by Nikki Dean
Allie hesitated, her gaze flicking between them for a moment before she sucked in a deep breath and nodded. “OK.”
She hit the mute button again, disabling it. “Fine, Xander, I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
“By yourself?” he asked suspiciously.
“Do you want the internet fixed or not?” she shot back. “I can ask if they did anything, but I might need to call the cable company if the TV doesn’t work either. The TV and internet use the same cord.”
Greg tapped the router with a devious grin and Allie shook her head with a sigh. “Yeah, I have the router and I’ll bring it over. But if your conference call is a big deal, maybe you should go to the coffee shop anyway. I don’t see your phone cords.” She put one hand over her eyes, explicitly not looking at the tangle of cords beneath the router.
They could hear Xander mumbling something about shoes as he fumbled around, finally culminating in a string of creative uses for the word fuck.
Allie laughed and said, “See you soon!” then hung up the phone. “OK then,” she said to Greg, Abel, Bentley and Trevor. “This isn’t really how I expected today to go, but I’m totally on board. Now where are his shoes so I can get him to leave the apartment?”
Greg rolled his eyes, then pulled four left flip flops out of the bottom of his box of assorted stuff. “What? I didn’t want him to have any that matched, so I took all of the left ones I could find.”
“Great plan, except that now we want him to leave the house, not stay in it because he doesn’t have any shoes,” Abel replied in exasperation. “So now he’s going to stay there because he can’t go anywhere else.”
“I left him one pair by the door,” Greg said defensively. “They just don’t match, but if worst comes to worst, he can wear them together. I didn’t want to be unsafe if there’s a fire. I’m not a monster.”
Allie laughed and patted his arm. “I’m sure he’ll figure it out, or I’ll just point them out. Xander is a mess on his best day, so he probably won’t even realize that you took his shoes unless he notices the shoelaces thing.”
“Which he’s not getting back. And we’re not taking the router out of the truck until he’s gone,” Greg replied, somewhat mollified by her entertainment. “He can go to Dark Roast with zip ties in his shoes for all I care.”
They all laughed and headed for the door together, Daisy in tow.
Chapter 8
Xander opened the door a sliver to see Allie standing on the other side, alone. He looked around cautiously, then, satisfied, unlatched the security chain and opened it all the way.
“What’s up, your boyfriend couldn’t come this time?” he asked sarcastically as he watched her walk into the apartment, then turn to look at him just as Trevor’s hand closed around Xander’s wrist.
“Nope, we’re here, asshole,” Trevor said as he braced the door with his foot and pulled Xander through the opening. Twirling him around, he pressed Xander’s chest against the wall beside the door while Greg, Abel and Bentley filed in after Allie. Satisfied, Trevor shoved Xander away and darted inside himself, slamming the door closed just as Xander reached it to pound on the other side.
“Allie, what the fuck! This isn’t what we agreed on!” he yelled from outside.
“Go away or I’m calling the cops, Xander,” she yelled back. “Your name isn’t on the lease, so I’m calling the office right now. They’ll be here to talk to the police and tell them that you’re not supposed to be here, and you’ll probably get arrested for trespassing. So I’d leave before then if I were you.”
“I’ll tell them about your stupid dog!” Xander threatened.
“You mean my dog?” Trevor growled at him as he opened the door again. He had the security chain firmly in place and trapped Xander’s hand against the wall when the dumbass tried to reach inside to undo it. “Daisy is mine. There’s no dog food here, or toys that would indicate she’s doing anything other than visiting with me, so you tell whoever you want whatever you want. No one cares, Xander.”
“Bitch, when I get back in there…” Xander shot back.
“What? What do you think you’re going to do?” Trevor demanded. “Allie never wanted you to live here and you bullied your way in. What the fuck do you think you’re going to do against me, much less me and three other guys, you pathetic little limp-dicked fuckup?”
Xander glared through the three-inch opening but didn’t respond. Trevor let him go and he jerked his hand back through, then yelled, “Don’t forget I know where you live, Allie. You’re gonna regret kicking me out like this when you know I don’t have anywhere else to go!”
“Excuse me?” Trevor slammed the door and ripped back the security chain, then wrenched the door open again to stalk across the hall to Xander, pushing him up against the railing with nothing more than his chest. Greg, Abel and Bentley were right behind him.
“The fuck did you just say to her? You think it’s OK to threaten her safety like that, and think nothing is going to happen to you for it? Bitch, we’ll happily line up and take turns beating your ass if you ever come near her again, do you hear me? If you so much as glance her way, we’ll fucking know because one of us will be with her at all times from now on. One of us, with Allie. Who used to be your girl, but since you’re too much of a twat to know how to treat a lady, she gets all four of us. Whenever and however she wants.”
Xander shrank back, his ass on top of the railing already. “I didn’t mean it like that, I was just talking shit.”
“Yeah, threatening her, trying to make her feel afraid. Stupid, mindless words from you, but you know what that does to a woman?” Abel demanded in fury. “They keep her up at night, worry her every time she has to leave the house, make her look around the parking lot or bus stop an extra minute, all because your stupid fucking ass decided to mouth off and say some shit like that. So how about I tell you that if you ever come near her again, I won’t just beat your ass but I’ll put you in the hospital. Football be damned, you don’t get to try to terrify a woman like that and get away with it.”
“Or you could just call the cops,” a new voice said from down the hallway. “I heard him threaten her too, and I wouldn’t have any problem at all telling them so.”
“Ha! A witness! And you heard what these four assholes just told me, right?” Xander asked in delight. “You heard them threaten me, too!”
Allie’s neighbor shook his head. “Nope, I didn’t hear anything like that. Just heard you yelling at Allie not to forget that you know where she lives.” With that, he went back inside and shut his door, then opened it again. “I’ll be here all night, so let me know if you need me to talk to anyone.” He closed the door again and left it shut.
“You hear that, you little shit? No one’s on your side, and you know why? Because you’re an asshole. Now get out of here,” Bentley demanded.
Allie tossed two trash bags full of clothes out beside the door. “There’s all of your shit Xander. I’ll call your sister to come get anything else I find, and I hope I never see you again. Bye.”
She shut the door, leaving the five of them outside. Her four turned on Xander with menacing smiles and he bolted, skirting around them to pick up his stuff and then ran down the hallway, his unlaced sneakers flopping against the pavement with every step he took.
Chapter 9
“He ran like a duck,” Greg joked as he replaced the lightbulb in the living room. “It was hilarious. You should have seen it, Allie.”
“I bet it was. You wouldn’t be able to tell from looking at him, but he’s never really been the athletic type. He’s pretty built, but it’s a gym body, you know? Not like you guys,” she replied as she carried a load of laundry to the washer.
“I’m so jealous,” Trevor muttered. “My unit doesn’t have a washer and dryer, so I have to use the laundromat.”
“After today, feel free to bring your laundry here any time,” she replied with a laugh. “My last place didn’t have a washer and dryer in it either,
and it was awful. That’s definitely on my list of must-haves for the next apartment.”
Abel shot Greg a glare as he opened his mouth to say that his house had a brand new set of appliances, and he closed it without making a sound. He did glare back at Abel for good measure, though.
“Where are you thinking about looking?” Abel asked as he turned back to the fridge to put back all of the food he’d taken out a mere hour or so before. “You gonna stick close to campus?”
“I haven’t decided yet. I’d like to be close, but I’m OK with driving an extra ten or fifteen minutes if I have to. It’s not that big of a deal, but I do like to be on the campus bus route, just in case.” She closed the washer lid and wiped her hands on the seat of her jeans. “I guess I should order pizza now, since we never really got the chance at Mads’ place.”
Pulling out her phone, she ordered a large pineapple pizza on the app, then looked at the guys for their requests. “Mushroom and hamburger sounds good, or whatever you want,” Trevor said to Abel. “I don’t really care either way.”
“I could go for mushroom and hamburger.”
Allie nodded and added that, as well as cheesy breadsticks, to her order and charged it to her credit card. “OK, guys, it’ll be here in about thirty minutes. I feel like pizza is such a lame-ass way to say thank you after you just solved literally the biggest problem in my life right now.”
“Here’s a tip - don’t date losers anymore, and you won’t have problems like that,” Bentley joked.
“I’ll put that on my list,” Allie teased back.
“Your list? Of what?” Abel asked as he moved to the pantry. “Like do you have a real list of disqualifiers? Because I feel like ‘don’t date losers’ should have been number one a long time before now.”
“Uh, actually, number one is ‘don’t date freeloaders’. It’s slightly different than dating losers, but costs more money in the long run. Next is ‘don’t date assholes’, because I can’t stand a man who’s mean to me, or other people. I never got that whole thrill from dating a bad boy that most girls seem to be into.”
“Finally, a woman after my own heart. But I think you’d enjoy a little bad boy every now and then,” Trevor teased. “Not all of us are mean.”
“Oh, you think you’re a bad boy? Why’s that?” she arched an eyebrow at him as she pulled Daisy’s dog bed out of the bag they’d crammed it into and shook it out. She tossed it onto the floor beside the couch and smiled as the dog happily curled up on it.
“Just trust me on this, sweetheart. I’ve done plenty of bad things.”
She wrinkled her nose. “See, that doesn’t appeal to me at all.”
They all laughed, Trevor included. Allie blushed when she realized what she’d said.
“Not that you don’t appeal to me!” she tried to backtrack, then blushed harder. “I mean, you’re appealing, sure, but not because of that. You’ve always been nice to me, and the way that you handled Xander just now was amazing, but that doesn’t make you bad.”
“I’m sure he thought otherwise,” Abel muttered. “We did just threaten him with assault and battery, for lack of a better term.”
“Well, I mean, yeah, but that was just if he kept harassing me. You’d never hurt anyone if there wasn’t a good reason behind it, right?”
Trevor stood from his seat beside the wall, having just finished screwing the cover back onto the cable outlet. Crossing the room, he stopped in front of her, looking down into her trusting eyes with amusement. He reached down and brushed her hair back from her cheek, tucking it behind her ear. Her eyes widened at the contact and she caught her breath.
Looking up into his face, she realized that even though she’d been around these guys so much, she never really took the time to look at them. Oh, she knew they were attractive, with hard bodies and abs for days, but she had been around a rippling six-pack or two before and knew she couldn’t let things like that faze her if she wanted to work with athletes.
But this… this was different. Trevor had the beginnings of laugh lines around his eyes, belying the smooth skin that helped everyone think he was still in his early twenties like she was. Well, closer to mid-twenties now, but still. He had a perpetually scruffy five o’clock shadow adorning his face, as though he couldn’t be bothered to shave unless he was about to go to work, but since that only happened every few weeks, it grew out between jobs. His dark hair was getting long, almost reaching his shoulders, where it curled gently.
“Allie,” he whispered, merely breathing her name. She jerked her eyes back up to his, then dropped them to his lips, mere inches from hers as he’d leaned closer. She unconsciously tilted her head back, giving him access.
One could have heard a pin drop in the room as the other three occupants held their breath.
Whether it had just been the way that he’d confronted Xander and gotten rid of him for good, or it had been something building up for longer, Allie wasn’t sure, but she was suddenly overcome with the desire to feel his lips on hers.
She leaned her head back, then shook herself as he drifted closer. What the fuck am I doing? This is totally unprofessional, and I can’t kiss him with the other guys here! Not that I even want to make a decision that big if it means I’m choosing him over the others! I don’t want to jump straight from one relationship to another one, even if it is just a kiss, and it’d be really hard to explain that to Greg and Abel without looking like a complete slut if I let them take me out, too.
This thought in mind, she turned her face away at the last moment, allowing his lips to fall harmlessly upon her cheek.
“I don’t think I’m ready for that yet, you know? I only just got out of a relationship with Xander, and I don’t want to give anyone the wrong idea,” she whispered. “But I really appreciate everything you’ve done to help me today, Trevor.”
“What idea would that be, sweetheart?” he asked quietly. His words had just enough volume behind them to carry across the small living room. “No one is getting any ideas that wouldn’t guarantee you anything but a good time. We already told you that you don’t have to choose.”
She blushed at the heat in his voice and skirted around him get out of the galley kitchen that he had her trapped in. “I don’t know what to say to that.”
“Say you’ll let us take you out,” Greg said from the bar. He’d come closer to watch the connection sizzling between Allie and Trevor, and looked over her head at his new friend with a nod. “All of us. Tonight. I know we can’t be the only guys interested in you, but I’m betting we’d be the only ones willing to date you all together.”
“All together?” she repeated with a squeak. “What does that really mean? Don’t I get a say in this?”
“Of course you do, Allie. None of us want to pressure you into anything that you don’t want to do,” Bentley tried to soothe her. “Everything is up to you. It’s like we said back at Mads’ apartment, it just feels right, and would work well. You already know Greg and Abel are a package deal, and I’d be happy to be included in that, for my own reasons. Trevor, too. What happens or doesn’t happen is entirely up to you.”
She still looked skeptical. Abel sighed and went to her, took her hand and pulled her to one of the four chairs lining her kitchen table. He sat in one and tugged her into his lap, allowing the other three guys to fill in the vacant seats. He figured that the fact that she didn’t protest meant that she was either considering the idea, or she was too distracted by the thought of all of them wanting her to bother bitching about something so inconsequential as where she sat.
Nothing could have been farther from the truth. Allie was fighting to control her heart, which she thought might thud its way out of her chest at any moment. Being surrounded by these four guys that she’d been fantasizing about for months, all saying they wanted to be with her too, was insane.
It was insane. She was their trainer. They were her clients. Couldn’t happen.
Right?
Abel wrapped his arms aro
und her and gave her a hug, almost like he couldn’t resist the moment. She relaxed into his strong arms and hugged him back, sucking in her breath when her arms hit his bare sides.
How did I not notice that he’s wearing this shirt? I tease him about having ripped off the arms, leaving gaping holes halfway to his waist, all the time. It’s no wonder Xander went running, with these muscles on display.
She had to curl her hands into fists to avoid running her palms over his sides, then up his back like she wanted to. The sheer expanse of skin that was showing, just begging to be touched, was intoxicating, and she wondered what he’d do if she gave herself this small luxury.
He’d probably just take the damn thing off, but then the rest of them would do the same, and we need to talk about this first, she realized. Do they just want one night together, like some sort of kinky five-way, or two at a time, and if so which ones? Or one at a time, and I’ll just be up all night, then they all go home and we pretend it never happened? I don’t think I can do that, if we do it once. I like them all too much to cross the sex line for nothing.
The moment ended and Abel let go and leaned back in his chair, leaving her sitting a little awkwardly across his thighs. He scooted back and pulled her closer, cuddling her like they’d sat this way a thousand times.
I don’t want to get my heart broken four times tonight, she realized as the other guys sat down around them, sprawling into her chairs like they belonged there.
“So what are you guys thinking here, when you say you all want me? You mean like a real relationship with all four of you or just a random night of gang-bang sex? Because while being with all of you sounds tempting, and I’ve never done anything even remotely like that, I don’t think I’m up for that. Especially not with you four.”
“Why not with us four?” Trevor asked as Abel growled, his chest vibrating beneath her shoulder.