by Lily Harlem
He didn’t reply, just gave me a sad smile then walked away.
Gabe and I watched him leave.
I felt as though with every step he took some part of me left too.
Gabe slipped his hand around my waist and pulled me against his side. I wondered if he felt the same.
I suspected he did.
“Give him time,” Gabe said. “He’ll be okay. He’s made of strong stuff.”
“Yes, I know, but I hate to see him in pain.”
“Me too.” Gabe kissed my temple. “Me too.”
Chapter Twenty
Gabe finalized the details of the Dawson versus Dawson case then we walked out in to the sunshine.
“Where do you think he’s gone?” I asked Gabe.
“From here…probably toward St. Paul’s. Shall I call him?”
“No, let’s see if we can find him first.” I glanced up at the blue sky dotted with only a few small fluffy clouds. “It’s a nice day, it’s not often we have time together on a Friday afternoon.”
“No, you’re right.” He reached for my hand and linked our fingers.
We went in the direction of the cathedral. There were some nice spots to sit within the grounds and it was likely where Brent would have headed from the court.
“Nadia is a right case, isn’t she?” I said.
“Yes, bloody awful. Thank goodness he never has to see her again.”
“I couldn’t stand the way she spoke to him, it was with such hate.”
“Hard to imagine them in love.”
“Yeah, she doesn’t seem his sort,” I said.
“No, she doesn’t have a…” he lowered his voice, “dick.”
I grinned. “And she doesn’t give blowjobs.”
“Shh…” Gabe said, biting his lip and holding in a smile.
I nudged his shoulder. “Hey, let’s get an ice cream.” I gestured to a shop that had a sign outside with pictures of various ice lollies on it.
“Er, okay.”
“What, big hot-shot lawyers can’t enjoy an ice cream?”
“I didn’t say that,” Gabe said. “But shouldn’t we find Brent?”
“We can eat and walk.”
“Well, okay then.”
We wandered into the shop and purchased a raspberry ripple ice lolly each.
I walked out, licking the sweet, cold surface, and wondered if we should have bought one for Brent. No, it might be a while till we saw him and mine was already starting to drip.
Gabe fell in step beside me. “So what do you think he’s working through right now?”
“I don’t know. I guess it’s the end of an era for him. The end of something he thought he’d have forever.”
“We have it forever, don’t we?”
“You know full well we do.” I turned to him and smiled.
“You’re beautiful, you know that?”
“Why thank you.” My smile broadened. He told me that often enough but I’d never tire of hearing it.
“It wasn’t enough for him the other night, you know,” he said.
“What do you mean?” I knew exactly what Gabe meant and my heart rate increased at the mention of the other night.
Gabe glanced around; we were on a quiet backstreet now, there was nobody about.
“When we were in bed, the three of us,” Gabe went on. “It wasn’t enough for him.”
“He seemed pretty happy.”
Gabe’s expression turned serious. “You know what I mean, Hayley, I know you do.”
“I don’t want to say the wrong thing, Gabe, you’d best explain yourself.”
He slowed, as if not wanting to reach any destination until we’d had the conversation I knew had been brewing all week—except I’d thought I’d have to be the one to instigate it.
“I know I said that you could touch him and I didn’t want him to touch you and all that but…”
“But what?” I dropped my lolly stick in a bin and took his hand.
Gabe stopped. “But that’s not fair of me. I know that, it’s just…”
“It’s okay, tell me.” I touched his cheek.
“It’s just I don’t know how I’d handle seeing him fuck you. Part of me thinks I might be consumed with jealousy, another part of me actually thinks it would be really fucking hot to see the two people who make me so damn hard together.”
“Okay…” I drew the word out long and slow as a hundred thoughts went through my mind. Gabe was coming round to the idea of us being a proper threesome. I wouldn’t have to persuade him to let Brent and I sate our needs.
“Plus, there’s more to it, isn’t there?” He looked me in the eye and I held his gaze.
He was referring to the fact that we both had feelings for Brent. I suspected that Gabe’s were running pretty deep and that’s why he’d had a shift in what he wanted—how he wanted us all to work this out together. The week of thinking, being together yet apart, had done him good as well as me.
“Yes,” I said, “I think there is. It’s gone beyond a shag, a fantasy, we both care about him.”
Gabe nodded. “I care about him a lot. He’s got in here.” He tapped his chest the way he had before.
“You’ve known him longer than I have—”
“But nothing happened between us. Not until you were there.”
“I know, I really do, but that’s more time for you to have built up a relationship, fallen in love.”
“Love. Fucking hell.” He looked away and shifted from one foot to the other.
“That’s what it is, Gabe, if he’s in here.” I touched his chest.
“But I love you, endlessly, completely, with everything that I am.”
“I know you do and I love you but…” I sucked in a deep breath.
“But what?”
“But perhaps we have room in our hearts and our lives for Brent too.”
“As in a permanent threesome relationship?”
I shrugged and started walking again. “Come on, we really should find him.”
Gabe hesitated for a second then caught up with me. “You want him too, the way he wants you, the way I want him.”
“I think we can safely say we all want each other, Gabe.”
“Yes.”
“And it’s clear both Brent and I can handle seeing you with each of us so it’s just you who needs to cross that last hurdle. Decide if you can cope with seeing us two together intimately.”
“I think I can.”
“Are you sure?” I turned to him and frowned.
“Yes. I want you to both be happy, to have what you want.”
“It has to be about you as well.”
“It is…the threesome fantasy…it’s pretty obsessive at the moment. It’s all I think about, it’s like having a heavy package to carry around that I’m not allowed to open but I’m desperate to.”
“I can understand that.”
“Because it’s swirling around your head as well?”
“Yes, and my dreams…” I sucked in a deep breath. “I want him and I want you and I want to be there, in the middle of you both, us all making love, touching, fucking, kissing, no barriers, no rules about who can touch who. Because that’s something neither Brent nor I can live with.” The words had tumbled out of me not at all how I’d rehearsed them in my head.
“You’ve spoken to him about this?” He looked a bit perplexed.
I thought back to that day in my office when Brent had come to see me. He hadn’t actually said a word. I’d just known what he wanted, what he needed, it had been instinctual.
“No, we haven’t actually spoken about it.”
“Ah, okay.” He paused. “But how will it work? We’re so established as a couple, will it be weird?”
“We won’t know unless we try,” I said.
“That’s true.”
“But one thing we do know is that we’ll regret it forever if we don’t even give it a go.” My vision fogged a little. The thought of not giving it a shot with Brent as
a third person in our lives made me sad just to think about.
“So what do you suggest?” Gabe asked.
“That we find him and tell him how we feel.”
“Yes,” Gabe said, picking up the pace. “And first, a stop in there.”
He pointed to a shop across the street. It appeared to be a hardware store and had the word Timpson written in bold black lettering on a yellow sign.
“Why?” I asked, hurrying to keep up with him.
Gabe reached for my hand at the same time as he pulled his keys from his pocket and jangled them in the air. “Because we should get him a key cut. Give it to him, tell him that our home is his home.”
I grinned. “That sounds the perfect idea. It will show him that we’re serious.”
We hurried into the shop and Gabe handed over his front door key. Three minutes later and four pound coins lighter we walked out holding Brent’s new key to our home—and possibly our hearts.
We turned a corner and suddenly majestic St. Paul’s Cathedral loomed before us. Its beauty and size never failed to take my breath away no matter how many times I visited.
“There’s the small gardens at the other end,” I said to Gabe. “Maybe he’s there.”
“Well, it’s a long shot, he could be anywhere. We don’t even know if he’s come here. If he walked in this direction.”
“If he’s not you can call him.”
“Okay.”
We ambled with the tourists. I was trying not to rush or feel panicked, but suddenly I had a desperate need for us all to be together.
After slipping through a gateway in the huge black railings that surrounded the grounds, I scanned the area. A group of school children were sitting in a large circle, all dressed in blue and white and with a teacher in the center talking to them.
Most benches were occupied, manly by workers in suits, grabbing a late lunch or an afternoon snack. A couple sat on the grass eating ice creams the way we just had.
But I couldn’t see Brent.
“He’s not here,” I said, my shoulders sagging.
“Yes he is, look.” Gabe pointed to an archway set into the wall. It held a bench, dappled in shade from a large oak tree, and on it sat a lone figure.
“Oh, thank goodness,” I said.
We hurried to him. He sat with his knees apart, elbows resting on his thighs and his head hanging low as if studying his feet. For a big man he seemed small.
When we reached him we sat either side. Gabe rested his hand on Brent’s back and I touched his arm.
“Brent, are you okay?” I asked quietly.
He sighed. “I’ve had better days.”
“Do you want us to leave you in peace?” Gabe asked.
Brent lifted his head and looked at Gabe. “No, I want you here…” He turned to me. “I need you here, both of you. I just had to have a moment to mourn, I suppose.”
“That’s understandable.” I gave his arm a squeeze through his suit jacket. “It’s a momentous day when you get your decree absolute.”
“I know she’s a complete cow and you must be wondering what the hell I saw in her but she changed, or at least she showed me her real side as soon as I caught her cheating.”
“Well, she probably thought she’d be able to have her cake and eat it,” Gabe said.
“Don’t we all, though,” I said, stroking Brent’s hair.
His eyes were a little glazed and I couldn’t resist pulling him in for a hug. He pressed his face into my neck, breathed deep and melted against me.
I wrapped my arms tighter around his shoulders and touched my cheek to his soft hair.
Gabe caught my gaze, drew his eyebrows together and rested his hand between Brent’s shoulders. “You’re not alone in this,” Gabe said. “You have us.”
“We’re here for you,” I added. “Both of us, however you need us.”
He lifted his head, looked steadily at me then turned to Gabe.
“Yes,” Gabe said. “You heard right, and I probably shouldn’t be saying this on hallowed ground, but if you want my wife, if you want her in every sense of the word, I’m willing to share.”
Brent swallowed. “Really?”
Gabe nodded. “Just please, I need to be there, to start with, at least.”
“Of course…” He glanced up at the imposing cathedral. “And I think God understands lots of different types of love.”
“Love,” I said, reaching over Brent’s legs and holding Gabe’s hand. “Starts off small, like a ripple in a pond, but it can grow, get bigger and bigger, it just needs time.”
“I can’t hold it in any longer,” Gabe said. He clenched his jaw.
“What?” Brent asked quietly. “Tell me.”
“I’m falling for you, falling in love with you, Brent. I love Hayley with an intensity that scares me sometimes, but you…I love you too.”
There he’d said it. Admitted what I’d known. I felt lighter for him now that it was out in the open.
Brent swallowed. His eyes were sparkling with emotion. “I love you, Gabe, have done for a while now, but I didn’t think it would be allowed to have room to breathe, this love, I thought it was only going to be one weekend together.”
“We want more,” I said. “We want you in our lives, in our relationship,” I said. “Let’s see if what we have, between us, Brent, me and you, will turn into love too.”
“It certainly feels like it will, Hayley,” Brent said. “Damn, I want to kiss you. I want to kiss you both. But not here.”
“No, not here,” Gabe said. “I don’t think the City of London is quite ready for our public displays of affection, not yet.” He grinned sinfully. “Especially as I’m thinking it should be a naked display of affection.”
Brent smiled.
His smile made my heart leap. I’d hated seeing him so sad, so deflated. But he was back. Sexy, smart, confident Brent, the third in our lives, he was back and a free man for us to claim.
“Let’s get out of here,” Gabe said.
“Where?” Brent said, standing and holding out his hand to me. “You want to get a hotel or something?”
“No,” I said with a grin. “I’m sure we can make it to Chelsea without ripping each other’s clothes off.”
“What with him dressed like that,” Brent said, gesturing to Gabe, who looked gorgeous in his best black suit. “And you wearing that tight skirt…come on, I’m only mortal.”
I batted his shoulder. “Behave and let’s find a cab.”
Gabe laughed and linked my other arm.
If I hadn’t had three-inch heels on I would have skipped away from St. Paul’s Cathedral. As it was I clung to the two men who were a very central part to my life and my future.
Chapter Twenty-One
“Watch,” Gabe said. “Sit on the bed and watch as I take her clothes off for you.”
Brent sat on the edge of our bed. He’d removed his suit jacket, loosened his tie and undone his top button. He placed his hands behind himself and locked his elbows. “With pleasure.” He tipped his head and smiled at me.
It was a teasing tilt of his lips that made me want to kiss him.
I set down my shoulders and curled my toes into the carpet. A small shiver of desire tickled its way up my spine and over my scalp when Gabe nuzzled into my back. His hard cock pressed into my ass cheeks and his breath was warm.
“Stand still,” he whispered. “Perfectly still, you’re mine to give, mine to reveal.”
“Yes,” I said quietly, keeping my eyes on Brent. “I am.”
Gabe reached for the top button on my blouse and undid it. Slowly, agonizingly slowly, he then reached for the next one and released that too.
Brent licked his lips, his concentration on what Gabe was doing.
My blouse fell open, and Gabe gently released it from the waistband of my skirt. The material was so soft it was like fluid as he pulled it down my arms and let it float to the floor.
He eased down the zip on the back of my skirt, his fing
ers touching my buttocks through the material.
I felt it loosen around my hips then he stooped and helped it down. I stepped out of it and again he tossed it away.
“She’s beautiful,” Brent said, sitting forward. “Hayley, you’re a vision of perfection.”
“She is,” Gabe said, standing and kissing the tip of my shoulder.
I swallowed and a warm glow settled in my belly, heating my inner thighs and sending a tremor through my pussy. This was it. My moment with two men as my lovers and my first time, of many I hoped, with Brent.
Gabe slipped his hands up my belly to my breasts and cupped me over my white lace bra.
I rested back on him and his shirt was cool and crisp on my bare, hot skin.
“I love you,” he murmured.
“I love you too,” I fluttered my eyes shut.
He squeezed a little harder.
“It’s time to lose the bra,” he said, undoing the front clasp.
The cups fell and he slid the straps down my arms. The bra landed on the floor.
I looked at Brent again. He had a sexy, heavy expression and was sporting quite a bulge behind his suit trousers.
Gabe kissed his way up my neck and pinched both of my nipples between his fingers and thumbs. He pulled, stretching them, the way I liked.
I moaned and reached out. I clutched his waist, grasping his belt. “Gabe.”
“Shh…” he said against my cheek. “Just feel.”
Oh, I could feel okay; my breasts were tingling and the nip of pain was sending darts of lust between my legs.
Gabe released my nipples and again cupped my breasts. He pushed them together, his big hands covering them.
Brent loosened his tie some more, sliding the knot way down low. He shifted on the bed then tugged the tie completely off as though irritated with it.
“You like what you see?” Gabe asked.
“Do you need to ask?” Brent said, his voice a little hoarse.
Gabe chuckled, released my breasts and slipped his hands to the waistband of my thong. He hooked his fingers under the elastic and pushed.
The scrap of material fell down my legs and I kicked it away.
Brent stood. He reached for the cuffs of his shirt and undid the buttons. He then yanked it from his trousers and snapped the rest of the buttons free. I thought I heard one tear off.