Finally, after nearly an hour of writing out the day’s sales by hand with only two flashlights to keep me company, I lock up the office and do a slow check of the kitchen. Almost everybody’s finished and clocked out for the night, and if the conversations I overheard earlier were any indication, nearly every one of my employees is hanging out at the bar across town for an impromptu afterparty. I could make an appearance—several of them made a point to invite me. But that’s a line I don’t cross often.
Then again, I might be able to get a jump on that whole dating thing I’ve been thinking about all night…
Nah. I’m feeling something tonight, but that’s not it.
“Boss?” The quiet voice comes from a booth just outside the kitchen. Joelle stands up.
“Hey, I thought you took off hours ago,” I say. She’s so damn pretty that I miss the first part of what she says.
“—Was supposed to be my ride because of the storm and the buses aren’t running, but then he took off.”
“I can give you a ride home, if you want,” I say, catching on.
This is not my best idea ever.
Then again, twenty minutes in a car with Joelle Munroe might be enough to get my head back on straight.
So to speak.
Joelle nods slowly.
“If you don’t mind,” she says. “Meg and her husband offered, but they live on the opposite side of town and she’s exhausted already.”
“Not a problem,” I tell her, checking my watch. “Give me another twenty minutes, maybe. I think everybody’ll be done by then.” Her smile is thin as she nods again and checks the display on her phone.
“Somewhere you need to be? I can get you a cab if you need to leave now.” It’d probably be safer that way anyway. Safer for me, I mean. I’m not prone to jumping on women who need my help.
Just that I can’t stop thinking about what it would be like to jump her. Or for Joelle to jump me. Or any possible variation of those things. Every variation.
“No, I don’t mind waiting.”
“Tell you what,” I say, an idea forming. “My friend Alex is sitting in the bar. He can keep you company while I finish up so you don’t have to sit alone in the dark.”
“A-Alex is here?” She stutters his name and my eyebrows hit the ceiling.
“That’s right. You guys have met before.”
“Yeah. Last week, waiting on to-go orders,” she says. To my surprise, even in the dark I spy a blush creeping over her face.
Well, I guess it’s not that surprising. Alex is a good-looking guy.
What’s really surprising is that I’m not jealous of that blush. Considering the amount of time I’ve spent deliberately not-fantasizing about my newest employee, you’d think her obvious interest in Alex might bother me.
It doesn’t— which is just the weird-ass cherry on this weird-ass night. Fuck it all. I need a drink.
And that gives me a better idea.
“You know, Alex and I had talked about sticking around to play pool once I lock up for the night. Would you care to join us? If you don’t have plans already, of course.”
Alex and I had no such plans, but he’ll do me a solid once he sees Joelle, surely. Then again, he’s already seen Joelle. They met last week, she said… and he’s been avoiding me ever since. I shoot a glare at the lone figure nursing a beer at the bar across the room.
Hmm.
8
Alex
“So there sits Alex,” Elliot says, wiping imaginary tears from his eyes. “Drunk as a damn skunk from those disgusting wine coolers, and the sorority girls, they just keep bringing them, you know? ‘Cause he can’t say no to save his life.”
Joelle is giggling so hard behind her hand I think she might not be breathing. I roll my eyes, letting Elliot finish his story as I line up my shot. The streetlights outside, plus Elliot’s flashlights pointed at the enormous mirror behind the bar, give us just enough light to see the pool table.
Of course, the booze is doing its part to make seeing straight a challenge.
Snick. Only the eight-ball left to go.
“After, like, the forty-seventh pink wine cooler, he finally gets up and says, ‘Scuse me, ladies,’ and bolts out the door. I think he puked for a solid twenty minutes.”
As embarrassing stories went, Elliot could have done worse, I guess.
“I can’t even so much as smell them anymore or I get nauseous,” I chuckle, chalking my cue.
“That was your freshman year?” Joelle asks, wiping a genuine tear from her eye as she catches her breath.
“Not long after the day I met him,” says Elliot. “Ah, memories.”
“You’re an asshole,” I say then take my shot, sinking the eight. “But now you’re an asshole who owes me twenty bucks.”
Elliot looks at the table.
“Sonuvabitch. When did that happen?”
“Pay up, sucker,” I wiggle my fingers at him. “Unless it’s my turn to tell stories.”
“Oh, yes, please!” says Joelle.
She’s giving Elliot a hard time just like I am, but all my cock hears is a beautiful woman begging for more. I set the rack down and turn to the bar, but not before I catch a glimpse of Elliot.
I knew he had a thing for her; I goddamn knew it. The look on his face right now tells me his dick heard the same thing.
Not that I’m thinking about his dick. Jesus fuck.
“Anybody else want a refill?” I ask. My voice is about six times rougher than normal, but I ignore it and hope they will too.
“Are you sure it’s okay?” Joelle asks.
“Of course it’s okay,” says Elliot. “I’ve got an in with the boss.”
Joelle giggles. We had taken exactly one shot of tequila each, and I think even that may have been over her limit. She’s flushed and smiling, more relaxed than I’ve seen her before. And so damned beautiful. It’s hard not to stare but she’s not for me to be staring at, so I focus on getting our beers and heading back to the table.
Elliot takes his beer saying, “I’ll have to pay you back at home. I don’t have any cash on me.”
“Oh, well, in that case,” I say, setting down the rest of the drinks. “Joelle, let me tell you about the time Natalie Fleming stuck her—”
“Dude, really?”
Joelle laughs again, a full-out belly laugh this time. It’s impossible not to laugh along with her, at least for me. Elliot’s glaring like he means it.
“And on that note, I’m going to excuse myself for just a minute,” Elliot says, still glaring daggers at me. I try not to watch him adjust himself as he slides off his stool, obscuring the bulge behind his fly.
I shift, resisting the urge to do the same.
Joelle’s sneaking a look at me from the corner of her eye, and not for the first time tonight. I take advantage of Elliot’s absence to ask her.
“You keep looking at me like that, sunshine. Something on your mind?”
That blush rises in her cheeks again and my breath catches. I’m a junkie for that blush.
“Not really,” she says, almost whispering. Joelle looks around, making sure Elliot’s still gone.
“You can trust me, you know,” I say. “I can keep a secret.”
Understatement of the year.
“It’s just—” She looks so damn nervous again. I hate that. I walk around the pool table to take the stool next to her.
“Just what?”
“You flirted with me at the bar that night,” she says, the words coming out so fast I almost don’t catch them all.
“Of course I did. You’re a beautiful woman. I enjoyed talking with you.”
That blush peaks again.
“Thank you,” she says. “But I mean, you flirted. At first. But then you stopped.”
I take a long pull from my drink then set the bottle down and meet her eyes.
“You work for Elliot,” I say slowly.
“Yes,” she says. She’s leaning in like she can’t hear me so I le
an in a little closer.
“Elliot’s my friend.”
“I know.” She’s whispering now.
“I didn’t… I didn’t want to make you feel pressured in any way about your new job. Those are hard enough without… additional complications.”
“Complications?”
I can feel the heat of her breath on my cheek. The slightest dip of my will bring us together.
“This is going to be complicated,” I murmur, brushing my lips across hers.
“I don’t care.” Joelle wraps her small fist in my shirt and yanks, closing the gap.
The world fades to nothing behind us as she opens for me. I slide one hand from her cheek into the soft curls behind her ear, relishing the shiver that action yields before fisting my hand in the hair at the back of her head. I tug, just little. Her answering whimper has me going painfully hard in an instant and I tug again.
Joelle’s head falls back and whatever she sees on my face makes her gasp.
“I thought—”
“You thought what, sunshine?” I ask, biting her bottom lip gently.
“I thought you didn’t want me,” she says, looking away.
Hell.
In my mind’s eye, I’m already pulling her over to straddle my lap so I can show her exactly how wrong she is. A heartbeat before I can pull her to me and make that stunning vision a reality, the sound of approaching footsteps finally registers.
He stops a few feet away and no one so much as takes a breath until he speaks.
“Of course he wants you, Joelle,” says Elliot, holding my gaze. “Every man in his right mind wants you.”
For another long, breathless moment, none of us move. Joelle’s closed her eyes, waiting. For what?
My eyes are glued to Elliot’s as I touch my lips to kiss her again, just the faintest brush of skin. Joelle trembles even as Elliot’s quiet moan cuts through the silence.
We’re standing on a precipice here. I’m not sure how we got here but I can feel it, feel them both waiting for me to move us all into what happens next.
I know Elliot wants this girl. I also know he won’t touch her, not as long as he keeps to that rule about dating his employees. I don’t know as much about the beautiful woman currently vibrating with need in my arms, except she tastes like the best that both heaven and hell have to offer and that I haven’t wanted any woman the way I want Joelle.
In the end, I go with the truth.
“He’s right,” I tell Joelle. “I want you, very much. Elliot can tell you what it feels like.”
Joelle is quivering, damn near shaking against me now. Elliot sucks in a breath. We’ve never done anything like this before—never had a threesome or shared a woman. Not even in college. I’m taking one hell of a chance assuming he’ll even consider playing along.
But I think he will. I think he wants Joelle too much and the possibility of touching her even by proxy is more than he can walk away from.
If it wrecks me in the meantime, so be it. If this is the closest I’ll get to seeing him need like this, yearn for someone like this, I’ll take it. It’ll haunt me in every shower wank and wet dream for the rest of my life, but I’ll take it.
“It feels… like my skin is too tight,” Elliot says slowly.
He takes a couple of shuffling steps toward us, his voice low. I keep brushing my lips against Joelle’s in soft, undemanding strokes. Elliot keeps talking, his voice slow, almost hypnotic.
* * *
“Every time you look at me, the world goes a little bit dim, like somebody’s turned a dial on everything but you. I can’t catch my breath. My heart pounds like I’ve run three flights of stairs.”
Joelle whimpers, blinking up to look at me. Elliot steps closer.
“Is that true?” she asks. I don’t know if she even knows who she’s asking, but we both answer.
“Yes.”
Her mouth drops open on a gasp.
“Kiss me,” she whispers. I look at Elliot.
He’s a mess. His hair is mussed where he’s been pulling at it with both hands. There’s a faint sheen of sweat across his forehead I can see in the dim light of the bar. His hands are shaking.
“For Christ’s sake, Alex, do it,” he says.
“Say it again, Joelle,” I tell her, stroking a finger across her cheek. She’s kept her eyes closed this whole time. I need to know she’s here with me.
With us.
“I shouldn’t,” she whispers.
“Shouldn’t what?” I whisper back.
“I shouldn’t do this. I shouldn’t want… this.”
I desperately want to demand she tell me precisely what it is she wants, but the ‘shouldn’t’ comes first.
“Joelle. Look at me.”
Her eyes flutter open, focusing on my face.
“If you don’t want this, it stops here and now. Anytime you say so, okay?” I wait until she nods. “Beyond that, don’t let somebody else’s idea of ‘shouldn’t’ keep you from something you want. What we do together is between us.” It’s all I can do to keep from glancing over at Elliot, who’s breathing so hard I can hear it from six feet away.
Joelle drops her gaze to my mouth for a long, hot moment.
“Kiss me, Alex.”
Thank God. I meant it when I offered to stop but it might have killed me in the process.
The instant I take her mouth, Elliot groans softly and then I’m lost in Joelle. She’s soft, hesitant, a little shy. I coax her mouth open to sip a little deeper.
Sweet. She’s so damned sweet.
Her hands come up to twist in my hair, making me shudder. It’s been so long since I felt anything at all, let alone something so big. I’m awed by her, even as she presses against me to take my tongue deeper. When she begins kissing me back, my brain shuts off. I grip her hips and haul her into my lap.
The stool doesn’t afford much room to maneuver and I’m careful to plant my feet so we don’t tip over. Bracing my feet wide, Joelle’s knees slide alongside my hips and our bodies meet right where I need her most.
Joelle’s head falls back, breaking our kiss as she gasps, her eyes closed. Unable to resist her heat, I shift my hips, pressing the hard ridge of my cock along the seam between her legs.
“Jesus.” Elliot’s voice comes from somewhere close by and it makes me buck up into her sweetness all over again, drawing a moan from them both. Elliot bends down, his face radiating warmth as he whispers in my ear.
“I think she’s going to come.”
I think so too. I can hear the need in his voice and it makes me ache in an altogether different way.
I can’t give Elliot what I want, but maybe, just this once, I can give him something he wants.
I tighten my grip on Joelle’s hips, sliding her across my rigid fly, relishing the moan it draws from her throat. I grip a handful of her hair, pulling her head back so I can draw my tongue along her neck, nipping with my teeth, testing that water.
She starts to shake.
I bring her mouth back to mine, determined to get her where she so obviously wants to go. I’ve never been this hard up for someone else’s orgasm.
I keep my mouth busy at her neck, stealing a hand across the scooped neckline of her shirt, tracing along the seam there with the lightest touch I can manage.
“Please,” she gasps. Joelle is rocking against me now, working her pussy across my cock, and I can tell she’s close. “Please.”
I press my lips to her ear. “Please what?”
I can feel Elliot standing right behind me, the heat from his body practically caressing my back as Joelle rides me. I want him to see. I want to give him this, even as I’m dying to give Joelle more.
I close my teeth around her ear and tug, and that’s all it takes. She’s keening, grinding on my cock, wet heat seeping through her jeans, her nails biting into my shoulders as she comes hard, crying out. She rocks into me, almost dragging me along in the wake of her orgasm, finally slowing to a stop as her breathing slows
.
For a few moments, there’s only silence punctuated by heavy breathing. I squeeze her in a hug, because that was the hottest thing that’s happened to me in years and we’re only fooling around like teenagers. The press of her body reminds me that some of us still haven’t come yet and I guess she has the same thought because Joelle’s eyes fly up to meet mine.
She opens her mouth to say something and a shrill ring cuts through the silence.
Joelle’s eyes go wide and to my undying regret, she climbs off my lap.
“My phone. Where did I leave my phone?”
“Back booth,” says Elliot. It’s more of a growl than actual speech. “By the kitchen.”
She nods without making eye contact and runs off to find her ringing phone.
I chance a look at him as Joelle answers the call. Elliot’s leaning into the bar, arms set wide, gripping the ledge so hard I wonder it doesn’t splinter between his fingers. If his shallow breathing is any indication, the last ten minutes turned him on every bit as much as it did me.
Elliot looks at me then, and my cock leaps behind my fly. He doesn’t want me, I know he doesn’t, but right this moment my dick doesn’t know that. He’s looking at me like I could take the pain away, and it damn near rips my heart out of my chest.
Joelle comes back before I can speak, and thank God for it. What the hell can I say?
“I have to go,” she says softly.
“Let me get my keys,” says Elliot, turning to face us both.
“I called an Uber, but thanks.” She looks at me like she’s about to say something else, but seems to change her mind. “Thanks,” she says again. I get a small smile before she heads to the door.
I follow her out front. Once I’m sure the driver’s not a murderer, I pay her in advance and open the door for Joelle to slide in.
I guess she finds that funny because she finally smiles at me.
“Thanks, Alex.”
I want to say more. I want to bring her home with me. And as I register the restaurant door closing behind me, I know we damn well need to talk about what just happened. But I don’t say any of that.
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