by Sara Cate
Ellis leans down, hooking his hands under her thighs as he lifts and wraps her legs around his waist. She lets out a playful laugh as she kisses him, and I can't help but smile. This feels so good, being with them like this.
He takes her to the bed, and my dick starts to rouse already as he tosses her onto the mattress, climbing over her like a prowling animal. He stretches his body over hers, and I watch as he presses kisses down her chest until he licks and nips at the tawny buds of her breasts. She moans, groaning even louder as his fingers drift to the apex of her thighs. Her back arches as he presses one inside her, then her head turns and she stares at me, the sweet sounds of her pleasure through her lips as our eyes meet.
I tug my bottom lip between my teeth as he enters her with force. It feels like he's entering me at the same time, and my breath hitches in my chest as he slides as far in as he'll go. She lets out a throaty cry, grabbing for his back, the bed sheets, the headboard as he thrusts harder and harder.
Before long, my cock is ready for another round, but I'm not ready yet. I like watching. I like the way my chest grows hot seeing them together, and it's not jealousy. It's...pride. I feel so intensely for each of them that seeing them together feels like my heart is about to explode in my chest.
Hanna's breathing gets higher and more shallow, her legs clinging to him as I know she's about to come, but he doesn't stop. He notices it too, picking up his pace and keeping up his exact cadence until she's shivering and screaming.
He kisses her hard as she comes, and I feel like I might explode right along with her. But judging by the way he's still moving, I know he's not done yet, which is good. Because I'm not done either.
Coming up for air, Ellis leans back long enough to stare down at her, brushing her hair out of her face and looking at me with a sly smile.
"I think he's ready to jump back in."
"About time," she whispers with a wicked grin as they roll over so she's on top, riding him slowly as she watches me. Getting up from my chair, I palm myself, walking toward them. Running my hands along her scalp, I grasp a handful of hair and pull her face toward me. Tangling her lips with mine, I kiss her hard, feeling her whimper into my mouth as Ellis jerks his hips upward.
I drift my hand down her spine, trailing slowly over her ass and pressing one finger over the soft entrance there. Her eyes widen as she bites her lip. When she doesn't say anything, I kiss her again and then move away toward the side table to retrieve the lube still in there.
My eyes meet his as I climb onto the bed behind her. Cool drops of lube land against the surface of my cock as I slick myself up, a shiver running up my spine watching her hips tilt for me.
"You ready?" I whisper against her back.
"Yes, please," she whines, drawing it out.
After taking a moment to prep the puckered hole, slipping a finger inside and hearing her moan, I add a second and love the way it makes her hips move faster. Then, I press the head of my cock to the tightness, pressing in, sheathed in warmth and suddenly it's like I've never felt closer to two people in my life.
The three of us cry out together. I barely move at all as Hanna rides our dicks together. She clings to Ellis with one hand and me with the other, and my eyes keep finding his as she draws herself closer and closer to another climax.
Liquid heat travels up my spine, our breaths mingling like watercolors, the three of us so blended, we’re bleeding into each other, colliding into one. No longer three separate people at all. I feel him and I feel her and soon I can’t tell who I am in this mixture. Soon it’s just us.
She lets out a strangled cry, her nails digging into my hand as I feel Ellis’s hips jerk up with the spasms of his orgasm. Hanna shudders, her legs shaking around him, and I drive into her, possessive and wild.
This is the part I love, how it feels to fall, throwing myself off the edge and spilling everything I have into her. There’s a strong, broad hand clutching my leg as I let go, and it stays there throughout the entire release until I’m panting and sweaty, leaning on her but being held up by him.
Together, Hanna and I collapse, settling each of us on either side of Ellis’s pounding heart. We lie there for a moment, catching our breaths and letting our heart rates settle into a normal rhythm. It’s silent—a comfortable silence where none of us feel the need to speak. I feel his hand against mine as I turn onto my side.
“I don’t want this week to end,” she says, gasping for air.
“Hm,” Ellis replies, kissing her on the forehead.
“It doesn’t need to,” I add.
He’s still facing her, and there’s fear racing down my spine as I remember what he said earlier. This is really over with him. I fucked him over too bad.
“So, what if we stay?” he asks, turning toward me. “What will you say to people when they ask about us?”
I swallow. “I’ll tell them it’s none of their fucking business.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of. You’re still holding on to so much fear, Nash. You refuse to be vulnerable. So afraid of what others might think about you if they knew the truth.”
“I don’t care what people think.”
“No, but you know letting others in means there’s nothing standing between you and happiness. But you can’t let yourself be happy, Nash. I don’t understand why.”
“I am happy,” I whisper, turning onto my stomach and touching his lips. Hanna is resting her head on his chest and just looking at both of them, I feel like this thing in my chest might explode.
I can accept this. I can tell the whole fucking world I love these two people and not give a shit what they say. Fuck, I’ll tell them all right now. Then…then we can just be us. Free and happy and it will all be fine.
“I’m happy too,” she whispers, resting her eyes and reaching for my hand.
“Are you happy?” I whisper to him, lost in his gaze.
His jaw clenches and he lets out a heavy breath. Squeezing Hanna a little closer, he says, “I’m afraid so.”
Leaning forward, I press my mouth to his, breathing in the same air and letting my tongue slip through to taste him. After slowly pulling myself away, I keep my eyes on him as I rest my head on the pillow.
I can let myself be happy. If it means keeping things the way they are right now at this exact moment, I can.
31
It’s still dark out when I wake up. The bed is warm, almost too warm with bodies tangled next to me. The only sound is the A/C running, mingled with the heavy breathing of the two other people in my bed. My back is to Hanna, and when I turn over, I notice the way she’s resting comfortably in his arms. Her head is on his chest, the tight black curls of her hair cascading across his arm, and I reach out to play with the softness.
My mind replays what she said last night. She wants it to stay like this, the three of us. And yeah, I want that too, but that’s a stupid thing to want, isn’t it? It’s unrealistic, not to mention the attention we’d get. And least of all…my dad and Zara would lose their shit. It’s not that I care what they think about my life now…but fuck, do I?
Fuck, then Zara’s words pierce every single thought and panic worms its way in. Does she already know there’s something going on with me and Ellis? This whole time I thought I was keeping a wall up, and I wasn’t. I’m not being careful enough…reckless. I’m being reckless. Just like after Preston died.
And if I give in to this idea…letting Hanna and Ellis into my life. No one will think it’ll last. They’ll see how reckless I am, foolish, trying to replace Zara or what the three of us had. I’ll look like a fucking idiot.
I can’t lay here and stare at them anymore. The longer I do, the longer it starts to look like a very similar situation from three years ago, lying with Zara between us, her leaning a little closer to him. And look how that turned out.
Climbing out of bed, I walk to the bathroom, shutting myself in before I turn on the lights. The man in the mirror makes me stop. My hair is a little shorter, my beard
trimmed tight. And as hard as I try to find the CEO, the man, the one who has everything together, someone like Ellis, the more frustrated I become because the guy in the mirror is still the same fuck-up who lost the only girl he ever loved to his fucking dad.
I was supposed to have it together when I went to Amsterdam, but I didn’t have shit together. It was just the beginning of a slowly escalating tailspin that has now grown completely out of control. If the mess I was in before Zara came to Del Rey was bad, what is this I’m in now? There is a man and woman in my bed, and they want me to be in a relationship with them.
I’m a goddamn joke.
Clutching the end of the countertop between my fingers, I take heavy slow breaths, trying to calm the manic rattling in my brain. But the voices are persistent and too fucking loud.
I’m out of control, again. I’m fucking everything up again. I own a goddamn company and I’m acting like a child.
I should have died in that crash with Preston. Or worse…I should have saved him.
If I hadn’t been so selfish, so lazy, so cold and terrible, I would have made that flight with my brother, and I would have stopped him from ever flying in the bad weather that day.
Preston is dead because of me.
There’s a torrent in my brain at the exact moment Ellis opens the door, and it’s really just bad fucking timing.
“What happened?” he asks, deadpanned and aware, as if he knows what’s going on inside my head, as if he has any fucking clue.
“Nothing,” I mumble, shutting down, immediately closing up so he can’t see what’s behind the mask.
I step away from the counter, pushing past him toward the bedroom in a desperate attempt to flee. I need to walk away, brood alone until this terrible episode passes, and I can breathe again. But no, he pushes because that’s what Ellis does.
He prods and demands and controls, leaving no room to breathe or fidget or lie. And as he grabs my arm, giving me an expression that looks almost like worry, I sneer at him.
His fingers release my arm immediately, so I guess the anger in my face was enough.
“Talk to me,” he says, his deep voice carrying through the silence.
Storming out of the bedroom in my underwear, I head straight for the bar. A drink will calm my nerves, quicker than anything else I have on hand. I sure could go for a joint right now, but I haven’t kept that shit in the house in years. So straight vodka will have to do.
“Should I be worried?” he asks as he steps up behind me. He’s so fucking calm, and I have the naivety to love that about him. I used to emulate him, but I should have known I’m nothing like Ellis.
So, when I realized I couldn’t be him, I settled for fucking him. Or rather letting him fuck me which I guess is a more appropriate way of putting it.
Pathetic.
“Nash, talk to me, please.”
“I can’t do this,” I say before throwing back the lukewarm vodka letting it roll down my throat like lava.
“And by this…you mean—”
“This,” I bark, gesturing between us. “I can’t keep lying to myself. Besides, I don’t have time for a relationship with one person, let alone two. And do you have any idea what the media would do with me if they found out. What it would do to my company?”
“I won’t talk down to you, Nash or treat you like you don’t know what you’re talking about, so I won’t comment on the business part of what you just said, but if we’re going to go round and round about you ‘pretending’ to be something you’re not, then you’re right. This isn’t going to work.” He gestures between us and it stings. A lot more than I expect it to.
A few hours ago, we were connecting. We were in some fucked-out bliss, but right now, I’m ruining it. I’m burning it to the ground before it even had a chance to start, and I hate myself for it. But it’s not like I can tear down this wall of anger now. The vulnerable, scared version of myself beneath it is pathetic, and I don’t want his sympathy or his pity. I’d rather he just fucking leave.
“Just out of curiosity, what happened between last night and just now? Why do you flip so fast from looking at me like you love me to showing me all the hatred you really feel?”
I swallow at those words. Love and hate.
“I just realized this whole time I’ve been trying to get back what I had with Zara and somehow settled on a cheaper version by fucking both of their best friends.”
His nostrils flare, and the first thing he does, which I give him credit for, is turn back to make sure Hanna is not within earshot to hear what I just said. Then, he charges straight for me, and at first, I think he’s going to hit me, and I almost wish he would. But he doesn’t. Instead, with wild anger in his eyes, he presses me against the bar, his hand firm and broad on my chest.
“I hate myself for letting you in again, but I don’t hate you. Because you’re so fucking broken you make it impossible to hate you. And you think you’re hiding how scared you are, but I see it. I always saw it. It’s the part I fell in love with…both times. And this time, I had myself fooled you would let go, maybe for her, maybe because she was a soft place to land and if I had both of you, I could finally let myself love you again without being scared you would do to me what you did last time. Because I don’t think you realized what you did to me, Nash. I don’t think you saw how bad that killed me. And I can see by the look in your eye now this isn’t what you really want. What you really want is to have someone who will protect you when you finally let go of all of this anger and misery you’ve trapped yourself in. I tried to be that person for you…fuck, I wanted it so bad, but I can’t keep letting you break my heart just to protect yours.
“So, you can feed me all the bullshit you want about Zara and your dad and continue blaming the world for your issues, but I won’t be around for it anymore.”
This close, I can see the moisture in his eyes, the raw emotion because Ellis is always so pure. There are no lies or deceptions with him. So, when his eyes brim with tears, falling over his cheeks, I feel them like stones in my heart.
“Goodbye, Nash.”
And just like that, his hand leaves my chest and the warmth of his body pressed so closely to mine is gone.
I did it. I did what I set out to do which was keep my heart guarded and my head focused on work and the things that really matter. And when he packs his bags and stands by the helicopter a few hours later ready to catch a ride back to the city for good, I remind myself this is what I wanted. What I need.
For the fucking life of me, I can’t remember why.
Something about how pathetic I am and how I don’t have time for relationships, but it all feels so forced now. My wall is fading away, so when I watch Hanna squeeze him with her face shoved against his chest, her back shuddering with sobs, I lose the will to fight anymore. She goes to her room where she stays for the rest of the day.
And Ellis gets on the helicopter, and he lets it take him far from here. I pushed him to do that. I might as well be the one in the cockpit flying the helicopter separating us.
32
I should have known it was all a dream. Did I really expect this island paradise to be real or for any of it to actually work out?
For a moment, I did. For a few brief seconds, I actually believed good things would just fall into my lap, but that’s not how it works.
Since the only reasonable place for me to live outside of Del Rey is my mother’s house, I decide to stay behind when Ellis leaves. Hugging him goodbye, seeing the despair and anger on his face still haunts me. He looks broken, and I don’t blame him.
Nash Wilde breaks people. It’s what he does. I had all the red flags, and I knew enough about him before coming here, but he got under my skin. When he took down the mask, I saw the vulnerable boy beneath, and I gave in to my urge to heal and nurture him. What I really ended up doing was falling in love with him, with us, with everything, and it was stupid.
So fucking stupid.
Because Nash’s walls are ba
ck up, and Ellis is gone.
Every day this week I’ve spent on the mainland, in the city, doing everything that needs to be done in order for me to start over. A new apartment, not as nice or as expensive as the last one. Renting of course because trying to put a down payment is clearly out of the question.
The second order of business, and this one took a lot less time than I expected it to, was finding work, real work. Zara offered me a teaching position at the studio, and this time I actually took it even though it won’t pay the bills by itself, which brought me to La Folie, an upscale bistro on the main drag of the city where the manager took one look at me and offered me an immediate interview.
After a couple of days, I was offered a position as a server, and swallowing my pride, I took it. Almost immediately, I felt a little freer. I’m starting a new life, which means dreams won’t fall into my lap. If I’m going to do this, I’m going to have to climb my way there.
The last thing on my list is in a manilla envelope sitting on my lap on the metro ride across town. The entire ride over, I write verses in my head, trying to calm my erratic brain. Of course, every line, thought, and feeling is of them. Nash’s sea blue eyes and how they seem even bluer when he’s wet. The way the sun reflects off Ellis’s hair. How I can recognize each of their kisses even with my eyes closed. And the strange way being with them together was so different than being with them each alone.
Even after everything, the thought of them—of us together, calms me.
Getting off at the familiar old exit, I feel my skin start to crawl. I almost back out, almost letting the voices change my mind, and the closer I get the more nervous I get.
I need another voice to drown them out so before I turn my last corner, I stop and pull out my phone.
He answers on the first ring.
“Hanna,” he says, his deep voice sending warm waves of pleasure through my body.
“Ellis.”
“Are you okay?”