by Edith DuBois
Michelle’s younger sister smiled at him, her wide blue eyes fluttering in what could only be described as a flirtatious manner. She was so different from her sister, in looks, in behavior, that it was hard for Thomas to comprehend that they were so closely related. But still, he was well known around town. People expected him to be polite. On top of that, he had no wish to offend the sister of the woman he was attempting to woo.
“I see you’ve got the notepad I gave you. Good. Not a peep, remember?”
She nodded, her smile wide and winsome. Thomas returned his attention to Michelle, who watched her sister with an almost pained expression. It was touching to see her so concerned about her sister’s health. Growing up in Savage Valley as a bear-shifter, he’d learned very young how important family was. He liked a woman who shared those same values. “So,” he asked, “are we up for a game of Yahtzee now? Or should we wait until after soup?”
Marina jumped up and down, clapping, and then she grabbed the Yahtzee game and ran out of the kitchen. “I guess that means now,” he said, smiling at Michelle. Her smile was small and tight, but she walked back toward the living room. He followed and saw that they had been watching Thelma & Louise before Michelle turned off the television.
“Any music requests?” she asked, moving to a shelf with hundreds of records lined up. “Aunt Agnes has been collecting since she was in her teens.”
Marina slid him a note and batted her eyelashes at him. May I pick?
“Sure,” he said, shrugging. She sprang up, her short-clad butt cheek coming only inches from his face. He lurched back, taken unawares. He glanced up at Michelle, but she quickly looked away, pretending not to notice the incident. Marina picked something from the shelves and, with a grin at Thomas, placed it in Michelle’s hands. She sauntered back to where he was setting up the Yahtzee game and sat down close.
Michelle fumed at the record in her hands for a moment, but without a word of protest, she took it out of its sleeve, placed it on the record player, and gingerly settled the needle against the spinning vinyl. Marina slid him another note. She’s my favorite. There was also an accompanying winky face. A second later, Marina’s hit single “Nashville Through and Through” permeated the air.
He nodded at her and shot her an awkward smile, not exactly sure how he was supposed to react to the song, so he decided to politely ignore it and return his attention to Michelle. She had joined them around the game. He saw Marina huff out of the corner of his eye. “So there are only a few basic rules of Yahtzee that you need to know,” he said, handing them both a score sheet. “First, always follow the dice. They’ll tell you what they want, so don’t get greedy. If the dice want twos but you want sixes, forget it. Go for the twos. Second, if you roll a full house and you don’t have one yet, take it. Don’t go for a three of a kind or a four of a kind. Don’t go for anything. Take the full house.”
“Why?” Michelle asked.
“Because the second you try to go for a full house, the dice will turn evil, and you will never get one.” She laughed at his odd rule but nodded her understanding with a smile.
“And last but not least, if you get a Yahtzee, we must all celebrate. Even when we’re all secretly dreaming of gouging your eyes out, we all have to do it. The Yahtzee roller may choose the manner in which we do so, but no matter what, you must celebrate. Got it?”
“Yes,” Michelle said, and Marina nodded. They each rolled to see who would go first, and Marina got the highest number. She snatched the die from Thomas with a flirty, smug smile and then held out her hand for Michelle to put her die in. For a long moment, Thomas thought Michelle wasn’t going to, but Marina was patient, and with a small narrowing of her eyes, Michelle surrendered the die.
Turning from her sister, Michelle said, “So all three of you Ashley brothers are doctors?”
“Yes, ma’am. My older brother Elias is a surgeon. I’m a family practitioner, and Franklin is the town vet.”
“Impressive,” Michelle said in teasing tones, but he also heard the interest in her voice. “The Ashley family has been a part of Savage Valley since the fur-trading days, and our family has always been known for its physicians.”
“You can trace your family’s ancestry back that far?” Now she looked truly impressed.
“Oh yes,” he said with a small, inward smile. “We have a particularly detailed account of our family history.” As did all the bear-shifter and lion-shifter families, he thought to himself. And they weren’t likely to forget it anytime soon, either, not with Bo Young lurking around to keep an eye on them. “In fact,” he said, “I believe the Savage Herald, the newspaper on Main Street, has some archival photographs of all the original families in Savage Valley.”
“I’d like to see those.” She smiled at him. It was a tentative smile, but there was something hopeful under the vulnerability. His cock stirred again. He wanted a taste, just a little taste, of those smooth lips, of the tongue that hid behind them.
He swallowed, thinking about how sweet her other lips would taste against his tongue. “I know the Carsons have some, too, hung up on the walls in the bank. I could take you around town one day, reveal all our historical secrets.”
“I would like that.” Her voice was husky, and her eyes were locked with his.
But then, Marina clutched his arm, jarring him out of the moment. She pointed at the dice. Four twos were face up, and she held a finger up at him.
“You have one more roll?” he asked.
She nodded. Shaking the last die in the palm of her hands, she sucked in a breath and then let it roll. It landed with a two facing up at them.
In a wild fury of movement, Marina exploded up from her seat and began dancing around. She went circles around them, dancing to the music with a wide, ecstatic smile on her face. Then she fell onto the couch and wriggled her legs in wild, happy abandon.
“She got a Yahtzee,” Michelle said, her voice far from enthusiastic.
“Congratulations,” Thomas said with a genuine smile. He jumped up from his spot and held his hand out to Michelle. “It’s the rules,” he said, laughing. “We gotta celebrate.” When she placed her hands in his, a jolt ran across his skin, and he yanked her up from her sitting position. He pulled her in close and spun her around the room. She shrieked and giggled.
When he put her feet back down, Marina slid into his arms, pushing Michelle out of the way. He felt helpless watching Michelle’s stricken face as she stepped away from them, but he could think of nothing to do or say to get Marina to stop pestering him. He gave her a few halfhearted spins and then set her back down.
Marina clapped her hands with joy and gave Thomas’s hands a little squeeze before going back to her spot around the game. Not wanting to seem rude, he resisted the urge to wipe his hands on his pants.
“Marina is always the lucky one,” Michelle said when they had settled back into their spots. “She always wins.”
“Aww, now, come on. Chin up. We’ve still got a lot of game left to play.”
“No. She always wins. Everything.”
Michelle locked eyes with her sister, and something passed between them. Thomas could sense the tension that had been sizzling between them all night grow stronger. Trying to cheer Michelle up, he teasingly chucked her under the chin. It seemed to momentarily distract her because she smiled up at him, and her face relaxed.
But then, damn it, Marina passed him a note. Where’s Franklin? I thought he would come with you since Michelle had to cancel on him.
He frowned at the note. “Cancel what?”
“What?” Michelle asked, a strange note in her voice.
“Did you cancel something with Franklin?”
She blanched at his question, glanced at Marina, but then returned her eyes to his face and nodded. “We had a date.” Her voice was quiet. Not for the first time that night, Thomas wondered what the hell was going on between the sisters.
But more importantly, Franklin had a date with Michelle? He hadn’t men
tioned a word of it to either him or Elias. But that was Franklin. He mostly kept to himself, only talking to his older brothers if he deemed it absolutely necessary.
That also explained why Thomas, when he’d come home from the office earlier, had found his younger brother chopping wood in the middle of September beneath the still uncomfortably warm sun, his face red and sweaty with the exertion. Blowing off steam. Thomas thought he’d probably do the same if Michelle cancelled a date with him.
So Franklin was interested in Michelle, and he was interested in Michelle. If Elias met her and took a liking to her…
His phone rang before he could finish that thought. He looked down at the screen. Exactly the man he wanted to talk to. “Excuse me, ladies.” He stepped out the sliding glass door in the back and slid it shut behind him, stepping out to the grass as he answered the call.
“Where are you?” Elias asked.
“At Agnes Bird’s, fraternizing with her nieces.” He turned to look through the glass. Michelle had risen and was glaring down at her sister, who sat demurely on the couch.
“The country singer and her sister? Why—”
“Skip the questions. Just meet me over here.” Michelle said something to Marina, making a sharp movement with her hand in Thomas’s direction.
There was a long moment of silence on Elias’s side. “See you in a few,” Elias said and then hung up.
He almost put the phone in his pocket, but then he heard Michelle’s voice, as clear as if she stood next to him. “I saw what you did,” she said to her sister.
Looking at the door, he realized he hadn’t pulled it shut all the way, and there were almost two inches between the glass and the wall. With his sensitive hearing, he could hear every word. He put the phone back up to his ear in case one of them should glance out the door.
Marina shrugged at Michelle, seemingly unconcerned with her sister’s agitated state.
“I saw you turning the dice. What is wrong with you?”
Marina wrote something on her notepad, taking her time, and then handed it over.
“No. I had a date with Franklin. But you saw to that, too, didn’t you?” Marina didn’t write anything, only stared up at Michelle, clearly unmoved by Michelle’s distress. She looked almost disdainful. “And why did you tell him?” She waved her hand at the Yahtzee game. “He came for you anyway. It was one friendly moment, and you…you couldn’t stand it. You had to suck it away for yourself.”
Marina began writing something, but Michelle spoke before letting her finish. “I’m tired. You can finish the game. I’ll leave you alone with him. It would make everything simpler, wouldn’t it?”
That was the last thing Thomas wanted. “Yeah, of course. Good. I’ll talk to you later. Thanks.” He made a big show of getting off the phone with someone as he headed back up toward the house. He slid the glass door wide open. “I’m back,” he proclaimed. After closing the door, making sure it slid all the way this time, he strode back toward the table. “And where do you think you’re going?” he asked Michelle, who was trying to sneak away toward the stairs. “We’ve still got a whole game left.”
Her eyes darted to Marina, and she began to utter some small excuse when a knock sounded on the front door. It had to be Elias, and Thomas smiled. The asshole must’ve seen Thomas’s car at the house and was already there when he called. “Expecting someone?”
“No.” She headed toward the front door. Thomas followed, catching delicate drifts of her fresh scent as her body cut through the air.
“Miss Andrews, how nice to see you again.” Elias stood at the front door, smiling down at an obviously disconcerted Michelle. “I was in the neighborhood, saw my brother’s vehicle outside, and decided to stop by and say hello.”
“Oh, then hello. Come in.”
“Thank you. Nice pajamas,” Elias said as he swept through the door. Thomas watched her face flush most becomingly at his brother’s offhand comment. Then she looked up and noticed Thomas watching her.
“Shut up,” she said and moved past him back toward the living room. He caught his brother’s eye and raised his eyebrows in question.
Elias grinned and mouthed two words.
Oh yeah.
* * * *
Michelle glared at the dice she had rolled. It was her second roll out of three for this time around, and she was going for sixes. They were all she had left to get on her score card, and she hadn’t gotten any on her first roll. She hadn’t gotten any on this roll, either. She scooped all five dice back up for the obligatory last roll, knowing that nothing she rolled would help her now, not even a Yahtzee.
“Come on,” Thomas encouraged. “Give ’em a good shake. Show ’em who’s boss.”
“You’ve at least got to get one six,” Elias said.
Thomas punched his brother in the arm. “We’re supposed to be cheering her on, not making her feel like crap.”
“It doesn’t matter. My score is already abominable. Marina’s gonna win this one anyway. What with three Yahtzees and everything.” Marina bestowed a smug smile upon them. She’d gotten two more Yahtzees since the first one. Michelle couldn’t be too upset about losing. At least the last two Yahtzees had been earned fair and square, so Marina would have gotten her celebration dance anyway.
“What if you get a Yahtzee?” Thomas asked.
Michelle smiled at him, thankful for his effort to make her feel better about her crappy score. “It doesn’t matter.”
Thomas’s eyes widened. “Never say a Yahtzee doesn’t matter. Never.”
Elias looked somber. “It’s sacrilege. Besides,” he said, perking up again, “with that attitude, you’ll never summon enough Yahtzee magic. Here.” He grabbed her hands and put his lips against them. Michelle gasped, unprepared for the sudden feeling of his big warm hands around hers. Her first reaction was to yank against his grip, but he held tight. With a wicked smile in his eyes, he whispered something against her fingers. A hot jolt shot up through her wrists then moved up her arms and tingled across her breasts. Elias’s dark eyes stayed locked with hers as he continued to whisper to the dice in her hands.
“There. I told them what they need to do. You should have no problems now.”
She shook the dice again, rolling her eyes, trying to pretend his skin on hers didn’t affect her as strongly as it did, and was about to release the dice when Thomas said, “Wait a sec.” His hand shot out toward hers. “It only works if both of us do it.” He cradled her cupped hands in his and bent his lips to her fingers as his brother had moments before. Michelle felt a warmth sliding thick and potent through her body and gathering hotly in her pussy. Damn, she thought to herself, worried that her body responded so strongly to both of them. Thomas pressed a kiss on her knuckles, and Michelle yanked her hands out of his, her heart beating fast.
“That’s enough.” She gave both of them a hard look, hoping to dissuade their attentions. She could feel Marina’s glare without looking, and Michelle could sense the air tingling around her, like the tremors from a silent, ticking bomb. When she shook the dice, her hands were a little weaker than before.
Elias nodded graciously for her to continue. His short dark hair set off the strong angle of his cheekbones, and his eyes. Oh, dear sweet Lord, they smoldered. They were deepest black, like Thomas’s and like Franklin’s. But they were alarmingly intense. His lids hung low over the dark orbs beneath, and when he looked at her, it was all she could do to keep her body contained. She wanted to leap across the table, wrap her legs around his muscular body, and dissolve into him.
But then she’d look at Thomas, and her body would be consumed anew by heat and desire. His hair was lighter than Elias’s, but it was a deep, rich chestnut brown color. The angles of his face were more squarer in nature, not quite so sharp as his brother’s beside him. Where both of his brothers were toned, Thomas was broad. He looked so solid, so sturdy. His cock had to be huge.
Shocked but also aroused at the direction of her thoughts, Michelle shook th
e dice vigorously and gave them a toss.
They stopped rolling, and Michelle stared at them.
“Oh my god.” The words came out with a laugh. She looked up at Thomas and Elias, who also started to laugh. “Oh my god, you did it,” she said. She looked back at the dice again. Not only did she get a Yahtzee, but it was a Yahtzee with sixes. “It actually worked.” She shook her head in disbelief. “The odds must be astronomical.”
“Celebrate!” Thomas shouted. “You’ve got to celebrate.”
“House rules.” Elias nodded officiously. Michelle laughed, rocking back in her seat.
“Cheater.” The whispered words came from across the couch, scratchy and strangled, forced unwillingly through barely functioning vocal cords. Michelle felt her stomach drop and looked at her sister, pleading with her eyes. Just this once. Let me have this. Please let it go.
Marina glared, her blue eyes narrowing into angry, viperous slits. “You cheated.”
“Marina,” Michelle said, keeping her voice even. “I did not cheat. I rolled the dice fair and square. You saw it, Marina. We all saw it.”
“You fucking cheated!” Marina swiped her hand across the coffee table, sending the dice and the playing cards flying in all directions. “I hate fucking cheaters.” She leapt off the couch and picked up a figurine that Aunt Agnes kept on an end table.
“No, Marina!” Michelle shouted, reaching for her sister. But she was too late. The porcelain exploded against the wall with a loud, air-cracking shatter.
“I hate you!” Marina’s strangled voice was painful to hear, and Michelle winced with each forced word. Marina began screaming and thrashing her body.
Thomas and Elias leapt up. Thomas wrapped his strong arms around the flailing form, containing her fit. “You’ve got to stop screaming.”
“I hate you,” Marina cried. “You don’t care about me. You’ve never cared about me. You want me for the money I make you. I hate you, Michelle. I hate you. You’re not my sister!”