“Any kind.” The smile vanishes. “If it means anything, I’ve never heard anyone say a bad word about him in that respect. In fact, I’ve had people tell me they hate him and his politics, but they respect he was so dedicated to Michelle and Susa. I honestly hope we lose him first, because if he loses Michelle, it will kill him. I mean, he wanted to go on to run for governor, and he would have nailed it.
“That was the actual freaking plan. He was going to run for governor, and Owen would run for state Senate, Benchley’s old seat, then Owen would run for governor while Benchley ran for US Senate, and then Susa would run for state senate. Lather, rinse, repeat. When Benchley had the heart attack, Michelle told him no more, he was done once his term ended, and he didn’t argue with her. Which, if you know anything about Benchley, that’s saying a lot.”
I shiver. “Would he have run for president?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. He says no, but I’m not so sure.”
“So can you do me a favor?” I ask.
“I’ll try.”
“If I have Chris coordinate visits with you guys, can we try to work in visits with Michelle and Benchley, too?”
“Absolutely, we can do that.”
“He said he hopes Susa doesn’t want to run for higher office.”
Carter leans back, running a hand through his hair. “Between you and me, that makes two of us. But if she does, we’ll do it. Because I want her to be happy.”
I think about the three children now living upstairs. “How do I keep the kids happy?”
“That is not an easy answer. Focus on being a parent as much as you can. As much normal stuff as possible. Help them with their homework. Have a routine. Dinner around the table every day, even if all you can spare is twenty minutes. But when you’re there with them, be all there. They need to know Mom is there for them.”
I think back to Momma. No matter how busy she was, she sat down with me every day in the evening to go over my homework with me. Even subjects she didn’t understand. In those cases, she asked me to explain stuff to her, to see if I knew it.
But the point was, I didn’t feel second-place to her job, ever.
In my life, she was Momma first, and State Senator Marlene Samuels second.
“I think I know what you mean,” I say.
“And we’re a phone call away.”
We both stand and he offers me a hug. “Thanks for coming with him,” I say.
“Glad I could. I mean, not the circumstances, but—”
“Yeah, I know.” I put the letter away and we return to the residence, where Chris and Kevin are sitting with Benchley in the living room and talking shop—of course—ahead of my reelection.
Chris holds a small glass of amber liquid on ice and looks…
Exhausted on a soul level.
I don’t want to hurry Benchley and Carter out. I should have invited them to stay overnight in the guest rooms. But once they leave, Kevin and I tuck Christopher in and we head back down to my office.
As we walk close together, we don’t hold hands, but he lets me brush the back of my hand against his, as if it’s accidental contact. That’s as much as he’ll allow me outside the residence, even when there are no members of the public in the White House.
I close the curtains and then without me even asking, Kevin sits in my chair and pats his lap. He knows me.
I curl up there, kicking my shoes off so I can tuck myself tight against him while he wraps his arms around me. I’m not expecting to cry again this hard, but I do, softly sobbing, my face buried against his chest and his strength wrapped around me. I don’t even know how long we sit there, but he knows what I need.
I needed Sir, and he’s here. My Prophet, his quiet, steady strength. The sadist is fun, too, but tonight Priest is wrapped in his own bubble of pain and he needs to work through it in his way. We’ll all spend the night in bed together, with Chris snuggled between us, but he has to process by himself. That’s him. That’s what he’s asked of us, a little time alone right now, and we have to respect that.
Kev gently rakes his nails up and down my outer thigh once I’ve calmed myself. “Can you talk about it, sweetie?”
Instead, I take out the letter and let him read it, tucking myself against him again while he does, my eyes closed.
I know he’s finished reading by the sound of his soft exhale. Then I hear him fold the letter and tuck it back into the envelope. “We need to put this somewhere safe,” he finally says. “It can’t stay in here. It can’t see the light of day while Benchley and Michelle are alive, and not while Susa’s still in office, or running for other offices. And we can’t tell Chris.”
“I know. Please, Sir?”
“Okay. I’ll put it someplace safe. Nothing on it identifies you by name, so that’s smart on her part.” I hear him drop it on my desk, then his hand returns, stroking my back. “Did he tell you…more than what’s in there?”
“Yes.”
This is a familiar routine with us. Sometimes, I can’t tell Kev stuff, because of national security. In those times, he knows just how to press to allow me the relief of him knowing my mind is heavy, but without me revealing what I can’t.
“That means we can’t let that see the light of day until you’ve retired from political life,” he says. “If ever. You’d be implicated for not exposing it, wouldn’t you?”
I nod.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
“No.”
He nuzzles the top of my head. I never imagined this man would become my world. That night he interviewed me outside Amalie Arena in Tampa, I had no clue he’d unlock my soul in ways I never dreamed.
Both of these men.
“We could go up to the third floor,” he suggests.
He means the workout room. There’s no staff up there tonight, unless we call for them, and it’d be far enough from the kids’ rooms they couldn’t hear us.
It’s…tempting. And this is a sweet pocket of time we might not have for a while. We can sneak little bubbles of privacy like this, but play is more difficult, except in bed, and we don’t want to wake Chris.
“Okay.”
He immediately pinches the outside of my thigh, hard, making me yelp. “What was that, girl?” he softly asks.
I shiver as engrained reactions sweep through me. “Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir.”
He kisses the top of my head and chuckles. “Good girl.”
Does it make me a horrible person that, after this day, just that little thing can turn me into a super-horny, squirming ball of need?
We go upstairs, and Sir takes over, quickly stripping me, putting me on my knees, and face-fucking me until he’s ready to put me on my hands and knees and fuck me like that.
I love it—I love Him.
Later, once we’re both satisfied and exhausted, he puts us both together enough we can head back down to the bedroom and climb in on either side of Chris. He’s asleep, and from the deep sound of his breathing I suspect the alcohol helped him a little.
At least he’s sleeping, and now he’s with both of us, and the worst is behind us.
From this point on, he can heal, the kids can heal, and we can start building our family.
I’m the last one awake, judging from the sound of Kevin’s snores, and I can finally…think.
Part of me feels more than a little angry that I was denied all those years with Benchley and spent them idolizing a man who not only wasn’t my father, but was a fucking abusive asshole, to boot.
But the politician in me understands why.
I also get why he waited to give me her letter, instead of telling me after she died, or even before she died, but when she’d gone nonverbal and we knew she was just months or less from death.
Promises to keep.
A lot of things in my life make better sense in this new context, though. I have no doubts I inherited a lot from Benchley.
I have a lot to learn from him.
I only hope there’s still time f
or me to spend time with him and get to know him better before we lose him, because it’s a comfort to know he’s still out there and looking out for me in ways I didn’t even know.
Because he loves me.
Because he’s loved me all these years, in secret and from afar.
Because he cared about Momma enough to hold those secrets for her.
And because he cared enough to kill for her.
Maybe ten or even twenty years ago, I might have been horrified by that revelation.
I now hold the keys to a huge empire, and have been anointed with secrets far worse than that.
Perspective.
I have perspective.
Ancient promises aside, I also hope I can be as good a parent to those children now entrusted to us as Benchley and my Momma were to me.
Chapter Fifteen
The last week of January, the kids are at school and I’m at work downstairs in my study when Kev appears in the doorway before lunchtime. It’s a Friday, and my schedule is light today. He and I spent most of this past week on the road, both for work and campaign stops, and I’m done. I plan on sleeping late tomorrow, watching cartoons with the kids, and staying out of Chris’ and Kevin’s way while they cook breakfast with them. Then we’ll go down to the family movie theatre and watch whatever it is the kids chose for tomorrow. Jasmine has the weekend off, and for now we’ve closed the White House to weekend tours to protect the kids’ privacy, so other than Secret Service and White House staff we basically have the place to ourselves.
Our home life has settled into a roughly flexible routine that I’m cherishing.
I sit up. “What?”
The eyebrow arch. That, and the way he silently holds out his hand to me tells me Sir’s totally in the house, and it makes me shiver in good ways.
Because of the obvious, and because of work, we haven’t had a lot of playtime lately. Chris and I have had a little bit here and there. Kev and I locked ourselves in the executive suite on Air Force one several times this week for some stress relief. I know Chris bent Kev over his desk in the East Wing yesterday afternoon and nailed him minutes after we’d returned from our trip.
But playtime for the three of us together has been rare. It’s easier for us to sleep in the same bed.
I stand and take his hand, and he pulls me in for a quick kiss. “Let’s go.” He releases my hand and steps aside, indicating for me to go first.
I’d rather walk at his side, but protocol dictates I’m supposed to walk ahead, or at least side-by-side.
We head upstairs, where I realize there’s no staff anywhere around. We have three hours before the kids return home from school.
When Chris steps into the foyer with an evil smile in place on his handsome features, I realize the sadist is back.
Oh, thank god!
I’ve really missed that sonofabitch.
Kev slips behind me, one hand grabbing my throat and the other taking my arm and pulling it up, behind my back.
“Got her?” Chris asks, sounding amused.
“Yes, Sir. I might not be a super spy like you, but I can control the girl.”
From the feel of the hard cock pressing against my back through his suit, it’s turning him on, too.
Chris laughs. “I wasn’t a spy, dammit.” He walks over, barefoot and in jeans, no shirt.
Damn, he looks good.
He grabs my chin and leans in for a hard, sucking kiss that nearly takes my knees out.
“Sorry, baby. Life got in the way there. Forgive me?”
I temper my disappointment. The sadist takes, unapologetically, and I kind of hoped this meant I’d get him back for a few hours. He really helps me clear out the mental cobwebs.
This version of the sadist is…well, he’s okay, but he’s more the version Kev usually gets and melts over. The gentler sadist who first fell in love with a practically virginal college guy in a nightclub in Daytona.
“I forgive you.”
He reaches past me and pulls Kev in for a kiss. “Bedroom, baby. Now.”
I’m not sure if he meant the baby for me or Kev, because he calls both of us that, and I love it when he does.
Off we go, Kev keeping a firm grip on me. Kev’s Sir mode hits different wavelengths within my soul, makes me desperate to please him. He doesn’t need physical control with me the way the sadist does, because Kev has a way of making me take everything from him without having to ask me for it because I’m usually begging.
Once we’re securely locked in our bedroom, the men work together to quickly strip me and get me up on the bed, where Chris grins as he looks at Kev. “Lean in.”
He does, and Chris relieves him of his necktie, which he uses to truss my wrists together, over my head, and fastened to the bed frame.
They both sit up, looking pleased with themselves. Kev kicks off his shoes, but when he starts to remove his blazer, Chris grabs him by the lapels and hauls him in for a long, deep kiss that soon has him moaning with need and me moaning because I’m helpless to get in there and help.
They’re on either side of me on the bed, Chris on my right and Kev on my left, and Chris pushes Kev’s blazer halfway off, holding it and pinning his arms to his sides as he kisses him again.
“Going to treat our good girl to a show she’s been missing,” Chris says as he looks right at me with an evil smile. He releases Kev. “Jacket off, then wait.”
Kev finishes shrugging it off and drops it to the floor. Then he quickly unfastens his collar and cuffs and rolls his sleeves up.
Meanwhile, the sadist grabs a riding crop I didn’t even see from the end of the bed, grabs me by the ankles, and shoves them up and back so I’m bent in half and my ass is now exposed.
“Hold her, boy,” Chris orders. “And keep her quiet.” Kev happily complies. He smiles down at me as he holds my legs back with one arm, and covers my mouth with his other hand.
My position gives the sadist a prime target, but first he slides a finger between my thighs, where my pussy is also now exposed.
I shiver, a moan rolling from me, and Chris laughs. “Yes, the girl needed this, too.”
The first strike, perfectly landing across the sit line between ass and upper thighs, makes me shriek. Thank god Chris thought to muffle me.
“Ooh, the girl felt that,” Chris said, his finger trailing over my clit this time and teasing me. “Let’s see what else she’ll feel.”
I can’t really see what Chris is doing, from how his back is to me, and my legs are in the way.
What I can see is, looking up into Kev’s blue eyes, the amusement plainly visible there as he blows me a kiss while I scream and moan into his hand. Chris alternates vicious hits with the riding crop with playing with my clit and pussy, back and forth, pleasure and pain and reminding me who’s in charge.
Who I want to be in charge.
And it’s even sexier with Chris in his jeans and Kev in his slacks and shirt
Kev is totally on the sadist’s side today. This is Priest and Prophet tag-teaming me. “I think she can take more, Sir,” Kev teases.
I moan against his hand, loving and hating this all at the same time, and needing every second of it.
“Oh, I know she can take more, boy.” By the time he finishes, I’m going to find sitting interesting tomorrow, I can tell already.
He takes a break from hitting me with the crop to slide two, then three fingers inside me, pulling another kind of moan from me as I try to rock my hips.
Both of those motherfuckers laugh at my predicament.
Chris pulls his fingers free and Kev opens his mouth, his gaze hot and longingly on Chris now.
Chris’ smile turns positively evil. He lets Kev suck his fingers clean, that talented tongue of his swirling around every digit and making me moan in desperation.
I know what that tongue feels like.
I know where I want to feel it, too.
They look down at me again. “Aww, is the girl horny?” Chris asks.
Wh
impering, I nod as best as I can with Kev’s hand in place.
Chris pulls his fingers from Kev’s mouth and they return to my pussy, where he finger-bangs me almost to the point of coming—
And then the rat bastard fucking stops.
“Nooooo!” I wail against Kev’s palm, and you know both those motherfuckers laugh.
I mean, okay, it’s a good laughter, because it’s actually a sound that’s been sorely lacking from both my men since our lives shifted hard at the beginning of the month, but still.
Motherfucker!
“Oooh, you pissed her off, Sir,” Kev jokes.
He’s not fooling me. Kev might be Chris’ boy right now, but my Sir is right fucking there, enjoying all the festivities as an active participant.
Damn, how I love both of them!
Chris has Kev suck his fingers clean again, then he has Kev let go of me and pulls him in for a long, sucking kiss, right over the top of me. While they’re kissing, Chris starts unbuttoning Kev’s shirt, slowly, knowing what this is doing to me and my desire.
I’m squirming on the bed, wanting relief, wanting to be part of this, and yet Kev’s tie keeps me bound and helpless to do anything but watch.
He removes Kev’s shirt and drops it to the floor, followed by his undershirt. Now they’re not just kissing on the lips, but all over, nipping and biting along pecs and shoulders, hands exploring, making love to each other and forcing me to watch.
#betterthanporn
Even better? They’ve completely shut off my thinking brain. I’m on auto-pilot, my body focused on only one thing—them.
#missionaccomplished
Chris palms the front of Kevin’s slacks and squeezes. Kev’s lower lip catches under his teeth as a deep groan floats free. “Fuck, Sir,” he hoarsely says. “Please let me come.”
“Should I let you fuck my girl? Is that what you want?”
I can tell you that’s what the girl wants!
“Yes, Sir, that’s what I want. Please?”
Chris grins and leans in. “What do I get, boy?”
Oooh, the trade. With all three of us together, Chris has a game he likes to play, making one or both of us beg for what we want by begging him to take something we know he wants.
Diligence (Determination Trilogy 2) Page 12
