Light Switch

by Lauren Gallagher

  My shoulders dropped. “What do you want me to say, Matt?”

  He sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. The silence went on, but eventually, he looked at me and said, “I don’t know what there is to say. I love you, and I want to be with you, but this…” He made a sweeping gesture to encompass all three of us, and when he spoke again, his voice was unsteady. “I just don’t see how this could work.”

  My heart sank a little deeper. It was easier to hear him out when he was angry. Knowing how much this hurt him was killing me. I took a deep breath. “I don’t know if it could or how it could, either. At the very least, I don’t want to lose my friends.” I chewed my thumbnail, eyes flicking back and forth between the two men I loved. “I just don’t know how to move forward as friends now that we’ve been here.”

  “And I’d rather have you as a friend than not at all,” Scott said. “But I won’t pretend I’m not in love with you.”

  “Then what do we do?” Matt’s voice was laced with irritation. “You make it sound so simple for us to operate as a triple, but—”

  “I just don’t see why anyone should have to get hurt over this,” Scott said sharply. “Not when there’s a solution that could avoid that.”

  “Who’s to say none of us will get hurt in a poly arrangement?” Matt asked. “They don’t always last forever, do they?”

  “No, no, of course not.” Scott shifted his weight. “But if we make her choose, or she prefers to do so, or if we both leave, then someone loses. Someone gets hurt.” He wrung his hands, and his eyes shifted back and forth between us. “But we’ve been doing the poly thing all this time and it’s worked just fine. Just because we’ve acknowledged it doesn’t mean it’s suddenly wrong or that it won’t work. Quite frankly, I think it’s worked just fine so far, so why change it?”

  Scott was always so controlled, calm, and collected. Tonight, I couldn’t help noticing the note of panic in his voice, as if he was unnerved by the fact that tonight’s outcome was out of his hands.

  I swallowed hard. “You two both deserve more than half a woman, though.”

  Scott shook his head. “Who says we’d only have half of you? I love Amy, but that doesn’t change how I feel about you or how much of myself I’d give you.” To Matt, he said, “And I wouldn’t be taking anything from you.”

  Neither Matt nor I spoke.

  It was Scott who finally broke the lingering silence. “We only have a few options.” He looked at Matt. “One, you and I draw straws and one of us walks out of here alone.” He turned to me. “Two, we make you choose, and one of us walks out alone while you, if I know you as well as I think I do, get consumed by guilt. Three, Matt and I both walk out of here alone, and nobody wins.” He paused. “Or four, we figure out how to function together, the same way we’ve been doing it all along.” “

  “Except it’s not the same thing we’ve been doing it all along,” Matt said.

  “Isn’t it?” Scott said. “No one’s feelings magically changed when they came out and admitted them. Whether we’ve been doing this since the beginning or it gradually happened while no one was looking, the fact is—” He paused, quickly clearing his throat. “The fact is, it happened. Here we are.”

  “I just, I can’t get my head around this.” Matt ran a hand through his hair. “Sex is one thing, but…”

  Scott swallowed. “Look, I know this is a weird concept for both of you. But really, as I’ve said, it’s what we’ve been doing all along. Just because we’re acknowledging the feelings doesn’t mean they magically appeared overnight.”

  “I understand that,” Matt said quietly. “But…”

  “Maybe this is easy for me because I’ve been doing the polyamorous thing for so long,” Scott said, “but Krissy, I’d rather share you than lose you.”

  I held his gaze for a moment, then looked at Matt. It was like having an angel and a devil on my shoulders. One pushing me forward, one pulling me back. And the more I thought about it, that was how it had been all along with Matt and Scott. Not that they’d been pulling me in different directions, but they’d been the polar opposites that brought me balance. My devil and my angel. Fire and ice. Calm and crazy.

  Up until that moment, I’d thought I couldn’t do polyamoury. Facing the two of them like this, I couldn’t imagine having one and not the other.

  “Maybe Scott’s right,” I said.

  Matt’s eyebrows jumped. “Are you serious?”

  “Well, why not?” I glanced back and forth between them again. “Look, right or wrong, complicated or not, I love both of you.” I swallowed. “If I chose between you, I’d have to lie to one of you, because there’s no way I could honestly say I love one of you over the other.”

  Matt chewed his lip. “Then, what do you want to do?”

  “I can’t choose between you. I just, I can’t. In fact—” I took a deep breath, forcing back the lump that rose in my throat. I’d never before had so much to lose as a result of one decision. Barely whispering, I said, “It’s either both of you, or neither of you. All or nothing.”

  Matt exhaled hard and his shoulders dropped. Scott leaned against the wall, alternately watching Matt and me. Finally, he took a breath and looked at Matt.

  “That means it’s your call, then.” He wetted his lips. “You know where I stand.”

  Matt eyed him. “No pressure, right?” he said dryly.

  Scott shrugged apologetically. “It takes three ‘yeses’ to make something like this work, and only one ‘no’ to veto it.”

  “How does something like this even work, anyway?” Matt asked.

  Scott shrugged. “It’s no different from any relationship you’ve ever had, minus the monogamy. I’ve been with my other girlfriend for three years, and she’s been married for almost ten. She’s my girlfriend, she’s his wife, and neither arrangement takes away from the other at all. Look, I’m not going to lie, polyamorous relationships do take more work. They are, by nature, more complex. But they can and do work, and quite honestly, it’s worth the extra effort.”

  Matt’s brow furrowed and he stared at the floor between us, his lips thinning into a bleached line. I wrung my hands. Scott was still, almost maintaining his usual calm, collected appearance except for the way his fingers drummed rapidly against the wall beside him. No one spoke.

  Once again it was Scott who at last broke the silence.

  “Matt, do you love her?”

  The question sent my heart into my throat.

  “Yes, absolutely,” Matt said without hesitation.

  “As do I.” Scott folded his arms across his chest. If the way he fidgeted was any indication, it wasn’t a defensive stance, just a way to occupy his hands. “Has the way I feel about her even remotely detracted from the way things are between the two of you?”

  Matt let out a breath. “No. No, I suppose it hasn’t.”

  “I know she loves you. I don’t want to interfere with that, I don’t want to take her away from you. All I want from you—” He cut himself off, swallowing hard. His eyes darted to one side and he cleared his throat.

  “Scott?” I whispered.

  Drawing a breath, he looked at me, then at Matt. “I have no reservations at all about sharing her with you. Just—” He paused again. His voice dropped to a whisper as he said, “Just don’t take her away from me.”

  Matt’s breath caught. So did mine.

  Scott cleared his throat again. “That’s all I ask.”

  “You really think this could work?” Matt asked me.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I have no idea if it’ll work or not. But, it’s worth a try.”

  “The way we’ve been doing things now has worked all along,” Scott said. “I see no reason to change it.”

  Matt ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “This could be fun to explain to the rest of the world.”

  Scott made a dismissive gesture. “Fuck the rest of the world.”

  “That’s easy for you to say,” Matt said. “Do
people in your life know about it?”

  “Some do, some don’t. If they have a problem with it, they don’t stay in my life,” Scott said. “Though I have kept it from my mom.”

  “She wouldn’t approve?” I asked.

  “No, it’s just easier to explain why she doesn’t have grandkids yet when I tell her I’m single rather than saying I have a small harem of girlfriends.”

  I stared at him incredulously. His lip curled into a cautious, but devilish grin. Matt snorted, and I couldn’t help myself either. The air rippled with releasing tension as we all gave in and laughed.

  Then Matt cleared his throat. “Okay, I’ll be honest,” he said. “The whole concept still seems strange to me. I’m not even sure I can fit the whole idea in my brain.” My heart sank, but he wasn’t finished yet. “But we’ve been doing this all along. I want to be with you, Kris, and it’s worked fine up to this point with all of us involved. I guess I’d be hard-pressed to justify asking you to choose between us.”

  I stared at him. “So you’re…” I bit my lip. “You’re okay with this?”

  He hesitated, then nodded slowly. “I’m willing to try it and see what happens.” He stepped closer to me. Taking a deep breath, he cradled my face in both hands. He swallowed hard, and I held my breath, afraid any lingering reservations would overpower Scott’s logic.

  He kissed me.

  With the gentle contact of his lips to mine, he quieted my worries and melted the tension in my neck and shoulders. I put my arms around him, sinking against him as my knees trembled beneath me.

  He lifted his head and looked into my eyes. “I love you,” he whispered.

  “I love you, too.”

  He smiled, kissed me one more time, and let me go. After Matt stepped aside, Scott put his arms around me and kissed me.

  “I love you,” I said.

  His trademark cockiness came back in the narrowness of his eyes and the curl of his lip. “Of course you do.”

  Rolling my eyes, I smacked him playfully. “Brat.”

  He laughed, then kissed me again, releasing my lips just long enough to murmur, “I love you, too.”

  When Scott broke the kiss, Matt looked at us with a grin and said, “So, I guess the question now is, what do we do with the rest of tonight?”

  “Hmm.” Scott stroked his chin with his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t know.” His eyes narrowed slightly and shifted toward me. A grin pulled at his lips. “But maybe a glass of red wine would help me think of something.”

  Epilogue

  About a Year Later

  “Four of a kind.” I fanned four queens on the table. “Read ‘em and weep, boys.”

  Matt, Steve, and Jim groaned in unison.

  “I think someone needs to see if she’s got cards up her sleeve,” Jim said.

  I tugged at my sweatshirt sleeves. “Nope, no cards. Guess I just have better poker skills than you do.”

  “Better luck is more like it,” Matt said, eyeing me.

  “Luck, skills.” I shrugged and pulled the chips toward my side of the table. “Either way, I’m winning.”

  The doorbell rang. Ramona excused herself to answer it, and when she returned, Scott followed.

  “Hey, Moore, it’s about damned time.” Matt rose to shake Scott’s hand.

  Scott shook his hand and clapped his shoulder. “Come on, now, some of us actually have to do more than just walk down the hall for this.”

  “Oh, excuses, excuses,” Matt said with a theatrical sigh.

  Scott rubbed his eye with his middle finger, then turned to kiss me on the cheek. A completely platonic, friendly peck to anyone who cared to look, and my sweatshirt masked the goose bumps his aftershave always gave me.

  “Looks like you’ve all been doing just fine without me anyway,” he said.

  “Well, someone has,” Jim muttered. He stood and gestured at his chair. “In fact, why don’t you have a seat over here at the Kristen Locke Slaughterhouse?”

  Scott laughed. “I think I can handle her.”

  “Good luck,” Matt said. “The woman’s on fire tonight.”

  Scott shot me a devilish grin. “Oh, I think I can put a stop to that.”

  “We’ll just see about that.” Steve put the deck in front of Matt. “Shuffle it, Sommers, and let’s see if this guy can put his money where his mouth is.”

  “Kristen’s been raking it in all night,” Steve said. “I think that woman’s been counting cards or something.”

  Matt laughed. “You don’t count cards in poker, idiot. That’s blackjack.”

  “Maybe we should play blackjack, then,” Steve said. “I could count cards and—”

  “Oh, come on,” Jim said. “Everyone knows you can’t count that high.”

  “Well, card-counting or not, I think it’s time someone’s reign of terror ended.” Scott smirked. “Let me go get a drink first, but enjoy your chips, Locke. They’ll be coming my way shortly.”

  “Arrogant bastard,” I said.

  “That’s why you love me, darling.” He deliberately bumped my chair with his hip as he walked by. Our eyes met and he winked before he disappeared into the kitchen.

  Scott had joined our poker nights a few months ago after Larry moved out of the complex. He’d fit right in with the banter and shit-talking, and he played a damned good game of five-card draw. His cockiness was the perfect poker face: no one could ever tell if he was bluffing.

  And as far as the three of us knew, no one else at the tables had any idea what was going on between us. The guys didn’t seem to care anyway, and Lynette and Ramona had never gotten more than vague answers and denials out of me. Scott wasn’t the only one who could put on a convincing poker face.

  Scott returned, red wine in hand, and took a seat across from me, where Jim had been sitting. I eyed the glass, then him. Matt just chuckled.

  “Okay, let’s deal this game,” Steve said.

  Matt picked up the deck. “Everyone ready.”

  “I am.” Scott grinned, looking right at me as Matt started dealing. “How about you, Krissy?” He sipped his wine, and when he set the glass down, damn it, I knew that look.

  I gulped. Scott Moore, don’t you dare unbutton your sleeve.

  “I’m ready,” I said.

  “Good.” The grin broadened.

  Don’t do it.

  Don’t…

  Oh, you bastard.

  Matt hid a laugh behind his cards. I shot him a don’t encourage him look, and he replied with a shrug and a wide-eyed expression of innocence. Of course he would encourage Scott. After all, he knew full well where the three of us would end up once Scott worked his evil magic on me. I had no doubt he was banking on it. God only knew I was, too.

  By the time Scott finished rolling his sleeve and went for his wine glass, my knees were trembling under the table and I no longer knew—or cared—what game we were playing.

  The cards and chips didn’t matter. We went through the motions, we placed our bets, we called and raised and folded, but this was a different kind of game for us. They could take every last chip from my side of the table and another fifty from my purse for good measure. None of that mattered because after we left this table, Scott Moore and Matt Sommers were going to fuck the hell out of me.

  And no one knew except the three of us.

  They all wondered why I lost my touch that night, why Scott’s arrival broke my winning streak, but they didn’t need to know. Nor did they need to know about the black corset and garters I had on beneath my jeans and sweatshirt.

  After all, I’d worn that for my boyfriends, not my neighbors.

  THE END

  About the Author

  Lauren Gallagher is an abnormal romance writer currently living in the wilds of Omaha, Nebraska. She and her husband, along with a coyote-iguana hybrid and two and a half cats, are thought to be in hiding from the Polynesian Mafia and a debt collector in search of a fine for an overdue book from the Library of Alexandria. Lauren continues to sk
illfully, if somewhat clumsily, elude them, but continues to have run-ins with her arch nemesis, M/M erotic romance author L. A. Witt. The implementation of Operation: I Don't Think So is expected to resolve that problem soon enough.

  Visit Lauren on the Web:

  www.loriawitt.com

  Twitter - @GallagherWitt

  Blog – http://gallagherwitt.blogspot.com

  ~*~

  Additional Titles

  From Loose Id, LLC:

  Damaged Goods

  From Samhain Publishing:

  Who's Your Daddy?

  All The King's Horses

  The Princess and the Porn Star

  Don’t Miss:

  ~*~

  Reconstructing Meredith

  The sequel to Light Switch.

  ~*~

  Winner - 2011 National Readers’ Choice Award

  Erotica Category

  Finalist - 2012 EPIC Awards, Erotica

  Finalist - 2012 National Leather Association

  Pauline Reage Novel Award

  ~*~

  “Scott, I need your help.”

  Five words from a woman he hasn’t seen in five years, and Scott Moore’s world is thrown off its axis. Ex-girlfriend Meredith has resurfaced with a past full of horrific abuse at the hands of a man who called himself a Dom, and she has the scars to prove it. Now she needs Scott’s help to reclaim her sexuality and put the past behind her.

  Scott is more than willing to help, but he has no idea the toll it will take on him, not to mention his other polyamourous relationships. What’s more, while Scott and Meredith face down her demons, their own past won’t be forgotten. Neither will Scott’s feelings for Meredith…

  Author's Note: This book contains references to sexual, physical, and psychological abuse that some may find disturbing.

  This book was previously published.