by Kallysten
When his internal alarm clock woke him on the morning of December thirty-first, he managed to slide out of bed without waking his lovers, and was already running through a mental list of everything he needed to do when he entered the bathroom.
It was a little before nine, and the club opened at six. Counting a couple of breaks and a lunch, that left him a good eight hours to supervise the cleaning crew, restock the bar, decorate the first floor, the dancing floor, and the catwalk—
“God, I could practically hear those gears spinning in your head from the bedroom.”
Lisa was still grumbling when she drew the shower door open and climbed in behind Brett. He turned to look at her, and only had time to notice her eyes, still halfway shut and full of sleep, before she pressed her body against him, her arms encircling his torso. Reacting on pure instinct, he closed his arms around her, but even now that she was in his embrace, he had some trouble believing that she was up at all.
“Are you feeling ill?” he said, teasing. “It’s still hours until noon. What are you doing up so early?”
Lisa huffed against his neck. “Same thing as you. Getting ready to make it another great party for the club.”
A wave of mixed love and gratitude crashed through Brett. He hadn’t expected this. Lisa worked a lot for the club, but her thing was public relations—planning parties, getting the word out, and making both humans and vampires excited about coming to the club. She left the specifics to him, and he couldn’t remember her helping with decorations and last-minute troubleshooting in years.
He still didn’t know what to say when Leo walked into the bathroom, tugged the shower door open and climbed in as well. He reached for Lisa’s shampoo, poured a dollop into his hand and started to wash her hair, all the while asking, “So, what are we starting with, then? I know the main bar is low on a few things, and it’s probably the same downstairs.”
They were both going to help, Brett realized, and his affection for both of them surged even more. It wasn’t that they didn’t help him when he asked. He was just used to each of them having their own role at the club. He didn’t know what was different today, but he didn’t mind at all, far from it.
* * * *
Preparing the club, even with three people working, took all morning and a couple hours after noon.
Or maybe, Lisa thought, amused, that was because the three of them were working together.
It wasn’t hard work. After so many years, Brett almost had it down to a science. The decorations were stocked in the back room, sorted by holidays, each box replenished during sales throughout the year. He also had a list of what decorations were supposed to go up where. Easy enough, Lisa supposed.
But when she climbed a ladder to hang streamers from the ceiling, Leo, who was holding the ladder, slipped a hand up her skirt.
“What?” he said with his most innocent look when she glared at him. “Are you telling me you didn’t see that one coming?”
He had a point there.
Lisa retaliated by pinching his ass while he was hanging the next streamers, and so Brett wouldn’t feel left out, she did the same to him. Their little yelps were adorable.
The next few hours became an exercise in frustration. Each of them stole touches and kisses from the other two as often as they could, but they kept it at that: caresses that lasted a second or two, kisses that were even more fleeting.
It wasn’t long before both Leo and Brett were walking hard-ons. Thankfully no one else was around to enjoy the sight that they made. Leo’s cock was a prominent bulge inside his jeans, while Brett’s pulled at the fabric of his khakis, distorting their line.
Lisa loved to see them like this: aroused, wanting, craving, in large part because of her. She, of course, needed them just as much. It didn’t take long before her panties were soaked, and after a while, she took them off. The surprise on Brett’s face the next time he caressed her ass and the flare of Leo’s nostrils when he caught a whiff of how wet she was only added to her arousal—and theirs.
By some unspoken agreement, they kept the teasing minimal until they were done. But with the last balloons tied to the railings, the two bars stocked up, the banners hung, and the confetti ready to be dropped on the dance floor at the tug of a string, they looked at each other and grinned.
The question at that point was whether they would make it back upstairs.
They didn’t.
Brett took Lisa from behind as she held on to the bar. Leo watched, stroking himself with one lazy hand and caressing them both with the other. When Brett was done, Leo pushed him to his knees and fucked his mouth with wild abandon.
Lisa had never seen anything more gorgeous than the two of them. She doubted she ever would. She liked it even better when two became three, however. For that, they took things back to their bed.
* * * *
Virginia turned this way and that in front of the mirror, but her reflection remained the same: atrocious.
The dress, deep green and velvet, had looked much better in the store. It hadn’t seemed so short then, or even so tight. She hadn’t gained that much weight in just two weeks, had she? She must have, seeing how all she could see anymore was the roundness of her belly.
“I’m not going.”
She said the words in a normal voice, knowing full well Anando would hear her even from the kitchen where he was cleaning up the dinner he had prepared for her. And indeed, only a few seconds passed before he joined her in the bedroom.
“What do you mean, you’re not going?” He sounded a little amused. “You’re all dressed up and ready to go.”
Virginia’s reflection in the mirror still didn’t change, even when Anando, stepping up behind her, encircled her with both arms and rested his hands on her stomach.
“I’m not going,” she said again. Tears weren’t far. Stupid hormones. “I look ugly and fat, and I’m not going in public like this.”
Anando’s lips caressed the shell of her ear, causing her earring to swing lightly. It was the first time she’d worn them since he’d given them to her for Christmas along with a matching necklace.
“You look beautiful,” he whispered. “You always look beautiful, but tonight you’re more gorgeous than ever. Don’t you see? You’re glowing.”
His words curled around her like a warm touch, but the mirror’s image was still much too cool.
“And you’re not at all biased,” she said, rolling her eyes a little. “You’d say that even if I was wearing a sack of potatoes and weighed half a ton.”
Gentle hands slid to her hips and made her turn to face him.
“Yes, I would,” he said. “And I would mean it. You’ll always be beautiful to me.”
He pressed a kiss to her mouth before she could point out that that was hardly a reassuring thought.
“But in this instance,” he continued, smiling against her lips, “you’re not wearing a sack of potatoes. You’re wearing a gorgeous dress that will make it very hard for me to keep my hands off you. You’re not fat. You just have a few more lovely curves than when we first met. And even if they keep growing, you’ll still be gorgeous to me. And I know they’ll tell you the same thing.”
At the reminder of those growing curves, Virginia started to look down, but he stopped her with a finger beneath her chin.
“That’s what you’re worried about, isn’t it?” he asked with a small smile. “Not what random people might think, but what they will think.”
She nodded, her throat too tight for words. She hadn’t wanted to let herself see it, but he was right, of course. What would she look like, standing next to always-gorgeous Lisa?
“Can we call it off?” she whispered. “We could just say… I don’t know. That I’m not feeling well?”
Anando’s smile twitched. “We could. But then they’d be worried. Who do you think would come check on you first?”
She slipped closer to Anando and wound her arms around him, holding him as close as her bulging belly would a
llow. Resting her cheek on his shoulder, she sighed and thought of what would happen if she bailed.
They’d come here, of course. Leo, certainly. Probably Brett. And Lisa… Yes, she would come too. Things were better between the two of them. They were becoming good friends. She’d worry, too.
“Do you want me to give them a call?” Anando asked.
She sighed again. “No. Let’s go. Are you ready?”
* * * *
Anando had welcomed a few new years at On The Edge. He had lost track of how many New Year’s Eves he had spent there, but at least six or seven, maybe more. He’d always been on the dance floor when midnight rung, usually with prey in his arms, ready to go home and continue celebrating until morning.
The previous year, he and Virginia had stayed home, dancing together to slow songs for hours, watching fireworks on television, and starting the year with champagne drunk from each other’s lips.
This year, when the hour approached, he was in a booth in the back of the club with Virginia at his side and Lisa across from him. He’d wanted to nix the champagne, but Virginia had insisted.
“You can have an extra glass for me,” she’d said. “And I can taste it on your lips like last year.”
Anando was hard-pressed to refuse her anything lately. He’d always had trouble saying no to her, but it seemed even more difficult now. There was something about her smile, the glint in her eyes, and the way she was still herself while her body changed from week to week that he simply couldn’t resist.
If anyone had told him that a woman would ever wrap him around her finger like this—and a pregnant woman, at that—he would have laughed very hard.
Or maybe, he’d have been very scared.
Reality was sometimes stranger than anything imagined—more beautiful, too.
“I should just hire an assistant for him,” Lisa said in a tone of fond exasperation. “I understood him working so hard when we were starting, but what’s the point of success if you can’t kick back and enjoy it?”
“The club is his baby,” Virginia said with a straight face, and Lisa burst out laughing.
“I couldn’t have said it better. It’s almost midnight. Let me go see if I can find my boys.”
She slipped out of the booth and pushed her way through the crowd. Leaning toward Anando, Virginia rested her head on his shoulder.
“Tired?” he asked her. “We don’t have to stay until midnight if you want to go.”
She took his hand and led it to her belly, where little feet were kicking up a storm.
“I think she likes the music,” Virginia said. “We’ll make a dancer out of her. And I’m not that tired. Let’s stay until the midnight toast.”
Anando pressed a kiss to her temple and closed his eyes. For all that they were in the midst of so many people, so much chatter and noise, the moment felt intimate. All Anando could hear was Virginia’s heartbeat, echoed by the baby’s.
* * * *
“Sorry!” Leo called out to the other two bartenders, receiving good-natured teasing in reply.
“We’re keeping all your tips!” Joana said, her hands never stopping between bottles and glasses.
Leo didn’t get a chance to answer, not when Lisa was tugging on his hand, dragging him through the crowd away from the bar and toward the office.
“Wait, he’s still in there?”
He had to talk loudly to be heard over the chatter. Lisa glanced back at him and nodded, not bothering to say anything more. Leo shifted his hand to entwine his fingers with hers, now walking at her side.
“It’s almost midnight,” he said. “I can’t believe he’s still working.”
Lisa gave him an incredulous look. “You can’t believe he’s still working? And what were you doing until a minute ago?”
“That’s different, I…”
She opened the office door, and they stepped inside. She met his eyes again, and Leo knew better than to try to finish that thought. There was no way he would win this argument. He focused on Brett instead.
“Any plan of attack?”
She snorted. “Plan? How’s this for a plan?”
She strode into Brett’s glass-walled office, her heels clicking on the tiles. Leo followed but stopped at the door, watching her as she stepped around the desk before Brett could do anything more than look up from his computer. Her hand disappeared into Brett’s lap, and the expression on his face was suddenly caught between pain and ecstasy.
“Do I even need to say anything?” she asked in a dangerous tone of voice.
“I was just…” Brett’s widening eyes sought Leo, pleading for help.
Shaking his head, Leo grinned. “Don’t even bother,” he advised. “Just come with us.”
Moments later, the three of them were weaving their way through customers to the booths in the back. Anando and Virginia moved to the back of the wraparound bench, making room for them.
Four glasses filled with bubbling champagne were already waiting, while a fifth in front of Virginia was an array of colorful fruit-juice layers. As they all settled down and picked up their glasses, the countdown started from the lower level, loud enough to be heard throughout the club.
“To a fantastic New Year,” Leo said, raising his glass.
Four glasses clinked against his.
“To us,” Anando said.
“All six of us,” Virginia added at once.
“To us,” they all repeated, and the last stroke of midnight exploded in a burst of cheers.
CHAPTER 22
“How about Joy?”
Leo’s words were muffled against Lisa’s back. She shifted a little under him—turning a page, he realized.
“It’s already on the list,” she said.
“How many stars?” Brett asked.
He still sounded a little breathless as he lay alongside Lisa, one hand holding Leo’s.
“Four,” Lisa said. “Although…” She scribbled something, her pen scratching softly against the paper. “Make that five.”
“Six,” Leo chimed in, then flicking his tongue at the nape of her neck.
She shivered, but the pen scritch-scratched again.
“Seven,” Brett mumbled, his voice fading, his grip on Leo’s fingers slipping.
Leo lifted his head toward him. Brett’s eyes had closed, and his lips were parted enough for a hint of tongue to peek through.
“I think we tired him out,” Leo whispered to Lisa, and she, too, looked at their lover.
From his vantage point against her back, Leo could see half her face, and he couldn’t have missed her expression softening with a small smile. She’d been ruthless all night as the three of them battled over potential names, but now she seemed ready to conquer the world for Brett if he asked her to. Smiling to himself, Leo trailed a line of kisses across her back.
“Should we…”
As close as he was to her, her words were so quiet that Leo could barely hear her.
“Hmm?”
“Should we give it to him now?” she finished.
Leo almost asked what she meant but understood when her hand covered his on top of Brett’s and she brushed her finger against Leo’s ring.
“Up to you,” Leo murmured. “But I thought you wanted to wait for his next birthday?”
His birthday… The last one seemed so far ago already, but it had not even been nine full months yet. Would Brett still want to be turned then? That was what they had agreed to, but would this be one more thing that changed with the arrival of the child?
“I thought I did,” Lisa said, now sounding frustrated. “But maybe…” She sighed. “I don’t know anymore.”
Leo pulled away from her back and found a place to sit between her legs and Brett’s. Lisa rolled over and sat up as well, regarding Leo pleadingly.
“And remember,” Leo said, fighting back a grin. “It’s Valentine’s Day. What happened to no gifts on commercial holidays?”
She rolled her eyes at him, and Leo chuckled, glan
cing to check that Brett was still asleep. When he looked back at Lisa, he reached for her hand, squeezing it.
“If you’re ready,” he said, “then all right. Let’s give it to him now.”
Lisa flashed him a smile and squeezed his hand back before letting go. She slid over to the edge of the bed and stood, her body graceful in its nudity. While she riffled through the back of her underwear drawer for the ring, Leo grabbed the notebook she’d been writing in and glanced at the list.
Close to fifty names were lined up in three columns. The majority had been slashed through with a line. Those that were left had stars next to them, from one or two to seven or eight. No clear winner yet, but they’d leave the game for another day. After all, Virginia wasn’t due for another couple of weeks, and they had something else to do now that was as important.
Lisa came back to bed, a square jewelry box in her hand.
Her trembling hand.
Leo curled his fingers over hers and held on for a few seconds. They shared a look, then Leo let go and, with the same hand, shook Brett slowly.
“Wake up.”
Brett started, jerking up and blinking owlishly at the two of them.
“Huh? What? I wasn’t asleep.”
“You could have fooled us,” Leo said, but already his words sounded more choked up than teasing.
“What?” Brett said again. He yawned and sat up against the headboard. “What name were we discussing again?”
Neither Leo nor Lisa answered. Lisa raised her hand, the box, still closed, resting in the center of her open palm. Brett frowned, then stared, his eyes widening. He licked his lips, his gaze flicking between Lisa, Leo, and the box.
“What’s that?” he asked, no louder than a whisper.
He looked awestruck and maybe afraid to hope too much. Lisa all but beamed at him. It had never been clearer how much she loved him—and Leo loved her that much more for it.
“A present for you,” Leo said. “From both of us.”