by Sami Lee
Doug hadn’t actually complained about her technique, but his patent lack of enthusiasm for the act had eventually made Erica stop trying. “There’s a chance I’m actually not good at it, you know.”
“Listen to me here, Erica. Any man who complains about any effort you make in that department does not deserve you. Not a minute of your time, you hear me?”
His staunch defense made her heart warm, made the awkward insecurities she’d experienced with Doug slip away. “Thank you, that’s sweet.”
“Sweet nothing, I’m serious. You’d only have to run your tongue over me once and I’d be thanking you. I’d be begging for more and praising my luck that you were willing to go there.”
Erica smiled. “Okay, I get it.”
“You sure? If you want I can drive over there and prove it to you.”
It was a flippant offer with serious undertones that Erica so wanted to take him up on. But she replied, “I’m happy like this.”
Strange as it seemed, she was. Right now, talking to Corey about surprisingly intimate things, Erica was happy. She wasn’t thinking about tomorrow or next week or anything but this moment.
“I figured you’d say that.” Corey groaned. “Never mind that my dick resembles a telegraph pole right now. Shit, listen to me. I sound like Griff.”
“That’s okay. I love the way he talks.”
“I was raised to be more polite, but damn, you bring something out in me. You make me more like him.”
“Is that bad?”
“No. I’ve always admired the way Griff can say whatever he wants and somehow get away with it.”
“What do you want to say right now?”
“That I’m so hard I’m not going to be able to sleep unless I… Can you guess what I’m doing right now, Erica?”
Erica closed her eyes. “Yes.”
“Because you’re doing it too. Touching yourself because you can’t help it. I can hear those soft little moans you’re making. They’re driving me crazy.”
“Oh, Corey.” Between her legs, her hand began to move faster.
“Can you guess what I’m picturing while I’m stroking my hard-on, or do you want me to tell you?”
“Tell me.”
His sigh was shaky. “I’m imagining you licking and sucking my dick, and you are so damn good at it that I want to come every time you close your lips around me. But I don’t let myself have an orgasm like that. You need me hard because you get so horny from sucking me, you have to have me inside you. Griff is there too, telling you to get on the floor, on your hands and knees. I slip into you from behind, so hard and tight you cry out. Griff puts his cock in your open mouth, pushing it all the way in. Every time I come back inside you, it forces you onto Griff’s cock, makes you take him to the back of your throat.”
The idea of being caught between them like that, of being shamelessly used for the pleasure of those two men made Erica’s arousal spiral out of control. The couch springs creaked as she rocked her hips with increasing vigor. No longer keeping up even a pretense of modesty, Erica spread her thighs and plunged two fingers into her aching, empty pussy, imagining it was Corey there instead. With her other hand she held on to the phone like she was making an emergency call. “Corey. Oh God. I’m going to… ”
“Jeez, so am I. I’m going to have an orgasm thinking about how sexy you’d look taking it from both of us like that.”
“Yes, Corey. Oh, yes.”
“That’s it, Erica. Come for me like I’m coming for you.”
The orgasm shot Erica into the glorious state of sexual free fall she usually explored on her own. As had been the case last week, sharing it made the rapture more intense. On the other end of the line, she heard Corey’s guttural groan and knew he’d reached his own peak.
Erica pictured the pearlescent evidence of his climax landing in creamy spurts on his tight abs. The mental image made her orgasm purl on and on in ripples. When the furor finally died down, she was left trembling and alone, almost as shocked as she’d been a week ago when Corey and Griff had both been with her.
Once again the realization of what she’d done was stunning. Phone sex was something she’d only heard about. She’d never imagined doing anything so brazen. Embarrassment niggled but was outweighed by a sense of euphoria and perverse pride. Maybe she wasn’t so boring and straightlaced after all. Perhaps she was even sexy.
What a time to work that out.
“Erica.” Corey rasped her name in astonishment. “I didn’t mean to do that.”
Erica could hardly speak. “I’ve never, ever…”
“Me neither.” His laugh tremored. “I told you I haven’t been as lucky with women as people think. I feel pretty damn fortunate right now though, Erica. You blow me away.”
“Corey Wachawski, you are the sweetest, sexiest man I’ve ever met.”
He sighed. “We’re going to see each other again, baby. We have to.”
Reality was a dark, heavy thing that smothered her fledgling sense of elation. Phone calls were one thing, actually seeing him was impossible. He’d think she was offering more than she had to give.
As though sensing her hesitation, Corey didn’t press her to commit to anything. “Will you stay on the line? I’d like to talk for a while. That’s all, just talk.”
Erica closed her eyes. How could she say no to him when he asked for something so simple in that sweet baritone voice?
“Okay,” she agreed. “Let’s talk.”
“You’re up, Wachawski.”
Corey tore his gaze away from the Sovereign’s entry doors to see Steve Waller handing him a set of darts. “How’d you do?”
Steve laughed. “A twenty-five and two bull’s-eyes. Thanks for paying so much attention to my stellar performance.”
“He’s been staring at those front doors all night,” one of the other firefighters, Mitch West, chipped in. “I figure he’s waiting on a girl.”
Steve, Mitch and another guy everyone called Curly put their heads together, fluttered their eyelashes and crooned in unison. “Oooh, a girl.”
“Very funny.” Corey snatched the darts off Steve and moved to the starting mark. He forced himself to focus as he took aim. The first dart hit the outer rim of the board; the second netted him ten points. By the time the third sailed into the backboard, the guys were razzing him soundly about his unsteady hands and speculating on how they’d become that way.
“So who is she?” Steve asked point-blank when Curly took his turn at the mark and hit a fifty-pointer first try.
“No one you know.”
“Nobody you want me to know.” Steve grinned at his brilliant deduction. “Afraid she’ll change her mind about you once she gets an eyeful of the trademark Waller smile?”
“Sure, that’s it.”
Corey couldn’t help but grin at Steve’s outlandish teasing. He wasn’t worried about competing with Steve Waller for Erica’s attention. All he was afraid of was her not showing up at the Sovereign ever again. He was a little scared she’d meant it when she said a relationship wasn’t on the table, because that would mean last night’s phone conversation hadn’t meant nearly as much to her as it had to him.
He thought of going around there, but he wanted to give her a chance to come to him. Corey sensed pressuring Erica right now would have the opposite effect than the one he wanted. And what he wanted was exactly what he’d told Erica—for her and Griff and him to be together once more. Okay, maybe more than once more.
His gaze strayed to the bar where Griff was having a long conversation with the bartender. The blonde woman was cute and obviously into Griff, if the way she smiled and leaned on the counter to best display her cleavage was any indication. Corey wondered if Griff would take her home, if sex with a random woman—and only a woman—would be enough to satisfy him tonight.
“Are we going to see this bird in here some time?” Curly asked as he returned to the table and picked up his beer.
“I don’t want any of you j
okers setting your eyes on any girl of mine.” The remark popped out before Corey could think better of saying something that sounded so possessive. The subsequent round of teasing jeers made him cringe.
“You lot sound like a pack of galahs.”
Griff’s mocking observation subdued the commotion. Steve took one of the beers Griff slid on the table and turned his attention to Griff’s love life instead of Corey’s. He tilted his head toward the bar. “You on the pull tonight?”
“When am I not?” Griff smirked. “Who’s winning this epic contest?”
As Steve updated him on the game, Griff’s gaze slid over the four of them as a group without landing on any particular man. Specifically not landing on him, Corey couldn’t help but think. It had been that way for days, since their night with Erica. It was as though the other man wanted to pretend Corey didn’t exist, that their friendship had never been. It cut Corey to the quick, and made him mad as hell at the same time.
Never in his life had Corey considered his sexual preferences mutable, but evidently they were. Nothing between him and Griff was the same, and while Griff’s cool attitude was partly to blame, Corey couldn’t discount his own part in the chasm that had opened up between them. He couldn’t be in the same room with Griff anymore without remembering what the man looked like naked, and the recollection never failed to cause a spike in his heart rate.
Did Griff sense that in him? Is that why he’d avoided Corey all week? Perhaps he’d read the situation wrong, and Griff was one hundred percent straight, so straight he was disgusted, not tempted, by Corey’s newfound interest.
The sound of a woman’s voice nearby made Corey’s ears prick up. He caught a snatch of conversation, something about “students” and “homework”, and his gaze snagged on a mane of red hair shining around a pair of creamy pale shoulders. His heart flat out stopped beating, trapping the air in his lungs.
He’d told Erica he’d swing by the Sovereign tonight, so that if she felt like dropping by—not like a date or anything that presaged a relationship—she could, no strings attached. He was halfway to standing before the woman turned and he saw her face. The disappointment was momentarily crushing.
It wasn’t her.
His companions were too busy discussing the latest rugby-league results to notice Corey’s reaction. All of them except Griff. Their gazes met and held. Corey saw comprehension in Griff’s hazel irises, understanding and something else that looked a lot like discontent.
Griff was the first to break eye contact. Taking one last swig of his beer, he put the half-empty glass on the table. “I’m going to love you lot and leave you. I’m stuffed.”
“Sure, mate.” Steve winked. “Get a better offer, did ya?”
Griff offered an enigmatic smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Without further explanation, he lifted two fingers in a nonchalant salute and turned on his heel, striding out of the pub without a backward glance.
Corey watched him leave, his emotions running riot. The bartender noticed Griff’s abrupt departure as well, dejection clear on her face. Griff obviously hadn’t made a date with her. Why had he let everyone think he had?
Because he wanted Corey to believe that night with Erica meant nothing to him, that Erica meant so little to him she could be easily replaced with the closest piece of flesh.
He’s lying.
Corey wasn’t sure how he knew. He simply did.
“I’ll see you guys later.” Corey left the rest of his own beer and departed with no explanation. He felt the surprised stares of his colleagues on his back as he followed the path Griff had taken to the pub’s frosted-glass exit doors.
Corey stepped out into the warm spring night. He scanned the car park for the familiar red Ute and saw Griff standing beside it, digging in his jeans pocket for the keys. Corey headed that way. “You looked at her too.”
Griff turned, surprised. “What?”
“The redhead inside. You looked at her.”
“So?”
“When you thought for that split second it was Erica, did you want it to be her?”
His expression was carefully neutral. “I didn’t care one way or the other.”
“Bullshit. I know you meant it when you said you liked her.”
“I liked fucking her, that’s for sure. She was a hot piece of ass beneath that schoolmarm look.”
The urge to grab Griff and shove him up against the car in anger was swift and surprising. Corey might have done it if he hadn’t guessed Griff was being deliberately vulgar to deflect attention from the real issue. “She wasn’t just a piece of ass, not to me. I don’t think she was to you either. I saw the way you changed when you were with her, the way you smiled at her and took care of her. You told her she was special.”
“I say that to all the girls. Women like to hear certain things from a man after she’s let him screw her senseless. I give them what they want, that’s all.”
“Why are you being like this?” Corey asked, dropping the subject of Erica for now because he saw he wasn’t going to get anywhere. “Why has everything changed between us?”
“Fuck off. Everything’s exactly the same.”
“You won’t look at me.” Corey hated the way his voice caught, giving away how much Griff’s attitude of late had stung. “You treated me like shit on your shoe this week.”
“Didn’t mean to.” Genuine regret laced Griff’s sigh. “I want you to be happy, Cor. You seem to think Erica does that for you, so go for it. Why are you giving me a moment’s thought?”
There were so many truths he could have uttered but fear stopped him giving everything away. “Because Erica wants us both again.”
“She what?” Griff’s astonishment pulled the veil from his expression. “How do you know that?”
“I called her. We talked for hours. She’s…amazing.” Thinking about her and all the confidences they’d shared made Corey’s heart gallop, made a goofy smile curve his lips. She’d been lonely growing up, and Corey identified with that because despite being generally well liked he’d never felt understood. She was sweet and generous even after going through the hardship of losing her mother so young, and her aunt so recently. Her Aunt Claire had longed to spend her final days at home, and Erica had taken leave from work to care for her until her dying day.
She carried so much sadness within her, and Corey wanted nothing more than to lift it for her. Well, that and to explore the chemistry between them…between all three of them.
“That’s great, Cor. Go, be amazed.”
The edge to Griff’s words made Corey’s ears prick up. “Are you jealous?”
“Of a phone call? You’re putting an awful lot of stock in it if you think it means she wants us both again.”
“We didn’t just talk.” Recalling the explosive orgasm they’d shared made Corey flush hot. “We really talked, if you know what I mean.”
Griff seemed to get the implication. “And you discussed me?”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck.” Abruptly, Griff turned away and grabbed the door handle of his car. Realizing it was still locked, he swore again and reached for the keys he’d shoved back in his pocket.
“Is that so bad?” Corey stepped behind Griff. Without planning to, he moved closer than he ordinarily would have, like a magnetic force compelled it. “That Erica wants you again? That I…”
When Corey didn’t finish the thought, Griff whirled around until they were almost nose to nose. “That you what?”
“I was curious, that’s all,” he burst out. “I don’t know why, I never have been before. But I really liked watching you fuck Erica. I loved seeing how much she enjoyed it. You knew just how to make her go wild and that was so hot. It made me think about you, not just her.”
“Corey, shut the fuck up.”
The harsh rebuke propelled Corey backward. His heart seized painfully. “You’re not…shit. I thought you were…” His throat closed around the word, the mortification of getting it so wrong. “I
thought you were bisexual.”
Griff stared at him levelly while Corey’s heart hammered out of control. At length he said, “I don’t like labels.”
Corey’s breath caught. “But you like blokes?”
“Depends on the bloke.” Griff’s gaze flicked over Corey’s face. “I can swing that way for the right person.”
Dully, Corey concluded, “And I’m not right.”
“Jesus, Cor.” Griff lifted his hand, using it to frame Corey’s jaw. “You’re gonna kill me.”
The contact made Corey’s heart race. When Griff used his thumb to trace the outline of Corey’s lower lip, Corey’s mouth dried out. The look Griff was giving him was the same one Corey knew he wore when he found himself this close to a woman he was dying to kiss.
Did he want Griff to kiss him? The notion sparked confused anxiety in his chest. It also rushed his blood. There was a distinct swelling in the general area of his Levis that couldn’t be ignored. Griff’s nearness, the touch of his hand, aroused Corey.
“Griff.” The name sounded like a plea. “I don’t know what to do with these feelings.”
He reached out and curled shaking fingers around Griff’s shoulder, noticing the flex of solid muscle beneath his palm. Griff’s hot breath puffed into the scant space separating them as he met Corey’s eyes.
He wasn’t going to make a move. Griff waited, the muscles in his face tense, while Corey wrestled with the possibilities. The air around them thickened, became hot and electric. It suffocated Corey, until he felt the only way he could breathe was with Griff’s help.
He inclined his head and met Griff’s lips with his own.
Chapter Seven
Five long years.
Griff had spent five agonizing years stuffing his emotions down, securely caging his sexual predilections and fucking anyone who’d have him, all so Corey wouldn’t guess that this was what he’d wanted most. Corey’s mouth, soft and yielding against his. His body, hard and strong, yet trembling with the force of the craving coursing through his blood.
After the first tentative melding of mouths, Griff deepened the kiss with a groan, unable to help himself. Corey responded with a moan that turned Griff’s dick into a steel spike. With a mammoth effort, he kept his hands above Corey’s shoulders, confining his explorations to the silky threads of his hair, the fine line of stubble on his jaw.
