by Eva Ashwood
Holy. Fuck.
I’d thrown out the suggestion of sharing as a joke, but as soon as the words had spilled out of my mouth, as soon as I’d seen the men’s reaction to it, it had struck me that I wasn’t actually joking.
That was exactly what I wanted.
I wanted the dynamic that’d been developing between all three of us to continue to grow. I wanted to fight alongside these men, I wanted to have them by my side as we navigated whatever challenges the gods threw at us next… and I wanted to fuck them all so badly it made my body ache just thinking about it.
Was it possible to have all of that?
Not just the friendship, not just the growing bond between us, but a physical relationship too?
Fuck it. This whole thing might collapse as soon as we get back to school anyway. Why bother playing it safe in the land where there is no safety?
“Yeah.” I met each of their gazes, affixing a cocky, confident look on my face even as my heart hammered in my chest. “I do. Think you can handle that?”
I watched the three of them absorb my words.
Then Merrick reached up and took the water bottle I’d forgotten I was holding from my hand. His fingers wrapped around my wrist, and he tugged me down onto his lap, spreading his legs so I perched sideways on one of his thighs. His arm banded around my waist, and he buried his nose in my hair as his lips found my ear.
“Ari, I don’t share.”
My breath caught, a spike of arousal at the possessive growl in his voice mingling with disappointment. I hadn’t known until I said it out loud exactly how much I wanted all three of them, but now that I’d spoken the words, it was all I could think about.
Fuck.
I was about to open my mouth, still not entirely sure what I would say, when he continued.
“These two are the only people in the entire fucking world I would even think about sharing you with. If we do this, it stops here. Just the three of us and you.”
His words were a low murmur, but Lachlan must’ve heard them anyway, because he grunted. “Aye, sweetheart. I agree.”
“Same.” Trace’s voice held a touch of humor. “Although I can’t guarantee I won’t accidentally elbow one of these assholes in the face.”
My snort of laughter broke the tension simmering inside me, and I reached out a foot to kick at him lightly. “Well, I can’t guarantee I won’t elbow you in the face, so I guess we’ll all just have to take the risk.”
I felt Merrick’s chest shake as he chuckled too, and his arm tightened around me. It was probably a good sign that threats of violence seemed to turn all three of these guys on so much. They really did get me.
A wave of nerves and arousal flooded me as Merrick’s hands drifted down to my hips. His fingers dug into my flesh as he gripped hard for a second, as if he were still struggling with the instinct to pick me up in his arms and carry me back to his cave.
Then, slowly, he turned me on his lap, shifting my body so that my back was pressed against his front and my legs straddled his thigh—facing me outward as if presenting me as a gift to his friends.
Both of the men sitting nearby moaned in appreciation, and I felt my chest flush as they each moved closer, dropping to their knees in front of us. Trace was shirtless, his skin still dusted with soot in some places and his tattoos almost seeming to move as the firelight flickered over them.
Lachlan’s hands fell on my thighs, his warm palms making my skin heat up through the fabric of my pants as Trace pulled my head down just enough to press his lips to mine.
It was the first time I’d kissed him—although definitely not the first time I’d thought about it—and I leaned into it like a starving woman, sliding my tongue between his lips to taste him.
Merrick groaned behind me, and as Lach’s hands slipped up under my shirt, gliding over the bare skin of my stomach, Merrick’s fingers moved in the opposite direction, sliding down between my thighs to brush against my clit.
My whole body jerked, and I yelped against Trace’s lips, my hands reaching out to clutch at anything I could grab ahold of. It felt amazing and insane, so many sensations hitting me at once that my body didn’t know where to focus first.
“Gods, I can tell you like this, Ari,” Merrick murmured against my ear, his fingers pressing harder against my clit, the touch growing more demanding. “I can feel how much you like it.”
I muttered something into Trace’s mouth that wasn’t even English, arching my back as Lachlan’s hands found my breasts under my shirt. My whole body was starting to undulate and writhe on Merrick’s lap, as if trying to flee the onslaught of pleasure and chase it all at once.
“Help me get her shirt off,” Lachlan muttered, brushing his thumbs over my nipples before letting go to grab the hem of the garment.
Trace broke our kiss, pulling away long enough for his friend to tug the shirt up and over my head, helping him pull it over my arms. Merrick, obviously presuming the two of them could handle it, kept up his delicious assault on my clit, massaging in slow, deep circles as I gasped for breath.
Lips found mine again, but they weren’t Trace’s. Lachlan and he had switched places, and as Trace leaned down to lick a line over my rib cage and up between my breasts, biting softly at the fabric of my bra, Lachlan devoured my mouth in a kiss as passionate and overwhelming as the man himself.
“Fuck,” he rasped against my lips. His hands were roaming my body, bumping into Trace’s as the two men seemed to compete to see who could touch me in more places at once. “This is insane. Why is this so fuckin’ hot?”
I didn’t bother answering. I just wrapped my hand around the back of his neck and made him kiss me again, sucking on his tongue as Trace bit down on one of my nipples. Merrick’s hand delved under the waistband of my pants, and I could feel his cock pressing against my lower back.
He was hard.
Were the others hard?
I wanted to feel. I wanted to drive them as crazy as they were making me.
Reaching out, I brushed my fingertips over their chests and abs, trailing downward. Lachlan was bulkier, but Trace was cut and lean, with the chiseled definition of a rock star.
I leaned forward a little until my hands reached their dicks, and the second I touched them, both men groaned and crowded closer.
Merrick pushed my hair aside as his lips worshipped the back of my neck, and I could feel his breath growing harsher, feel his hips thrusting up against me even as his fingers found my clit again, no barrier of fabric between us this time.
I was close to coming already. My body wasn’t used to being attacked from so many different angles all at once, and it felt like an electric current flowed through me, lighting me up like a damn lamp.
“Fuck,” I muttered, my hands scrabbling for the buttons of Lachlan’s and Trace’s pants. “Don’t stop. Don’t ever fucking stop.”
Almost as soon as the words were out of my mouth, a loud crack split the air.
And they all stopped.
Every single one of the guys froze in place—lips on mine, teeth latch onto my nipple, hands shoved down my pants—as if the four of us were some kind of extremely dirty statue.
Then the noise came again, sharp and loud. It bounced around the large cave, making it hard to pinpoint the exact source of the sound.
As one, we surged to our feet, my mind whipping from dazed lust to alert wariness so fast it almost made me dizzy. Merrick yanked his hand out of my pants, holding onto my hips to steady me as he gazed around, his breath sharp.
“What the hell was tha—?”
A loud, deep rumble echoed throughout the entire cave, cutting him off.
The ground shook wildly beneath us, throwing me off balance as if I were on a pitching ship in a stormy sea.
I reached out and grabbed for the three men, my heart dropping into my stomach as the rumbling grew even louder.
Oh, shit. This can’t be good.
Chapter Twenty
“Run! Run!”
&n
bsp; The scream tore out of my throat, but the sound was swallowed up by the noise around us, barely audible over the ear-splitting rumble of rock shifting and collapsing.
The guys didn’t need to hear the words though. They could probably read my lips, and besides, they were no dummies. Their survival instincts were on par with mine.
Abandoning our pack, the water bottle, everything but the clothes on our backs, we sprinted as fast as we could over the churning ground.
Trace and Lachlan ran in front of me, Merrick behind me, the three men surrounding me as if they could somehow save me from masses of falling rock. They couldn’t though—our magic might be able to deflect some of it, but none of us were strong enough to prevent the collapse of an entire cave. Even combined, our powers couldn’t do that.
Small chunks of rock formations began to break off from the ceiling, hurtling down like deadly hail.
We needed to get out of here. But how?
“The boat!” I called, following Lachlan blindly as he led us across the shaking cave floor.
“Too slow!” He called back. “We’d have to use our magic to propel it. We’d never make it out in time. There’s a passageway in the far wall. A smaller tunnel!”
Fuck. I didn’t like the sound of that. But before I could even try to argue through panting breaths, a loud crack made me duck. When I looked back over my shoulder, I saw the cave entrance begin to collapse, sending huge boulder-sized chunks of rock falling into the river of fire below.
Okay, passageway it is then.
Bigger chunks of rock began to fall all around us, and we picked up speed, scrambling and falling and pulling each other onward as we traversed the uneven ground. We were within three feet of the passageway when we skidded to a stop.
Just like at the cave entrance, the ceiling began to collapse. Chunks of rock broke off and plummeted toward us as if trying to keep us from getting through the passageway.
We all put our hands up, not even looking at each other but moving in sync.
Bursts of magic shot from each of us in different forms. I used mine to grab the boulders and redirect them over into the lake of fire. Merrick sent sharp shards of energy, bursting the rocks into tiny pebbles that rained down like stinging bees. Lachlan wielded something like a giant magical hammer, bashing chunks of the ceiling into oblivion before they could hit us. And Trace used those balls of energy I’d seen him create before, hurling them out to wrap around the rock pieces and send them spiraling in the opposite direction.
The ground stopped shaking for a moment, and we didn’t hesitate.
“Go, go, go!”
I grabbed Trace and Merrick’s hands, urging Lachlan on with a jerk of my head.
We dashed into the narrow passageway, which was darker and more shadowy than the rest of the cave had been, not lit by the glowing light of the fire lake. It felt ominous and too tight, and my heart thrummed hard in my chest as we raced forward.
Please, gods, don’t let me die in a fucking cave.
Although maybe praying to them to let me live through this was stupid, considering they were the ones who’d brought us here. They were the reason any of us were here.
“This seems like a really fucking stupid plan!” Trace yelled as we ran.
“You got a better one?” Lachlan shot back, and Trace made a noise that might’ve been a laugh if he wasn’t sucking in gasping breaths.
“Fuck, no.”
The grumbling noise had resumed behind us, but for the moment at least, the passageway we were in didn’t seem to be collapsing the same way the main cave had been. Who knew how long that would last though?
Drawing on my magic, I threw several orbs of light ahead of us, trying to help Lachlan see the way ahead. After another several yards, his steps slowed slightly.
“What? What is it?”
I almost bumped into him, grabbing his shoulders to steady myself. I’d had to let go of Trace and Merrick’s hands—it wasn’t conducive to sprinting, and besides, there wasn’t room in the narrow passageway to run side-by-side.
“It’s gettin’ narrower,” Lachlan grunted.
I glanced around his broad back, realizing he was right. Up ahead, the hallway began to close in, growing narrower and narrower. We continued forward, but it got to the point where the guys had to turn sideways to fit through.
“We should turn back. There has to be another passageway!” Merrick yelled out from the back.
Lachlan shook his head, even that movement seeming difficult in the tight space. “There’s not. I checked the whole perimeter. This is the only way.”
He looked like he was about to have a panic attack, and I couldn’t blame him. His chest and back both practically scraped the rock on either side of him as he forced his large body through the tight space. If it got any narrower, he truly wouldn’t fit.
I had a sudden horrifying vision of him getting stuck, wedged between two slabs of rock, pinned down like a bug as the ceiling collapsed and crushed him.
“You okay?” I muttered, fear tightening my chest.
“Yeah.” He grimaced, sucking in a breath as he forced his way through a tight spot. I could see tears on his shirt and scratches on his skin from where he’d scraped against unforgiving rock. “Good thing I’m such a wee man.”
A short laugh belted out of me, wild and a little manic, and his eyes twinkled for a moment. Then the ground shook again, drawing us both back to the danger of the situation.
The walls shivered, making me worry that they’d crush us, but at least nothing was coming down from the ceiling. The sound behind us was dying out too, and I wondered if the entire cave back there had collapsed.
Finally, just when I was sure we’d have to either turn back and try our luck or stop where we were and try to dig our way out or something, we reached the end of the narrow corridor.
Lachlan squeezed out first, and we all followed, stumbling forward into an enormous space. It was another cave, even bigger than the one that’d held the lake of fire. My magical orbs of light flew up toward the ceiling, casting a blue-white glow over the place, and I shivered as I glanced around.
There were bones and cloth, and what looked to be old types of armor and weapons, strewn all across the ground.
Wherever we were, it was not a place of peace.
“A portal!” Trace called out. “There! Thank fuck.”
My gaze flew up, following his pointing finger as we picked up our pace again, dashing across the wide floor and avoiding the piles of bones.
On the other side of the huge cave, a large portal swirled and shimmered wildly in front of us. It looked like it was combusting or something. Sparks shot out from the sides of it, and I knew that we only had a limited amount of time to get through.
“Hurry! Before it closes!” I yelled, putting on another burst of speed despite the protests from my aching lungs and legs.
When we were about halfway to the portal, two other contestants came stumbling out of another entryway to the right of us, one several paces behind the other.
Chetna and Knox.
For a second, I thought they’d teamed up just like we had, but then Knox turned around and shot a blast of energy at Chetna, who just barely avoided it. They both looked rough—bleeding, bruised, and covered in ash and dirt. Whatever they had gone through to get here, they had taken it hard.
The four of us ignored them for the moment, sprinting toward the portal. If we didn’t get there soon, we’d miss our chance.
The movement drew Knox’s attention, and the large man with curly black hair let out a yell, racing us to get there first.
“We should all just go through the portal together!” Merrick yelled out to him. “It’s the only way out of here.”
In response, Knox wiped the blood from his forehead and used his magic to create a long spear. Barely slowing his pace, he threw it as hard as he could, straight at Merrick’s face.
“Fuck!”
Merrick swiped his hand to the right, knocking
the magical spear away with his own burst of energy just before it impaled him. It dissipated into the stones, the light of the magic fading.
Oh, so that’s how it is, huh?
No fucking teamwork for this guy. Knox could see just as well as we could that the portal was about to collapse, but he wanted to be the only one to pass through.
Well, screw that.
Immediately, all four of us drew up our magic, rushing toward Knox and Chetna. I’d agreed to play nice with the three men by my side, but I hadn’t agreed to play nice with everyone, and I certainly hadn’t agreed to let assholes try to kill them while I stood by and watched.
Several of Trace’s whirling balls darted under Chetna’s feet, upsetting her balance as she ran and sending her sprawling across the dirty cave floor.
I glanced at the men. Between the four of us, we could probably take these two competitors out, bombard them with magic and get rid of them. But as my gaze met Trace’s and then Merrick’s, I could tell their hearts weren’t into it. They didn’t want to kill anyone.
All six of us were converging on the portal, and as my guys exchanged blows back and forth with Chetna and Knox, I stepped to the side. Using my magic, I swirled my hands around in a circle, knowing I had to do something to get those two students out of the way.
My magic created a long shimmering net, and I held it at each end taking in a deep breath.
“I’m sorry about this,” I called to Knox’s back as he fought against Lachlan. “But we need to get through the portal. We don’t have time to fight you.”
Before he or Chetna could look over at me, I pulled back and threw the net, watching as it blanketed both of them and then wrapped around their ankles, bringing them down hard.
They struggled uselessly. My binds wouldn’t hold forever, but they’d give us enough time to get out of here. Lachlan looked over at me and nodded in thanks, dropping the magic spear he’d held. We had all been through too much to end up killing one of our own classmates.
