Feeling sick, she put the half-eaten tub of ice cream on the ground.
Edward’s words hit her hard because it meant that at some point, unless she did date George, she would lose him.
Not ‘lose him’ lose him, but he’d have to come back here. She’d have to…her throat closed.
Live without him.
He was her best friend, and had been for so long now that she didn’t know what the world would even look like without him a twenty-minute walk away.
They hung out four times a week. Minimum. Outside of that, they had lunch, usually went out for dinner.
A frown puckered her brow as a thought came to her…had they been dating all along and she just hadn’t realized it?
Sure, there’d been no kissing or sex to give the game away, but they lived like a married couple.
She knew his freakin’ kitchen better than he did! She certainly cooked there more than him. If her car broke down, she called him first and he came and did his ‘manspection’ then deigned to allow her to call the breakdown company on her insurance. She didn’t do his laundry, but he often told her to bring her stuff over so it could be washed by his staff. Three nights a week, she usually found herself in his spare bedroom too. On Fridays and Saturdays, but at some point during the week as well.
Feeling sicker than she even had a moment ago, she whispered, “But I need him.”
Something in Edward softened. She didn’t know what, but he just seemed to relax before her. His eyes, though not necessarily hard, grew gentler and the smile he sent her was kind. Not patronizing but empathetic.
“I know you do. He needs you too.”
“Why does he want to share me with you then?” Why wasn’t she enough?
“Because he thinks you’ll make me happy.”
“But why is he even thinking about that? Men don’t normally think that,” she snapped. “They think about conquering and hording things for themselves. Not sharing the spoils of war with their brother, too.”
Edward sighed, lifted a hand and rubbed at the side of his throat. Perry felt his tension, and was apologetic for it, but she needed answers.
She needed to understand, because none of this was making any sense. She’d been George’s partner for years without even realizing it.
Why? Why hadn’t he taken that final step toward making them a real couple?
Because he’d been waiting to introduce her to Edward? What the fuck was that about?
“George loves me,” Edward said softly.
“Most brothers love their siblings. Doesn’t mean they want them to fuck their girlfriend.”
“I know. Trust me, I know.”
“You don’t know. You can’t know how alien this is for me.”
“You’d be surprised.” He closed his eyes, then opened them again, but this time, there was a flame buried within that scalded her, leaving her gasping for air. “Did you hear about what happened to George and me—”
“The kidnapping. Yes. I’d never heard of it before. Not until I came here.”
“You know how tight our privacy laws are, and when it happened, the country came together and rallied around us.” His smile was frigid. “Amazing how a singular event can do that. We have a group of extremists who disapprove of our being ruled by the monarchy… before our kidnapping, they were gaining traction with the people. After? Support disintegrated instantly.”
“The security of your family’s reign rested on the danger you were placed in. That’s hardly a fair trade.”
He clenched his jaw. “You’ve got that damn right.” She watched as he tried to regain control of himself, but that harsh hiss was, to this point in their acquaintance, the angriest she’d ever heard him.
Edward seemed to be perennially calm. She wasn’t sure whether she was relieved to see the rupture in his control or not. She had a feeling that where George was like a duck on a river—unruffled but his legs flapping away like crazy under the surface. Edward was like a dormant volcano. Any eruption could have devastating consequences on anyone close to him.
“What happened, Edward?” she asked quietly. Gently. She needed to know, Perry realized. Somehow, she got the feeling that all the answers to the many questions she had about both men could find their source here.
“Has George never spoken to you about it?” he asked tightly.
“No.” And that hurt. She’d told him her worst, her deepest and darkest secrets, and he’d never shared this with her. Xavier had. Their cousin had been the one to break the news of this particular tragedy to her.
He reached up and scratched at his temple. “We were beaten.” His nostrils flared. “Touched. Humiliated. They did things that…” Edward closed his eyes, but the pressure of his jaw made the skin bleed white around his lips. “I’ll never forget. George, thankfully, doesn’t seem to remember much.”
“But you do.” A statement. Not a question.
“I remember everything,” he seethed, eyes popping open to catch hers with his. “Every minute of it, I can replay it. From when they snatched me from my bed to when our security found us in that squalid little house in Heldafort. And every second in between.”
She cleared her throat at the rage burning away before her, and was once again reminded of the volcano analogy… if she wasn’t careful, she’d be swept up in the outpouring of lava. The threat didn’t stop her from stating, “Xavier said you were wild afterward.”
A single nod was her answer.
“I can’t blame you,” she whispered, and as shutters fell down over his eyes, barring her out, the way he severed the connection between them—even if she’d been in danger from the explosion—hurt.
“If you’re looking for a reason for my being a pervert,” he snapped, “then you’re looking in the wrong place, Perry.”
“I’m not. I’m just trying to understand.”
“Understand what? Me?” At her nod, he carried on, “It will take more than an armchair psychologist to figure me out. All you have to know is George feels guilty, Perry.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “For forgetting. For being the younger brother and for my being the elder… I protected him. Shielded him from…” Edward swallowed. “He loves me and wants me to be happy. That’s why he wants you for me. For us.
“We all have those moments in our life, Perry, when we figure out what we need. Some people need shoes, others need to gamble. Some like to be spanked, some want to be pegged.”
Pegged? What the fuck was that?
“George and I like to share. It’s not unusual. Most guys do it at some point if they’re lucky. At college or when they’re in their twenties. During my wild phase, I discovered it, and inadvertently involved my brother. For me and George though, it stuck. Really, really stuck. Denying that need is hard.” And it sounded it. His voice had become brutal. His words crystalline as he explained, and she sensed how tough it was. Felt for him in that moment, even as she could still feel confusion. “It’s like not having sex.”
She reared back. “Excuse me?”
He nodded. “Yeah. Exactly. Fucking by myself is like jacking off in the shower. It’s nice, I get off, but that’s it. When I share a woman…” He gritted his teeth. “It’s like fire.”
And those flames were still burning in his eyes, giving her a taste of what he offered. What he promised.
“I didn’t just share with George. I managed to do it with a couple of friends in college, but with George, it’s easier.”
“Creepier, too,” she grumbled, and was surprised when he laughed.
“I’m not looking at his dick when I’m with a woman, Perry,” he chided. “The other guy’s presence is almost irrelevant. Because, like I told you the last time we spoke of this, it would be about overwhelming you with pleasure. The pleasure two men can give you.”
Her throat closed. “Me?” she squeaked, wondering why they’d gone from impersonal ‘woman’ to the very personal ‘you.’
“Yes. You. I know you wa
nt me. I’ve seen you looking. Watching me. I know because I do the same with you. George is a bastard. He’s the snake in the Garden of Eden. He’s offered us both the apple and he’s waiting for our own needs to work against us.”
She gulped. “George isn’t that manipulative.”
“Maybe not with you, but with me he is. He knows dangling temptation in front of me is the only way he’ll make this happen.” She watched as he leaned forward and pressed his elbows to his knees. He bowed his head, stared down at the ground, and then murmured, “He got it right this time. He knew I’d want you.”
She let out a shocked gasp. Shocked because the way George, Edward, and Xavier talked, she was like Jessica Rabbit. But she wasn’t. She was short, more than a little round, and had a mouth that wouldn’t quit, too.
Yeah, okay, she was pretty. Passably, so. But she’d seen Edward’s wife. Arabella DeSauvier had been like beauty incarnate. So porcelain pristine, she’d been almost creepy in her perfection.
How could Perry, ordinary American Perry, ever compete with that?
And yet, the heat in his eyes belied that concern. As he stared at her, she could feel the flush soaring over her cheeks, cresting her throat and breasts with the power of it. She gulped. “What do you want from me, Edward?”
His smile was slow, sexy. God, it hit her in places she couldn’t even begin to imagine.
“Everything.”
Chapter Thirteen
“What are we doing?”
George squinted at Xavier as, later that afternoon, he headed off the estate grounds and drove them out onto the road which would lead to the highway.
Xavier, of them all, had the best estate. The main house was Palladian in style, tall and proud, elegantly slender with copious windows that overlooked acre after acre of tilled land.
When George’s uncle had died, the first thing Xavier had done was make the estate pay for itself.
In Uncle Sebastien’s time, the estate had always functioned at a loss, but Xavier had converted all the garden areas into farmland, and he’d constructed the greenhouse for his mad-hatter experiments.
Truth was, he could see why Perry was attracted to Xavier. They were two peas in a pod.
Both of them were scientists. Both of them thought analytically, and shared opinions on conservation and environmental issues. If he’d been thinking about it, approaching Xavier would have made more sense than Edward! But it was about time his brother stopped being so goddamn stoic and actually lived a little.
Perry was going to make that happen. And yeah, he knew he was putting all his eggs in one Perry-shaped basket, but when a man found his soul mate, what other alternative did he have?
He grimaced as he realized making Perry conform to his desires was exactly the opposite of how a man should treat his soul mate, but he knew her.
He knew her so damn well.
She was a kinky little minx when it came down to it.
He’d heard her talk when she was drunk. Had seen her, back in the early days, kissing one of her boyfriends at a party. She’d been half-sozzled on some of the ghastly punch on offer, but it had worked wonders on her—she’d practically been humping the lucky bastard in public.
She spoke freely about sex, discussed things with him that no other female friend had ever talked about…
No, she’d never mentioned the desire to be shared while sober, but neither had she admitted to him her love of kinky books! And he’d seen the stuff she read on her kindle. Anything from BDSM to, yes, ménage. He’d made a point of looking at her reading material when they’d had that illuminating conversation over shitty cocktails followed up by vodka shots.
That, did she but know it, was why they were here today. Why he was putting them all through this…
Whoever Perry thought she was, deep down, wasn’t the woman she wanted to be.
And as a friend, he pondered sagely, it was his duty to help her realize her potential.
He was the King of Generosity.
“What are we doing, dammit?”
Xavier’s voice broke into his self-deprecating thoughts. “Isn’t it obvious? We’re going to the castle.”
“Yeah, that part’s obvious. I just don’t know why I’m here.”
George cut him a look. “Because you want to be with Perry, that’s why.”
“Have you given up on Edward? Is that it?”
George shook his head. “No. Not entirely. But I’m not totally selfless. As much as Edward needs to share, I do too.”
Xavier frowned. “This isn’t a fucking free for all, George.”
“I know! I never said it was. But Perry likes you.” He shrugged. “She doesn’t like many people.”
Xavier preened a little at that. “She doesn’t?”
“Nope.” That was why her sleeping with Xavier had messed so entirely with his plans.
As he drove out of the countryside and toward the ocean where the main seat of the DeSauviers was found, he narrowed his eyes against the sun. It was the end of summer, but they had very pleasant autumns. Regardless of their location, which should have had them enduring wet and soggy Falls, they didn’t. But, their winters were cold.
Frigid, sometimes.
Although, after Massachusetts, his idea of frigid had certainly changed.
“I want to show her her options,” he said after a moment’s contemplation as he asked himself exactly what it was he was doing. “Truth is, Xav, I don’t have a fucking clue what to do. I’ve messed things up and I want to rectify it. All I know is I can’t lose her, and I’ll do what I have to to make sure that never happens—that she never leaves me.”
Xavier reached over, and with his fist, knocked George’s arm gently. “She loves you, idiot.”
“I know. But it might not be enough. I just… she’s scheduled to leave in two weeks. I’ve wasted ten days by letting her waffle over this, and I can’t let her go back to America without having a heart to heart.”
Xavier grimaced. “Is it really fourteen days since she came here?”
“Yeah. She’s been busy, granted. She packed so much work into this trip, it’s insane.”
“You sound proud.”
“I am. She’s amazing.” He blew out a breath. “If she stays, finding a place for her to work wouldn’t be hard.” Trouble was, he needed to know what her decision was because when he officially claimed her as his girlfriend, that was it.
There was no going back.
The situation with Edward would never be able to be resolved.
That was why he was under such pressure.
As the spare heir, he could marry pretty much whoever he wanted and not worry about heirs himself.
Edward had to worry about that.
It was his damn duty, and that was why he wanted Edward to have Perry. She’d lessen the burden of that duty. She’d make him and George so fucking happy that even thinking about it, had the power to make his throat thick with emotion.
She was the gift he’d never known he’d even asked for. Now it was time he proved that to her.
Her breathing was heavy. In his peripheral vision, he saw the fast jiggle of her breasts and wanted to groan at the sight.
“Y-You can’t have everything,” she told him, trying to sound self-righteous and failing.
Miserably.
His cock hardened as she licked her lips, and in her lap, where her hands had fallen, he saw her fingers curl in on themselves. She was fighting this. Fighting them. And he couldn’t blame her.
But he would convince her.
George was right. This desire, perverted or not, wasn’t going anywhere.
He wanted Perry, and he wanted her to be so overwhelmed with everything they could gift her, that she never questioned, ever again, why she was doing this. The realization that this was right, that this was exactly how it should be, filled Edward’s senses.
It was like suddenly taking in a clean breath of fresh air after decades of inhaling smog.
Everything felt c
learer, everything made sense. Even the crackpot shit his brother spouted… it all made sense.
He needed Perry and she needed them. He was exhausted living this half-life. Denying himself what he needed just to make his people happy. His people were happy with their own lives, making their choices and their own decisions.
They’d have to be content with that.
He wasn’t their King, yet. He still had a life to lead, and he intended to lead it.
He knew it would piss her off, knew it would agitate her, but he cocked his finger and beckoned him to her.
His grin appeared when she jerked back, outrage slaloming across her features. Her eyes narrowed even further at the sight of his smile. “I’m not a dog,” she told him stiffly.
“I know,” came his calm retort. “But there’s no way in fuck I’m making the first move, not when you’re still undecided. I won’t coerce you into this. You have to accept whether it’s something you want or not. And you need to make a decision quickly…”
He sat back in the uncomfortable sofa, aware that his cock was tenting his pants, doubly aware that she knew he had a hard-on too. He didn’t mind her knowing though; especially when it caused that hectic color to appear on her cheeks.
She gulped, and it looked hard—like her mouth was dry. “This is too much pressure,” she whispered.
“There’s no pressure at all,” he immediately countered, wanting her to know that. Needing her to know that.
“Then why do I feel like I’m drowning?” she huffed.
“Because you’re melodramatic?” He cocked a brow at her, enjoying her growl of annoyance. “You do understand why…” His own words agitated him, but she had to understand. “You have the right to say no to this, Perry. There will be no recriminations from me. That I swear to you. But, once you do that, and you stick with George and that goes public? There’s no going back.” He stared at her. “Do you understand that?”
She bit her lip. “Maybe.”
“There’s no maybe about it.” Trying to appear more relaxed than he felt, he rested his arm on the sofa and propped his chin up on his fist. “If this is to work, then you have to be mine in the eyes of the public.”
Perry and Her Princes Page 16
