clenching. “Don’t I get a say in my own marriage?”
“Calm down, Ariane.” Liam reached for my hand. “Of course we talked about marriage, we love you, we want you to stay, forever.”
“We’d like to prove how committed we are to you,” Quinn said, placing down his cutlery and wiping his mouth with a serviette. “Perhaps it would make you feel more secure if we were married, especially if you had our baby.”
I shook my head, first at Liam and then Quinn. “But I’m in love with you both, and last time I checked it was illegal to marry more than one person or had you forgotten that tiny fact?”
“Of course not, you’d have to pick one of us,” Liam said, spearing asparagus.
“How…how could I possibly choose?” My appetite had gone, this was the most bizarre conversation of my life, and there’d been a few lately.
Quinn shrugged. “Put names in a hat, draw straws, I don’t know, it would only be a legality, which would cover you financially and give the child a surname.”
“We should double-barrel it,” Liam said enthusiastically. “Gilbert-Rosser, that sounds nice. And you could change to Ariane Gilbert-Rosser.”
I twisted my finger around a lock of hair hanging on my collarbone and drew in a steadying breath. Not every girl was lucky enough to get a double proposal from two gorgeous, sexy guys, and I really should count my blessings. “You’ve got this all sussed out,
haven’t you?” I said slowly, marvelling at what my life had become.
“No.” Quinn sighed, wrapping his arm over my shoulders. “Not by a long shot.”
“We’re just sure of one thing,” Liam said, reaching forward and touching my stray curl of hair. “We want you to stay, and if you have our baby, if you want to make us fathers then we’ll be very happy indeed.”
Chapter Ten
It was dark by the time we wandered back into the apartment, Liam and I were both tipsy and when Quinn said he had research to update on his laptop we were happy to strip naked and fall into my bed.
My stomach was full and my eyes tired and I found myself going heavy in his arms as we lay entwined. We kissed gently, softly. I nuzzled into his neck, absorbing the delectable scent of his skin through my nose and pores. Let my hands trace the flat muscles of his belly and chest.
Soon his breathing became steady and slow against my cheek and I drifted off into a trance of babies and palaces, of knights and white horses. Surrounded by Liam’s strong, healthy limbs I sank into blissful dreams feeling content, sated and loved.
*
I yawned and stretched the kinks from my bones before I opened my eyes to the morning. A scratchy chin pressed a kiss to my temple and I turned to see Quinn smiling down at me.
“Morning, gorgeous,” he said.
“Mmm.” I smiled up at him. “What time is it?”
“Just gone nine.”
I placed my hand in the center of his chest and pushed quickly upright. “You’re late,” I said, “you can’t be late two days in a row, even I won’t encourage that.”
“It’s okay,” he said with a smile and pulled me back into his arms. “It’s Saturday.”
“Oh yes,” I sighed. “Of course.”
“I’m still on call, but unless one of the senior members of the team needs me then I’ll be here, with you. The ward was pretty quiet when I left yesterday, I might just get away with it.”
“Where’s Liam?”
“He’s on Sri Lankan time, some deal he’s doing. He got up at three when I came to bed.”
“Oh.” It was strange how quickly it had become normal to go to bed with one man and wake up with another.
I traced the tip of my finger over Quinn’s chest and circled his nipple. It was a perfect nipple, not fat and insipid, it was small and hard and dark and seemed to be permanently pointed. I loved the way the black hairs around it fanned outward, they weren’t too long, nor were they short and wiry, they were soft but masculine and the way they thickened at the center of his chest and then led a happy trail downward was adorable.
“So what are we going to do today?” I asked, heading toward the other erect nipple.
“Mmm, now there’s a question with a million naughty answers.” Suddenly he flipped me over and settled between my legs. His hands grasped mine and dragged them up over my head.
I gasped in surprise. The head of his cock jutted up against my pussy and his weight settled over me.
“Hang about,” I said breathlessly and tugging to free my arms.
“No, let’s get to it. Let’s make that baby we talked about.”
“No, seriously Quinn.” Much as I was tempted I made my voice firm. “I’ve got to pee.”
His face crumpled. “Oh, okay, for that I’ll let you get up.” He rolled off me and I slid to the edge of the bed. “You want some coffee?” he asked.
“You know me so well,” I said with a grin and walked my naked behind into the en-suite and shut the door.
I took the time to have a shower and then threw on Liam’s discarded blue shirt from the night before. It hung almost to my knees and smelled deliciously of both him and the French restaurant.
Quinn was in the kitchen, also freshly showered, and wearing just his dark jeans. It seemed the postman had been. “This is for you,” he said, handing over a large, hard envelope with a big recorded delivery sticker on the front.
“Excellent, that will be my pictures from Hilary.” I was glad to get them safely in my hands.
“I’m dying to see them.” Quinn poured two mugs of steaming coffee and passed me one.
“What’s that?” I asked, nodding at a box on the side.
“Some toys.”
“Toys? I thought the baby was hypothetical?”
“Ah, these are special toys.” His left brow twitched. “Toys for grown-ups.”
“What do you mean?” I had an inkling. I knew Quinn well enough by now to know it wasn’t going to be a Rubik’s Cube or a Nintendo in there.
“You want me to show you?” He grinned his most swaggeringly confident smile, which flashed his teeth and narrowed his eyes.
“If you want to show me.” I licked my lips, took another sip of hot, rich coffee and then placed my mug on the island.
“Come on then.” He walked round me, his hand smoothing over my waist and drifting to my butt cheek. “Come into my lair, if you dare.”
We headed toward his room at the far end of the hallway. I hadn’t been in there, I hadn’t needed to. Quinn had always come to me.
He opened the door and I stepped inside. It was very different to Liam’s burgundy and cream room. Quinn’s was darker, more mysterious. The curtains were three-quarters drawn over the open window so the light was subdued, but I could make out an enormous bed with a wrought iron headboard. Piles of jewel-colored cushions neatly stacked on a black silky duvet cover. Two wooden bedside tables held oversized lamps with black velvet tassels hanging from their shades. There was a La-Z-Boy chair like Liam’s at the end of the bed and next to it stood a large wooden cupboard.
“Do you like it?” Quinn asked, ushering me farther in.
“Yeah, it’s great.”
“Perhaps you’ll help me mess up this bed,” he said, shifting a lock of hair from my neck and speaking directly into my ear. “It’s far too neat.”
“Mmm,” I said. Little tickles of sensation caressed my scalp and neck where his hot breath breezed.
He left my side and I missed his body heat.
“Come over here,” he said, placing the box on the nearest bedside table.
I followed eagerly with my feet sinking deep in the pristine white carpet. I was keen to see what “toys” he’d bought.
“Three things,” he said. “I’ll show you the first one.” He dipped his hand into the open cardboard flap and pulled out a strip of black velvet, it was slightly shaped at the front and had long ribbons hanging from it.
“Close your eyes.” He looked down at me, his pupils burning with desire. “Close your eyes, Ariane.”
Whatever Quinn wanted to do, whatever game he wanted to play was all right with me, although there was one I was particularly hoping for. I just wondered if it was what he’d planned.
I dropped my eyelids. He secured the velvet eye mask around my head, being especially careful not to snag any of my hair in the knot he secured at the back.
Anticipation pooled in my pelvis. Not being able to see, having that one sense removed, was more exciting than I’d ever imagined it could be. Suddenly the sound of Quinn’s breaths, the energy radiating from his body so near to mine and the touch of his fingertips in my hair intensified tenfold. Other senses became my world, all I could rely on.
I heard the whump of cushions hitting the floor and felt a waft of air as the duvet pulled back near my bare legs.
“Sit down,” he said, guiding me back a step.
As the soft, cool sheet touched the back of my legs I sat. I heard the chink of metal and turned to look, but of course I couldn’t see anything. “What’s that?” I asked, trying to keep a sudden note of nervousness out of my tone.
“Something to keep you exactly where I want you, Ariane. It’s my turn to be in control, you had your fun yesterday.” He laughed, a deep sexy laugh that sent a tremble to my belly. “Take Liam’s shirt off,” he said. “And that cute little thong you shouldn’t have bothered putting on.”
I peeled the shirt over my head and wri
ggled out of the thong. He reached for my left wrist, harnessed it with his long fingers, and then cool metal snapped around my tendons and bones. “What…?”
“Handcuffs, Ariane, handcuffs to keep you at my mercy, chained to my bed…just for my pleasure.” His body pressed over mine and I inhaled the spiced essence of his bare chest. I adored it, I’d become used to it, it represented sex and pleasure, fun and desire. I breathed deep and let him press me backward until my head hit the fluffed pillows. He was chaining me up for his pleasure, but I had a sneaking suspicion my pleasure would match his.
He reached for my other wrist, captured it, and hoisted it up to the cold, hard iron slats of the headboard so my arms were stretched above my head. I heard the clink, clunk of scraping, locking metal. It rang through the quiet room and the sound sent fizzes of pleasure to my nipples and clit. Experimentally I tried to move my arms back down to my sides but I was completely trapped, tethered, as I knew I would be. Out of instinct I looked up at my prison, but only dense blackness greeted me. I was blindfolded and chained up. Quinn could and would do what he wanted.
“Strawberry jelly,” he husked by my ear.
“What?” I asked, swallowing a lump of nervous expectancy and wondering what the hell he was on about. “What do you mean?”
“Strawberry jelly, Ariane. That’s our safe word, Liam knows it too, if you don’t like something say ‘strawberry jelly’.”
“But why?”
“Because you might shout ‘no’, or ‘stop’ at the height of your pleasure and not really mean it, or you might cry out or groan and I might think it’s because you’re in pain and not enjoying it.” His lips hovered above mine. “I don’t want to spoil our fun because of a miscommunication, and I also want you to feel safe and loved at all times…no matter what.”
I sucked in a breath and licked my lips. “Okay, strawberry jelly.”
“Don’t forget it.” And then he was kissing down my neck, his hands caressed my breasts. He squeezed my nipples until they became hard and tight, then circled my areolas until they, too, tensed and twisted. His fingernails scraped gently over my stomach and dipped into my bellybutton, his mouth took turns catching my teased nipples.