“Got it. We play it by ear, take it where she wants it to go.”
“Exactly.” Now that it was settled, Braden looked back to his screen and resumed wondering how he was going to slay that damn stubborn dragon and get to the damsel waiting for rescue inside the castle. But thinking of that damsel made him look back up. “One more thing.”
Tommy peered around his screen again. “What’s that?”
“You can do anything with her, anything she wants. But just don’t kiss her. On the mouth, I mean.”
Tommy blinked, clearly surprised. “Why? What’s it matter?”
Braden’s chest tightened slightly. He didn’t have an answer, only knew he felt strongly about it. “Just don’t.”
An hour before Braden was set to return with Tommy, Laura finished her work and headed upstairs to shower. As she ran the soap over her body, she couldn’t help thinking of the ultrasensual bathing she’d shared with Braden. She’d been in a state of semiarousal all afternoon—ever since he’d kissed her on the couch and gotten her so hot, then left without taking it further. Now, her nipples remained sensitive and erect, and her pussy tingled with want.
Biting her lip with a thought toward the evening, she reached for the shaving cream still on the shower bench and, sitting down there, shaved her legs and the sensitive mound between. Like before, each gentle stroke of the razor blazed a trail of fire over the aching flesh, getting her hotter still.
Was she preparing for a ménage à trois? She pulled in her breath, still unsure. She only knew she wanted to make of herself what Braden had made of her prior to this: a wholly sexual being. She wanted to be aroused. And she wanted her body to be smooth and soft and clean, and her pussy boldly on display, for whatever happened later, be it with one man . . . or two.
After, she stroked her fingertips between her parted legs to make sure she felt smooth to the touch. Smooth, wet, and slick. Knowing what she would feel like to Braden—or anyone else—amped up her excitement further.
Only when she exited the shower, letting her towel drop to the floor to walk through the room naked, did she notice the pretty little shopping bag on the bed, pink and shiny. As she approached, she also spied a card bearing her name.
Hurriedly, she opened it and read the small, precise script inside.
Snowflake—
I bought this for you before I came, and just hadn’t found the right time to give it to you. I’ve been more concerned with getting you out of your clothes than getting you into sexy ones . But I thought tonight appropriate—that is, if you decide you want that ultimate pleasure I promised. No pressure, though. I want to give it to you more than I want to breathe—but you have to want it, too, just as much as I do. I hope you’re wearing this when I come home—but if not, I understand.
Braden
Her heart pumping fast, she reached in the bag. Nestled in pale pink tissue paper she found an ensemble of champagne-colored lace: a demi-bra, a pretty cami with triangular, curving cups, and a sexy thong. She remembered a time when he’d asked her for her bra size, and she supposed this was why. Only then, she’d imagined him having more items delivered—she couldn’t have conceived of him coming here and turning her sexual world upside down.
Without hesitation, she stepped into the lacy undies, which sported a little bow in back where the tiny strips of fabric met, then put on the bra and walked to the mirrored doors of the closet. They fit perfectly and felt expensive. She had to let out a heavy breath just looking at herself—the rise of her breasts from the bra that barely concealed her nipples, the slope of the panties hugging her cunt.
Returning to the bed, she slid the cami on over the bra. Both were necessary if she really intended to don the cami as “outerwear”—its cups offered no support, and she wanted her chest to look pert and firm, wanted the curves to swell sexily above.
Which begged the question—was she really wearing this? Tonight? To dinner?
She bit her lip as she studied herself in the mirror again, then reached for the jeans she’d worn last night. She would have liked some strappy shoes to complete the outfit, but overall, the jeans and cami alone made for a sexy, confident look.
A look which, if it were summer, she would actually wear on a date or out with friends. But if Braden and Tommy showed up to find her in this, with snow outside, when only last night she’d worn a sweater and snowflake socks to dinner—it would make a statement. For Laura, it would say Fuck me as clearly as fishnet stockings and stiletto heels said it for Candy next door. They would come in, they would see her, and they would know what she wanted.
The question was: Did she? Could she? The answer didn’t seem much clearer than it had earlier today.
Unless you considered that she stood here dressed for after-dinner sex when she knew her lover and his friend were due to arrive within the hour.
Unless you considered the way her pussy burned right now, and the sense that her breasts felt bigger than usual, aching to burst free from the champagne lace that held them.
Unless you considered that the very darkest part of her wondered what it would feel like, wanted to know, wanted to experience it, wanted to throw all caution to the wind for the first time in her life.
That’s when she heard the door open below. Damn, they were early.
“Laura, honey, we’re home. Are you upstairs?”
She rushed to the doorway and out onto the little bridge that overlooked the foyer. “Just on my way downstairs right now.”
And the next thing she knew, she stood before both men, smelling the cold they’d brought in and watching them stomp the snow off their shoes, then seeing them peer up at her . . . and smile. Braden’s look was particularly knowing, and particularly heated, as his gaze took in her top before rising to her eyes. “You look great tonight, baby,” he said, lifting one hand to her cheek as he leaned in to deliver a short, slightly chilled kiss.
But Laura didn’t feel the cold—only the heat, the slow fire that had just ignited in the room between the three of them. “Thanks,” she said, trying to disguise a last somewhat nervous swallow. Then she turned to Tommy, ready to be bold, ready to show Braden she could be as adventurous as he wanted her to be. “I’m glad you could join us again tonight.”
Chapter Fourteen
Tommy leaned in to kiss her cheek, his hand curling warm at her waist, and the simple contact sent a soft frisson of arousal echoing through her. “My pleasure,” he said, and Laura forced herself to meet his blue eyes, just to see what she found there. Nothing smarmy or presumptuous but a tinge of sensual awareness that she couldn’t deny. As she turned for the kitchen, her nipples rubbed against her bra.
So was it true? Had she decided she was really going to indulge in this wildest of fantasies? As usual, the very question sent a heavy breath whooshing from her, so she decided to cut herself a break and not force herself to answer. Instead, she pulled a bottle of wine from the fridge, since a glass of Chardonnay sounded welcome right now.
“Ready to put the steaks on the grill?” Braden asked—and from there, things turned amazingly easy. Since, after all, they were just three normal people having dinner. Sort of.
Braden and Tommy fired up the grill, putting on the steaks and potatoes, while Laura tossed the salad, then set the table. She turned on music, something low and soft in the background.
When they sat down to their salads, Laura chose the chair at the head of the table. Only when Tommy sat on one side of her and Braden on the other did she realize perhaps it had been a subconscious effort to put herself between the two men, to begin to get used to that, see how it felt—even if only in some small way.
And though conversation was easy—the guys telling her about the new computer games they’d tested today—everything inside Laura began to heat up, to swell with an inescapable and potent sexual consciousness. She wasn’t sure if it was just her body, wound up from her thoughts through the day, or if it was more palpable than that, something they all could feel passing betw
een them, hovering in the air—but a whole new element of sensuality pervaded her being. Everything she touched, she felt more. Everything she ate delivered more taste than ever before.
She found herself forking an entire cherry tomato into her mouth, letting her tongue run over its smooth skin as she luxuriated in its very roundness, until finally she bit into it and let the tangy flavor burst across her taste buds, wet and cool. She washed it down with a swill of wine, welcoming the fruity warmth as it passed into her throat, then lowered the glass back to the table, where her fingertips slid slowly up and down the stem.
When Braden went to check on the steaks, Laura emptied her glass and watched as Tommy reached to refill it.
“Braden tells me you had a rough breakup not long ago.” She wasn’t sure it was the right topic, but it had just popped out—with a little help from the wine. She liked knowing he was a guy with feelings, a guy who could take a relationship seriously—maybe more seriously than Braden, for all she knew.
He nodded, took a sip from his own glass. “Yeah. But it was my own fault,” he admitted with an endearingly devilish glint in his eye. “Did he tell you that?”
She shook her head.
“I cheated on her,” he said, then held up his hands as if in defense. “Don’t let that make you think I’m a lousy guy, though—because believe me, I regret it. It was a stupid thing to do and I’ve learned my lesson.”
She tilted her head, intrigued. “Why does a guy do that? Cheat on a girl he cares for?”
He grinned. “Easy sex?”
She laughed softly, despite herself.
“Seriously, the temptation was there and I took it—but I really don’t know why. Now I think maybe I just wasn’t comfortable knowing I was getting in so deep with Marianne. Maybe I wanted to sabotage it—or at least prove to myself that she didn’t matter as much as I was afraid she did.”
“And?”
A grin of admission. “She mattered as much as I was afraid she did. And now I wish I hadn’t been afraid.”
She tried to reconcile this guy with the one who had three-ways with ski bunnies—and realized it wasn’t that easy to peg a person, to lump him into a category. She’d learned in her own way recently that she herself possessed a lot of different sides, varying and sometimes conflicting parts of her personality. She supposed everyone did, whether or not they chose to let it show.
She found herself reaching out to touch his hand on the table. “I’m sorry it worked out that way.” Heat flew up her arm and her pussy flooded at the simple gesture. Yet it wasn’t just her general attraction to Tommy causing it—it was knowing what they might do together later, with Braden, and it was knowing Tommy knew it, too.
Their eyes met, and her nipples tingled. “I think I’m starting to get over it,” he said, his voice delivering a playful hint of flirtation.
She smiled but drew her hand back as one French door opened, admitting Braden with a platter of still-sizzling steaks and foil-covered potatoes.
“Although I gotta admit, I still miss her sometimes.”
“Who’s that?” Braden asked, lowering the platter to the table.
“Marianne.”
“Ah. The famous lost love.”
Laura couldn’t help thinking Braden sounded less than sympathetic, even though he’d sounded more so when he’d first mentioned the breakup to her. A guy thing, she supposed.
As they all began reaching for steaks, she said to Tommy, “A breakup can be so hard.” Although she was actually thinking ahead, to how she would feel when she left Braden, more than thinking back to any particular past pain. “You just miss so many little things about the person. And big things, too.”
“I miss the sex,” Tommy said, and his unexpected bluntness made her laugh.
Braden high-fived his buddy across the table, but afterward Tommy said to Laura, “Not just because I’m a sex hound, though. It was pretty special with her.” He sliced into a baked potato, then took a large sip of wine. “She had this little place on her neck,” he said, pointing to his own. “And when I kissed her there, she just went wild.”
“Neck kisses are fabulous,” Laura agreed. As she’d noticed last night, talking about sex with him seemed easier than it would with most guys she’d just met. Then she looked to Braden, who was swirling the wine in his glass as he cast a sexy grin. “When Braden kisses my neck, it goes all through me.”
“You like it even better when I kiss you lower,” Braden pointed out, his voice deeper than before.
The usual heat ascended her cheeks, but she still gave him a smile and let the wine wash away her inhibitions, as it had so many times. “You have a skilled mouth.”
“You do, too, honey.”
She found herself licking her upper lip in response, simply needing to feel something there, some sensation at her mouth. She cut into her steak and as she ate, like before, it tasted richer, juicier, her potato more buttery. She could barely make sense of it, but everything she put in her mouth felt like a tiny aphrodisiac. Even the fork and knife in her hands felt heavier, and it was sensual just to hold them, wrap her fingers about them.
At some point she realized her knees were touching both guys’ knees under the table to either side of her—and that she wasn’t pulling them back, and neither were they. Tommy asked Braden how his family was, and Braden turned the topic to Laura’s career, yet beneath the table something entirely different took place. Her pussy rippled with excitement, nervous anticipation—but she found herself getting less nervous and more anxious with each passing minute.
For dessert, Braden unveiled a plate of sinful-looking frosted brownies.
“Where did those come from?” Laura asked. She’d have certainly honed in on such treats if they’d been here for long.
“Made them this morning while you were working.”
She’d heard him in the kitchen for awhile but must have been completely absorbed in her story not to have smelled them. She blinked playfully. “Why, Mr. Stone, I didn’t know you baked.”
He winked. “Only for you, baby.”
He set the brownies in the same spot as the platter, which he’d just removed—quite the little host, she couldn’t help thinking. And when Laura bit into one of them, it was so chocolaty, gooey, and delicious that she actually moaned—and her pussy spasmed lightly.
“Sounds like I should bring these to bed with us,” Braden said with a wicked, teasing grin.
“It would be messy,” she said.
“You worry too much.”
She kept her eyes locked on his. “You’re right, I do.” Her knees still touched both his and Tommy’s. “And I’m going to stop. Right now.” She meant it. She was going to quit thinking so much. At least for tonight. “All worries of any kind are officially . . . gone.”
As if to prove it, she indulged in another big bite of the sticky brownie, letting out another soft moan as the scrumptious taste melded with her new sensual awareness to trickle, once more, all the way down into her panties.
“You have”—Tommy leaned closer to her, drawing her attention back to him—“icing on your mouth.” Reaching up, he gently swiped it away with one finger—then held it out to her.
Wrapping her hand around his, she drew his finger near and licked the chocolate away. Fresh excitement blazed through her, making her stomach tighten as she broke a sexy gaze with Tommy to look at Braden.
Her lover’s expression dripped with such dark desire that she felt it pooling within her, beginning to fill her. “Still a little more,” Braden said, his deep voice barely audible as he leaned over to lick a bit of remaining icing from the corner of her mouth.
“Oh . . .” she heard herself sigh as pleasure fluttered downward. And she began to understand—fully now, and with no real fear—that this was going to happen. And that she was going to let it.
“More wine?” Tommy asked, noticing her glass was nearly empty again.
Sounded like a good idea. “Yes.”
“I’ll o
pen another bottle,” Braden announced and rose, partially clearing the table as he went. Tommy and Laura got up, too.
When Laura automatically began to help, stacking plates together, Braden touched her arm. “Leave it, honey. You and Tommy go in the living room, chat a little more.”
She didn’t answer, just put down the plates and picked up her wineglass to join Braden’s friend where he now stood peering into the vast darkness out the floor-to-vaulted-ceiling window. Getting up had suddenly made her feel the alcohol a bit more, but she didn’t mind.
“You live up there, correct?” She looked to the right, up the mountain, lifting a finger in that direction.
He pointed. “You can see my security light from here. Do you see it?”
She looked, but trees seemed to be blocking the light from her view. “No. Where?”
Tommy set his wineglass on the desk, then positioned himself behind her, placing his strong hands at her waist and turning her body just slightly. “It’s hard to spot—you have to catch it at just the right angle through the pines.” His breath came warm on her neck as he spoke, and the warmth spread downward.
Although the strangest sensation struck her just then: she liked Tommy a lot, but if she were here alone with him now, just the two of them, she wouldn’t be nearly so anxious to fool around. Tommy was hot, but it was Braden’s presence, Braden’s desire for this, that made her want it, too, and that made Tommy’s nearness so exciting, his touches so tantalizing.
“You haven’t seen us fucking in the window, have you?” she asked. Another wave of warmth passed through her at her own shocking brazenness.
His hands remained firm at her waist, his body grazing hers from behind. “You fucked in the window?”
She nodded, still peering out into the black, aware that he was beginning to grow hard against her ass. She supposed if anything would make her pull away at this point, it was that—but she didn’t move. “Right over there,” she said softly, pointing. “Next to the telescope.”
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