“Come on, little one. Let’s go inside, and I’ll fix you a sandwich.” Gage stepped back then took her hand in his.
Daria shrugged and crossed the grass to the house beside him. Roman walked on her other side. For a second she felt important, like a movie star with two big, strong men guarding her from the world.
Then reality crashed down around her. They were doing this for Mrs. Stone. A lot of things would happen over the next few days, not because people cared about her specifically, but because they loved Mrs. Stone and all the good works she had done.
Once they entered the kitchen, Gage led her to the table in the corner. He pulled out a chair then waited as she stared at it. It took a moment to realize he wanted her to sit down. Once she did, she jolted when he kissed the top of her head before walking away. He had never done that before. What was going on with these two? Was it the shock of the fire? Or was something else going on?
She did not turn to watch. Instead she stared at the reflection of the room in the window across the table from where she sat. The men embraced, and then Gage laid his forehead on Roman’s shoulder. Roman lifted a hand and wrapped it around the back of Gage’s neck.
“I’ll fix Daria something to eat while you make up the beds,” Roman said in a soft tone that again carried that thread of power. It made her wonder if she should go up and make her own bed instead of putting Gage out.
Gage’s response was so soft she was not certain, but thought she heard him say, “Yes, Master.”
Master? What the fuck?
In the glass, Roman brushed his lips across Gage’s temple before the bigger man straightened and walked away. After that, Daria’s attention turned to her own reflection.
She barely recognized the woman with the lush dark brown hair that draped over her left shoulder in a ponytail that ended just below her collarbone. The woman in the window wore just enough makeup on to enhance her big amber-colored eyes and the perfectly proportioned lips. The woman in the reflection looked like a successful, young professional woman or a young mother, not someone whose life once again lay shattered at her feet.
Even after eight years away from her past, whenever Daria looked into the mirror she still expected to see the angry teenager with the super-short, spiky pink and green hair and three earrings in each ear who wore her anger and too-big clothes like a shield.
The belligerent attitude and smart-ass mouth she had developed to keep everyone at arm’s length did little other than earn her regular slap-downs by the latest of the parade of men her mother brought into their lives. Her mother did not care how the men treated them as long as they kept buying the beer.
She had been too drunk to step in when the last one decided he wanted to fuck Daria instead of her mother. Daria objected, and the man ended up in the emergency room needing stitches where she had cut his thigh with a broken beer bottle. Her mother landed in the morgue the next morning from alcohol poisoning. Daria was sent to the county group home to wait for her eighteenth birthday.
Two weeks after moving into the group home, she met Mrs. Stone. Five minutes later Daria agreed to go home with the elderly woman.
She never knew what Mrs. Stone had seen that day, but somehow the elderly woman had looked past the wild child exterior to the frightened girl cowering within. Over the next year Mrs. Stone, along with many of her other foster children, helped Daria put the bad stuff of her past to rest while helping her grow to be confident and self-reliant in almost any situation.
When Daria aged out of the foster care system, Mrs. Stone hired her as her secretary, companion, and then later, her caretaker. Only in the past year had the old woman pushed her toward choosing the next step in her career path. Like numerous others of her foster brothers and sisters, Daria decided to go into a career in public service by training to be a paramedic.
She jumped when Roman set a plate in front of her. Looking down, she swallowed hard to keep from bursting into tears again. “You remembered,” she whispered.
“Of course I did, baby girl,” he said with a wink before he retrieved two glasses of milk from the counter by the refrigerator.
Daria smiled down at her sandwich. Peanut butter and banana cut in triangular quarters. She did not need to lift the bread to know he had placed a layer of chocolate chips between the peanut butter and the slices of banana. A relatively healthy sandwich with a treat, Roman was the only one who fixed her favorite sandwich just the way she preferred.
“Thank you,” she said softly as she stared at the sandwich without making a move to eat it.
* * * *
“You’re thinking too hard,” Roman said as he sat in the chair next to hers.
She had not touched her sandwich yet, just looked down at it with an intent expression. He knew from past experience with Daria that he had better be ready to discuss something of serious importance.
“What is it that has you staring at your favorite sandwich like it’s covered with ants?”
He fought back a smile when Daria shrugged and picked up the first quarter of her sandwich. He watched as she quickly ate it in three bites, as she did the second one. When she picked up the third quarter, she finally looked at him.
“Why did you kiss me like that?”
She sounded confused and looked beyond troubled. Roman thought he felt Mrs. Stone’s hand reach into his chest and squeeze his heart at the idea that he had caused this beauty any troubling thoughts. Though it was hardly the time for this particular discussion, the reality of the situation needed to be brought into the open.
Pushing back from the table, Roman turned his chair. He twisted her chair around so they sat face to face. “I kissed you because I couldn’t hold myself back any longer.”
“But you’re gay! And if you haven’t noticed, I’m not a man. And you love Gage! You two have been together forever. Why would you want to screw that up?” Daria’s eyes got bigger with every sentence. She blinked twice before pushing back and standing. “Maybe I should leave and go stay with Mariellen or Kelso instead.”
Before she could take a step, Roman grabbed her arm and pulled into his lap. “No, baby girl, you’re staying here with us. There are some things we need to talk about. I wanted to wait until you’d gotten your feet under you, but now is as good a time as any.”
Daria wiggled in his arms, trying to get away, but Roman held tight. He shifted her to sit across his lap and held her with one arm around her back, holding her hips, and the other arm wrapped around her chest, his arm just brushing the undersides of her breasts.
“Roman, let me go! What will Gage think when he comes back?”
Roman tightened his hold as she attempted again to climb from his lap. “Gage knows how I feel. And I know how he feels. We’ve talked about this, and we’re in agreement. Now settle down and relax,” he ordered, purposely using his Dom voice to see if she would react as Gage did.
She stilled immediately, proving to him that she was as much his woman as Gage was his man.
“What’s going on?” Gage asked as he stepped into the room.
“We’re about to have a talk,” Roman said.
“Now?”
Roman nodded. “Right now. Get yourself a glass of juice and join us.”
Daria frowned at him, her bottom lip pooching out just a bit. “How come he gets juice and I have to drink milk?”
She looked so cute pouting that Roman could not help himself. He leaned down and brushed a kiss on the tip of her nose. “Because, sweet Daria, Gage has a severe sensitivity to milk.”
“Oh,” she said, looking surprised. “Why didn’t I know about this?”
“It’s not a big deal,” Gage said as he sat down in the chair she had used. “You didn’t finish your sandwich.”
Roman watched as Gage picked up the last quarter of the sandwich, smashed it appropriately flat, and held it up to Daria’s lips. Roman waited until she finished eating before reaching a hand out to his partner.
“Daria, the first thing you need
to understand is that we are not gay. We are monogamously bisexual,” Roman said carefully as he slid his hand around so it lay over her beating heart.
“What does that mean, you’re monogamously bisexual?” She looked from him to Gage and back again.
“It means that the only men we’re attracted to is each other. And the only woman we have any interest in is you,” Gage said gently as he reached out and took Daria’s hand between his. “What we want to know is whether or not you’re interested in us, too.”
Chapter 4
Daria watched Roman’s mouth move, heard the words he said, but still had a hard time comprehending what he meant. She stared into his bright blue eyes as she tore apart his statement into small, manageable pieces.
They were not gay.
They were both attracted to her.
They wanted to know if she was attracted to them?
Before she could scream, “Hell yeah,” she reached down with the hand Gage was not holding. Pinching her thigh, pain shot from the skin between her fingertips to her brain.
Okay, she was awake and not in the throes of some bizarre shock-induced dream. But what does it mean?
She did not realize she had spoken out loud until Roman brushed a kiss on her hair and said softly, “It means, baby girl, that we want you here with us, in our lives and in our bed. We want to be your men.”
“But…but…how can we do that?” Daria turned to look at Roman, who looked just as serious as Gage did.
“All you have to do is say yes and we’ll work the rest out,” Roman said. His voice was soft and intense as he leaned closer and brushed his lips back and forth over hers.
Her body went weak at the touch. Her nipples stood up and begged for attention as her pussy went soft and wet in preparation for sex.
“Yes,” she breathed. “I think I’ve wanted you since the day Mrs. Stone brought me home and you were there cutting the grass.”
“Just Roman?” Gage asked, sounding hesitant.
She squeezed his hand and turned to smile at him. A big yawn escaped before she said, “No, I wanted both of you, but you were committed to one another, and I couldn’t have chosen between you if someone had pointed a gun to my head. Not then and not now. I want you both. But I still don’t see how we can do this.”
Gage smiled, looking like a happy man, and then his gaze shifted to Roman, and his smile slowly melted away. “There is something else we need to talk about, angel.”
“More? I don’t think there could be anything bigger than this,” she joked before yawning again.
She looked from one to the other when neither spoke. They exchanged a glance, and Roman gave a slight shake of his head to which Gage nodded in agreement. Then both men turned their attention to her.
“More can wait until tomorrow. For now we can all do with some rest,” Roman said as he gave her a squeeze for helping her climb from his lap.
* * * *
As soon as Daria was on her feet, Gage leaned forward, wrapped an arm around her waist, and stood with her dangling from his shoulder.
“Gage! What are you going?” she yelped as he followed Roman across the kitchen.
“You’re tired, and I thought I’d give you a ride upstairs.” He chuckled, patting the back of her thigh. “Now just relax and trust me. I’m a fireman and trained to rescue damsels in distress.”
He could not help but grin at his Master when Daria giggled then slid her hands in the back pockets of his jeans. Roman looked at them and smiled in approval.
Once they climbed the stairs, Gage walked into the guestroom before setting Daria on her feet again. He looked around at the room then to the woman and knew they were doing the right thing.
“I brought you a T-shirt to wear and a new toothbrush.” He waved toward the corner of the bed where he had left a set of towels and everything else he thought she might need that they had in the storage cabinet.
He watched as Daria looked around the room that she had helped them paint a soft peach three years earlier. They had made her pick out the paint and most of the furnishings but did not tell her why. Truth was, they had wanted to claim her the minute she turned twenty-one except for the promise Mrs. Stone had extracted from them to give her another four years.
Seeing her look around the room they had put together just for her made the wait worthwhile. He wondered how long it would be until she preferred sleeping with them to sleeping in here.
“You want me to sleep in here?” she asked as she looked past him to Roman, who stood in the doorway.
Gage turned as well to look toward the man he loved more than anything. The man who ruled his life with a velvet-covered iron fist.
Roman smiled gently at them. “Daria, we would love to have you in our bed tonight and every night, but we are not going to push anything on you. You’ve had a hell of a day and night and if you would prefer to sleep in here alone, we will abide by your decision. But if you wish to join us in our room, you are more than welcome.”
Gage watched Daria out of the corner of his eye. He had to swallow hard to keep from groaning in need when she licked at her lips with her pink tongue. He had to look away when she bit her bottom lip as she considered the situation.
“I’d like to sleep with you, please,” she said.
Roman nodded with a smile. “We’d like that, sweetheart. But just so you know, we have a rule about no clothes in bed. Why don’t you go ahead and get ready for bed? We’ll meet you in there, okay?”
Before Daria could turn away, Gage wrapped an arm around her and brushed a kiss over her hair. “Take your time. We’ll wait.”
He followed Roman across the landing and into their room.
He waited until the water in the guest bathroom began to run. “Why didn’t you tell her the rest? She needs to know.”
Roman gave him the look that said he was dancing on the edge of insubordination. In this room more than anywhere else in the house, Gage submitted totally to his master, but at this moment, he needed to understand.
“I think we’ve overwhelmed her enough for one night. Especially after the fire and everything else that she went through today. We’ll tell her in a day or two, once she’s found her feet. By then she’ll probably have figured it out. She’s known for some time that I’m the boss in this relationship. She just doesn’t know how much of a boss I am,” Roman said.
He took off his own clothes and tossed them on the bed before going into the bathroom they’d built out of the bedroom that had been between their room and Daria’s. Gage stripped down and put his clothes and Roman’s in the clothes hamper.
When Roman emerged, Gage went in for a super-quick shower. After brushing his teeth, he tidied the room before turning off the light and returning to the bedroom. Daria was in the bed alone with the covers pulled to her neck. She looked scared.
Daria looked in his face then her eyes dropped slowly down his body. He felt the brush of her gaze like a hand gently stroking his skin. He felt his cock twitch and begin to stiffen. He saw her swallow hard as she watched his erection come to life until it was pointing straight out in front of him, long and strong.
He turned around slowly then grinned when he once again faced her and met her wide-eyed gaze. “Like what you see?”
She slowly nodded her head up and down.
“Do I get to see you?”
Daria dropped her face until her chin rested on her chest. Then her head moved slowly from side to side one time.
“Daria? Can’t we see your beautiful body?” Roman asked from the doorway to the landing.
Looking past the man, Gage deduced that he had gone back downstairs to lock the doors and turn out the lights. Which was why he’d put his boxer shorts back on, which he now peeled off and hung on the doorknob. When he straightened, Gage had to swallow at the sight of his man naked and as aroused as he was.
Daria looked at Roman for a long, long moment before she lowered the blanket to her waist. Gage sucked a breath as his eyes widened when he
saw the scars on her ribs and breasts. They were white with age, but the lines and circles gave him a real good idea of why she had ended up in Mrs. Stone’s care.
Someone had done some serious damage to his angel. But that was the past. Now was the present, and this was their time to show her how beautiful and loving they knew her to be.
Gage approached the bed slowly and climbed in next to her, wanting nothing more than to kiss her and assure her that she was the most beautiful female he had ever seen. His eyes met Roman’s as his Master crawled in on her other side.
“Daria, are you on the pill?” Roman asked gently as they settled down next to her with the covers pulled only as high as their hips.
“No, I tried them, but they made me sick,” she whispered, looking embarrassed and uncomfortable.
Gage laid his hand on her arm and began to stroke up and down the soft flesh, hoping to soothe her. “That’s okay, angel, we’ll take care of it.”
Roman looked at him and mouthed the word “Condom?”
Gage shook his head. They had not kept condoms in the house in years.
“For tonight, though, there will be no intercourse,” Roman stated as he looked across their woman. Gage saw the raging hunger in his Master’s expression. What was he planning?
“Huh?” Daria asked, sounding more than a little disappointed.
“It means that we’ll have to get creative in making love to our beautiful baby girl,” Roman explained as he leaned over her and claimed her lips.
Gage held back and watched as Roman seduced their woman, building her hunger, setting her arousal on fire. He knew that he would have his turn when Roman allowed it. For now he was quite happy watching as Master kissed and caressed Daria until she began to pant and shift her hips on the bed.
When Roman lifted his head and met Gage’s eyes, he was not sure what the other man wanted.
“Show our woman what you do best,” Roman ordered softly as his eyes cut down her body.
McKenzie, Cooper - Daria's Heroes [Men Out of Uniform 1] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 3
