A loud thump sounded from the kitchen, followed by a cheerful yell from Claire. “No worries! Just dropped the mayo. It’s plastic so it didn’t break!”
The glum tone she’d used only moments ago was gone, the delight in her voice unmistakable.
Dylan tried very hard not to grin. He had to admit, drunk Claire was a lot more fun than sober Claire.
Next to him, Aidan didn’t bother hiding his grin, which ignited the cycle of irritation all over again.
Aidan was attracted to Claire.
Dylan could see it plain as day, and he didn’t like it one damn bit. It had nothing to do with jealousy—he and Aidan brought women home all the time. Watching his roommate fuck someone else wasn’t anything new or scandalous.
No, it was Aidan’s attraction to this woman that bugged him. He didn’t want Claire fooling Aidan the way she’d fooled Chris, making him believe she was someone sweet and wonderful, when in reality she was a materialistic snob who liked to belittle women who weren’t as career-oriented as she was.
Chillax, buddy.
Realizing his chest had tightened with resentment, he inhaled deeply in an attempt to calm himself, then glanced over at his roommate.
Okay, enough with the roommate bullshit, he told himself.
His lover.
Aidan Rhodes was his lover.
The memory of Aidan’s lips stretched wide around his cock sent a bolt of lust straight to Dylan’s groin. Christ, he’d really needed that. He’d left for San Francisco yesterday morning and was back in San Diego less than forty-eight hours later, but he felt like he’d been gone for months. Sitting through that rehearsal dinner last night, getting all gussied up this morning, informing the bride her groom was gone…shit like that took its toll on a man.
Needless to say, he was happy to be home, and to him, home was San Diego. He may have been born and raised in Marin County, but he’d always felt so out of place there. The people in his neighborhood were uber-conservative, the kids from his high school preppy as hell, and that kind of stifling, judgmental environment was definitely not ideal for a guy who loved cock as much as he loved pussy.
“Aw, he’s still mad at me.”
Claire’s voice jerked Dylan out of a train of thought that’d been going nowhere fast.
“I’m not mad,” he muttered. “I’m mostly annoyed, and kinda tired. It’s been a long day.”
“No kidding.” She plopped down in the recliner and balanced her plate on her thighs, then picked up her sandwich and took a big bite.
His gaze instantly gravitated to her mouth, rosy red and shaped like a cupid’s bow. Each time he looked at her pouty lips, he imagined them wrapped around a dick. Those were definitely blowjob lips, all right.
As usual, Dylan found himself checking out the rest of her, and as usual, his cock liked the view. Claire McKinley was so fucking hot it was actually kind of infuriating. She’d removed all the little white flowers from her hair and now those reddish-brown waves cascaded over one shoulder, glinting like burnished copper in the light spilling down from the ceiling fixture. And that dress. Christ, couldn’t she put something else on? The material was so thin he could see every curve and indentation of her body, and her braless state pretty much ensured that he and Aidan wouldn’t be tearing their gazes from her puckered nipples anytime soon.
With her smoking-hot body and the alcohol-induced blush on her cheeks, she made such a tempting picture that Dylan’s mouth actually watered. He hastily had to remind himself of all the reasons why he shouldn’t be thinking about screwing her.
One—she was his brother’s ex-fiancée.
Two—he didn’t like her.
Three…okay, well, he couldn’t think of a third off the top of his head, but the first two reasons were more than enough.
“I’m tired too,” Claire said between mouthfuls. “But at least I have the next three weeks off. I can’t remember the last time I had one week off, let alone three.”
The sofa cushions dipped as Aidan leaned forward to grab his Coke can from the glass coffee table. He took a sip, watching Claire in curiosity. “What is it you do for a living?”
She chewed and swallowed before answering, and Dylan suddenly noticed the kind of sandwich she’d prepared. “No jam?” he asked warily.
“Nope. I don’t like jam.”
“Neither do I.”
They looked at each other for a few seconds, neither one speaking. Then Claire turned to address Aidan. “Anyway, I work at a consulting firm.”
“Cool. What does that mean exactly? What do you do there?”
A huge grin filled her face. “Consult.”
She looked so proud with her answer Dylan couldn’t help but laugh. So did Aidan, who said, “Care to elaborate?”
She shoved the last piece of bread into her mouth, then set her plate on the table and got comfortable again. “My firm helps organizations operate more efficiently, in terms of overhead or management or certain protocols. Basically I visit a company and conduct an analysis of their internal workings, and then I tell them how they can do better.”
“Sounds interesting.” Aidan looked impressed.
“Sometimes it is. But sometimes it’s boring.”
Aidan laughed and glanced over at Dylan. “Hey, look at that, you two have another thing in common.”
“Yeah, what’s that?” he asked suspiciously.
“You’re both capable of holding serious, articulate conversations even when you’re drunk as skunks.”
“Hey,” Claire protested, “I’m not drunk as skunks. I mean, as a skunk.” Her dainty eyebrows knitted together. “Do skunks get drunk? Why is that even a phrase?”
“Because it rhymes?” Aidan suggested.
She pursed her lips in thought. “Yes, that makes sense.”
Another burst of involuntary laughter flew out of Dylan’s mouth.
Shit. He really shouldn’t be getting any enjoyment out of this conversation. He wasn’t supposed to like this woman, damn it.
Deciding he needed a reminder about who he was dealing with, he looked at Claire and said, “So why did you get into consulting? I bet it was for the money, right?”
“Nope. I got into it because I like ordering people around. Can you believe it? I found the one job that pays me to be a know-it-all.” With another beaming smile, she hopped off the chair like an energetic little kid. “I’m thirsty.”
Aidan chuckled as she darted toward the kitchen. When Dylan saw the familiar glint in the other man’s eyes, he stifled a groan and issued another low warning. “Come on, man, not her. This morning she nearly became my sister-in-law.” He checked to make sure Claire was out of earshot, then added, “And I don’t like her.”
“Too bad,” Aidan murmured. “’Cause I like her a lot, bro.”
Their hushed conversation died when Claire strode back into the room with a tall glass of water. She sat, took a tiny ladylike sip, and watched them both with a thoughtful expression, for so long that Dylan shifted in discomfort.
“Stop staring,” he grumbled. “It’s rude.”
“But I just can’t figure it out,” she complained.
“Figure what out?”
“Are you two gay or what?”
The question came out of left field, but it didn’t raise his guard or provoke any indignation. If anything, he was surprised she hadn’t voiced it sooner, especially after the scene she’d witnessed a couple of months ago.
On the other end of the couch, Aidan was laughing again. “I don’t know. Hey, Dylan, are we gay?”
For a moment he was too distracted by that husky laughter to respond. Aidan had laughed more today in Claire’s presence than in the entire month Dylan had been living with him. Not that the guy was Grumpy McGrumps or anything, but the one thing Dylan had learned since moving in? Aidan Rhodes was intense. And haunted. Something was definitely haunting him, but Dylan had yet to decipher the shadows he often glimpsed in those chocolate-brown eyes.
He knew Ai
dan was hiding a lot of pain behind his seductive, laid-back exterior, but getting the man to talk about his emotions was like trying to train a goldfish—futile and exasperating.
“Are you making fun of me?” Claire sounded hurt as she looked from one man to the other.
Aidan grinned. “Nah, just teasing.”
“You still haven’t answered the question.” Her big eyes focused on Dylan. “Are you gay?”
He shook his head.
“Bisexual?”
“Yeah, I guess,” he answered with a shrug.
She glanced at Aidan. “Are you bi, too?”
“Yup,” he confirmed.
“Huh.” Propping her elbow on the arm of the recliner, she rested her chin in her palm and continued to study them. “Okay, so you both like women.”
Dylan rolled his eyes. “Yes.”
“But you also like men.” She chewed on her bottom lip. “And you have sex with each other.”
All right, now he was starting to feel rattled. The way Claire was staring made him feel like a specimen under a microscope.
“Where are you going with this?” he said irritably.
“I don’t know. I just have so many questions and they keep popping out of my mouth.” She straightened up and clasped both hands in her lap. “Which one of you is the bottom?”
He choked on the breath he’d just drawn into his lungs, then burst into a fit of coughing. Next to him, Aidan barked out another laugh.
When the coughs subsided, Dylan cast a frazzled look at the curious redhead. “Neither of us is the bottom,” he sputtered.
“So you’re both the top?”
“We switch off,” Aidan said helpfully.
Dylan turned to glare at his buddy. “Don’t encourage her.”
“Why not? This is highly entertaining.”
Claire hurled out another question before he could inform Aidan that his definition of entertainment was all sorts of fucked up.
“So if you had to choose, which would it be, men or women?”
“It’s not that simple,” Aidan said in a gruff voice.
“Sure it is. Just pick one, desert-island style. You can only bring one person with you, and that’s the only person you can sleep with for the rest of your life. ’Kay, you ready? On the count of three, pick a person. One. Two. Th—”
“I think it’s time for you to go to bed,” Dylan interrupted, bolting to his feet.
“But it’s still early!” Her gaze moved to the red numerals on the Blu-ray player. “It’s, um…” She squinted. “Well, it’s blurry, but I think that says eight o’clock.”
“Well, like you said, you’re very tired.”
As he reached for Claire’s hand and hauled her to her feet, he sensed Aidan’s dark eyes watching in disapproval. Fine, so maybe he was trying to get rid of her, but he refused to spend the rest of the night being interrogated about his sexual preferences. He’d performed his good-guy duty today by whisking her out of the country club, and that was as far as he was willing to go.
To his surprise, Claire didn’t launch any protests as he practically dragged her to the corridor on the other side of the apartment. She just kept chatting away—about the same topic he’d been trying to squash.
“Chris told me you’re kind of a slut. He said you sleep with a ton of women. So I’m guessing if you had to choose, you’d pick the va-jay-jay over the cock.”
Dylan burst out laughing again, and regretted it instantly.
Goddammit. He really needed to stop doing that.
“How is it you can say the word cock, but you use a euphemism for pussy?” he said with a sigh.
Her cheeks turned bright crimson. “I don’t know. I just don’t say that word.” Her tone grew haughty. “I grew up in a strict household where you weren’t allowed to talk about sex or be crude. So sue me. Anyway, what was I saying?”
“Nothing. You were saying nothing.”
“Oh, right, how I think you’d choose women.” She paused. “Actually, no, I changed my mind. Maybe you’d pick men. You live with a man, so…”
Ten more steps and they’d reach his bedroom. Just ten more steps.
Sadly, they were a measly three steps in when Claire decided to come to a full stop in the middle of the hall.
“What now?” he demanded.
She was staring at him again, except now there was an indecipherable gleam in her eyes that gave him a really bad feeling.
“Unless you were lying to Chris,” she said slowly.
She was clearly vocalizing a conversation she’d been having in her own head, because Dylan had no fucking idea what she was talking about.
Her expression turned shrewd. “Did you make up the whole manwhore reputation so Chris wouldn’t know you were really into dudes?”
Aggravation clamped around his throat, making it difficult to get out his next words. “No, I did not make anything up. I’m sorry to inform you, but I really am a manwhore. I’ve slept with a lot of women, okay? So now let’s get you nice and settled in your room, and I can go back to enjoying the football ga—”
He didn’t get to finish that sentence, because the next thing he knew, Claire was grabbing him by the front of his wifebeater and forcing his head down for a kiss.
Jesus Christ, she was kissing him.
And not a peck, either. This was a kiss. A hot, deep kiss with a helluva lot of tongue. And the second her mouth latched onto his, the manwhore they’d just been speaking of flew onto the scene like a bull bursting out of a chute.
He immediately took control of the kiss, hands sliding down to cup the firmest ass he’d ever had the pleasure of squeezing, mouth devouring hers like a man starved. Didn’t matter that he’d had an explosive orgasm a few hours ago—his dick was rock-hard and raring to go again, and it wasted no time in rubbing up against Claire’s pelvis and showing her exactly how much he loved women.
She whimpered, clung to the back of his neck. Her mouth tasted like peanut butter and alcohol, and her hair smelled like lavender, the sweet scent teasing his senses.
Dylan knew he had to stop this stupidity, yet he couldn’t seem to wrench his mouth away. Claire’s lips were so soft, so warm. Her tongue eagerly explored his mouth, eliciting shockwaves of desire in his body. When she hooked one leg around his hip and he felt the heat of her pussy against his thigh, he groaned with pleasure and started backing her into the wall behind her.
Their mouths were still locked, tongues tangling, and his hands moved from her ass to her waist, sliding down the sexy curve of her hips toward the hem of her dress, which he bunched between his fingers.
He was two seconds from ripping the dress right off her when a gust of reality swooped in and he suddenly realized what he was doing.
And who he was doing it with.
Stumbling back, he muttered a curse and tried to ignore the frenzied beating of his heart. He was still as hard as a concrete block, so hard he was surprised the heaviness of his cock didn’t tip him right over.
Claire looked as turned on as he felt. Porcelain cheeks sporting a pink blush, lips moist and swollen from the kiss, tits heaving as she caught her breath.
“What the fuck?” he said with a scowl. “Why did you do that?”
She looked flustered. “I…I wanted to see if you were seriously into women.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“I was curious,” she said defensively.
Dylan set his jaw and took a step toward her. “Has your curiosity been sated?” He lowered his hand to the painful bulge in his sweatpants and cupped his aching dick. “Is this a clear enough answer for you, Claire?”
A pair of wide brown eyes dipped to his crotch, flickering with heat that made his cock twitch. As she nodded in response, he could see her pulse hammering in the center of her throat.
Silence descended, broken only by the occasional muffled voices coming from the television in the living room. Aidan was still watching the game, Dylan noted. Thank fucking God. He would’ve
had a tough time explaining all this if he’d turned around and found Aidan standing there, especially after he’d ordered the other man to keep his hands off Claire.
“Any other experiment you want to try out on me?” he asked, unable to keep the sarcasm out of his tone.
“Um, no. I think I’m good.” Uncertainty washed over her face. “Why did you…why did you kiss me back?”
Million-dollar question right there. He was supposed to hate this woman, not lust over her.
Then again, who said one had anything to do with the other?
“Because I’m a guy,” he finally said. “When a woman sticks her tongue in my mouth, I react on instinct.”
“Oh. Okay. Right.” She tucked a few strands of dark-red hair behind her ear, then proceeded to spit out a string of rapid sentences that were nearly impossible to keep up with. “Anyway, you were right and I’m crazy exhausted so I’m gonna turn in now but thanks again for everything you did today and I’m sorry for what I did just now but I’m sure I won’t remember it in the morning so do me a favor and don’t remind me of it, okay?”
His head was spinning so fast he felt like he’d just gotten off a Tilt-A-Whirl. “I…yeah, sure, okay. G’night, Claire.”
“’Night, Dylan.”
She dashed off and disappeared into the bedroom, leaving him alone to run both hands through his hair in frustration.
There were many women he had no business making out with. Close relatives, of course. His buddies’ wives, no duh. That Black Widow broad who’d axe-murdered all her husbands, nope, not touching that one. Last but not least, Claire McKinley. Yup, his brother’s ex-fiancée-as-of-this-morning was definitely not someone he should be locking lips with.
Disgusted and annoyed at his lack of willpower, he ordered his erection to retreat, then stalked back to the living room so he could spend the evening with the person he wanted to be making out with.
Out of Uniform Box Set: Books 4-6 plus 2 Bonus Novellas Page 34
