by Nia Farrell
My first orgasm ripped through me, my body clenching around them as they drove into me. Edward cupped my breasts, lifting them for Daniel’s pleasure, holding me while Daniel sucked and nipped, teased and bit down hard enough to trigger a second paroxysm that flowed into a third.
“Jaysus,” Daniel grated, pounding into me now, his perfectly delineated muscles shiny with sweat as he pushed me toward a fourth. He took my nipple in his mouth and suckled it. Sucked harder yet when Edward threaded his fingers in Daniel’s hair and pressed his head against me.
I twisted Daniel’s nipples, and he exploded inside me with a guttural cry, grunting and huffing as he ejaculated, pouring into me, hot pulsing streams that filled me to overflowing. Edward dug his fingers into my hips and hissed as he found his own release.
Somehow they managed to roll us, still joined, onto our sides. Daniel, bless him, had me lift my head and slid a pillow beneath it. The feel of the three of us was so perfect, I wanted to weep with joy.
My body began to shake, filled with silent sobs that soon overflowed. The two men held me as I wept, fat tears squeezing from my eyes and rolling down my face to wet the linen case. Edward petted my hair. Daniel stroked my cheek, crooning soft, Gaelic endearments interspersed with butterfly kisses to my forehead and face.
Then Daniel started to sing the lullaby that I’d once sung to him, while he lay wounded and frightened, scared to death and rightly so. I had taken off my St. Michael’s medal, slipped it over his head, and closed his hand around it to give him something to cling to far greater than myself, the seeds of the faith that we’d been raised in. And I’d sung him the Irish lullaby that I’d learned as a child, hoping a song in his native tongue might comfort him.
Now it was my turn to listen. My turn to be comforted. When Daniel had finished, Edward raised himself on one elbow. Leaning over me, Edward turned my face back toward him and kissed me gently, tenderly, my lips, my cheek, my brow. He exhaled, a slough of breath that ruffled my hair, then he leaned across me and kissed Daniel.
The kiss was awkward. One-sided and ill-received. But Daniel did not fight it. Perhaps he was too shocked. Or perhaps he understood that it would inevitably come to this and had prepared himself for the eventuality. Either way, he lay unmoving and let it happen.
Given Daniel’s nature, Edward was neither tentative nor demanding. Edward’s kiss was soft yet sure. He pressed his lips to Daniel’s and murmured his thanks against them before lying down again at my back.
No one moved. No one spoke. We lay there in conjugal silence, three joined as one. I was the link. The bridge. They had both worked to make me theirs.
Now it was my turn to help them belong to each other.
Chapter Thirty-Four
The three of us dragged ourselves to breakfast dressed only in our robes. The marks left by clothing took time to fade—minutes that were ticking from the moment we awakened in a tangle, limbs entwined, arms snaked around each other, smelling of musk and sweat and sex.
Edward and Daniel had been hard, of course.
We’d gotten up too late to bathe, let alone have another interlude. A quick sponge bath and a wet comb through my hair were all that I was allowed before shoving my arms into the sleeves of my wrapper and trudging barefooted downstairs.
I knew we’d overdone it when Daniel ordered Irish coffee for breakfast. Last night had taken a toll on his leg, and he was suffering because of it. He said nothing, of course. He rarely did. Daniel was not a complainer where he was concerned. Politics, economy, prejudices, religion, the disparity between classes, elitist shite—now those, he could go on about for hours, and sometimes did, when he and Edward found a common thread that they could pick apart and follow as it unraveled. When we were together, it was safer to review historical events and figures, enjoy music, discuss art, or read while the men played cards.
Afraid that he’d set off my triggers, Daniel deliberately avoided any discussion of war in general, ours in particular. Edward, of course, thirsted for stories as much as Daniel craved whiskey when his pain hit. When our photography session was completed, I planned to see that each of them was satisfied, hopefully one with the other.
Sydney finished her full length studies shortly after lunch. From that point on, it was a constant repositioning of the camera, moving ever closer, until only our heads and shoulders appeared in the frame. We took more and longer breaks, to give Daniel’s leg a rest and pour him another shot, if that was what he needed.
Irishman that he was, Daniel could drink ungodly amounts and still appear relatively sober. Save for the sloppy grin, and the fact that he’d stopped shying away from Edward’s heated looks, I never would have known that he’d been imbibing, let alone drunk as much as he had.
There came a point when we had to stop, at least for today. Daniel’s leg buckled and we would have gone down hard, had Edward not caught us.
“Are you all right?” Edward asked. I nodded. Daniel grimaced.
“We’re done for the day,” I said. “Would you tell Sydney, please? Express our thanks and tender our regrets. I’m taking Daniel to bed.”
I put on my wrapper and helped him into his robe, grabbed the bottle, and escorted him to his room, where the sheets were clean, having been little used this past week. I turned down the bed and ordered him into it. He shook his head. “In a minute. Water closet.”
Ah.
“Why don’t you use mine? I could run you a bath. The warm water might help.” It might not, but it was certainly worth a try. I’d do anything short of dosing him with opiates to ease the pinch on his face.
“It might,” he said, though the inflection in his voice sounded more hopeful that I’d join him, which I did.
We fell asleep after cleansing our bodies and rubbing his leg to loosen the muscles. Nearly two hours later, when the water grew too cool, the chill on my front woke me with a start. My head bumped Daniel’s chin, rudely awakening him.
“Sorry,” I said. “Do you want me to warm the water, or shall I pull the stopper?”
“Stopper. Ye can warm me up in bed. Skin to skin’s the best for cold, and my pecker feels frosty right now.”
I dried us off, found our robes, and helped him hobble across the hall to his bed. Daniel sat against the headboard, propped on pillows with the sheets pulled up, less for modesty’s sake than for the warmth that they provided.
I motioned to the bottle sitting just beyond his reach. “If you need it, I’d recommend a scone or biscuit, a cracker or crust of bread—something to lessen the shock to your stomach. You’ve not eaten much today.”
He poked his tongue in his cheek and scratched his jaw. Shaking his head, he angled an impish glance at me. “And I suppose ye’ll be wantin’ to remedy that.”
“Three guesses and the first two don’t count,” I quipped. “Now, do you have a preference, or shall I surprise you?”
“A fruit pie, if she has them, but whatever ye forage is fine.”
I returned with a tray of fruit pies, scones, stewed apples, a wedge of sharp yellow cheese, a bowl, spoon, and a pitcher of cream that Daniel made short work of, pouring it over pies and soaking crumbled scones that he topped with the stewed apples. He saved the cheese for last, tearing it into bits to share with me.
“God, that’s good.” I nearly closed my eyes, relishing the burst of flavor on my tongue.
A set of footsteps paused outside the door.
“Edward? If that’s you, come in.”
The knob turned and the door swung open. Edward hesitated to enter, remaining tentative until he saw that I sat dressed on the bed, while Daniel was neatly tucked into it.
“Sorry,” he said. “I heard…well, I came to see how things were going.”
“I was making him eat. You have excellent cheese, by the way. Let me get an extra glass, and you can join him, hmm? I’d like to check on Sydney, and Daniel can tell you about Antietam.”
Edward looked at Daniel. Daniel looked at me.
“Later,
” I said, and slipped from the room, leaving the two of them to sort things out.
I felt no need to dress beyond my wrapper before heading upstairs. Properly underpinned, it was acceptable to be seen in one. Of course, I was naked underneath mine, but this was Sydney, who was quite beyond embarrassment, having made a profession of prurient imagery.
Sydney and Mary Margaret were hard at work, developing prints from the glass plate negatives. There were dozens of them, and a growing archive of images that would be for our eyes only. It was rather like doing a painting on commission to hang in a hidden room where no one but the owner would ever see it, let alone know of its existence. Sad, in a way, but such is life and art.
I spoke through the door of the darkroom, knowing better than to open it and risk ruining her efforts. She asked me to wait. I told her that I’d be in my studio, to come and find me when she had a moment to spare.
Rather than work on Young Frank’s watercolors and risk an untimely interruption of my own, I gathered my pens, the sepia ink, and a fresh mounted board and began making the copy that we’d planned.
No more than fifteen minutes passed before Sydney came with a print in hand.
“I took this just before your Irishman went down,” she said. “I wanted to see what you thought Edward might say if I asked to make an extra print for my portfolio.”
She turned it towards me, and I stopped breathing. The image was such that the subjects could remain anonymous. Just the top of my head between two clean-shaven jaws. Edward’s lips parted, his nostrils flaring, his vibration emoting pure, unadulterated lust. Daniel’s mouth soft, shy, hesitant, like Ganymede about to serve his first cup to Zeus.
“Oh, Sydney,” I breathed. “It’s…it’s….”
“It’s fucking perfect,” she crowed. “My God, look at them. And you, lucky thing, caught between all that push and pull.”
She reached out a hand and touched my hair, pushing it back from my face. For a moment I thought that Sydney might kiss me, but she dropped her hand and laughed at herself. “Too bad you’re taken,” she said. “I’m always looking for fresh inspiration. Is it true that you lived six years as a man? Served in the army? Fought in the war?”
“Yes,” I said, thinking of something else that I could give Daniel and Edward. “I still have my clothes. The hair’s grown out a bit.”
“But not too long,” she said, her thoughts already aligning with mine. “You should have a portrait done now, while it’s still this length. I could make small images to fit in their pocket watches. How do you want to do it? Fully clothed? No. No. I see you in a suit, with frockcoat and waistcoat unbuttoned, shirtless, looking like a dapper young man until you see the curves of your breasts. My God, how delicious. Tell me you’ll do it and I’ll see if I can talk your men into posing with each other. What I wouldn’t give to be a fly on the wall for that pillow talk.”
And so our pact was made.
Sydney took a dozen more exposures on Sunday before setting us free. Although it was late notice, Edward sent word to his father that we would indeed accept his invitation to Sunday lunch. Sydney and Mary Margaret would continue making their prints, and we would be completely away from the stench of chemicals wafting down from the third floor.
I hadn’t been to see Masey in several weeks. I refused to feel guilty when I had just cause. Daniel’s arrival. Setting up my home studio. Nearly finishing one piece and starting another. Having studies done for The Arrangement, my working title for Achilles, Patroclus, and Briseis. But Masey was family, and she’d never met Daniel, although I was certain that he’d recognize her from the portrait that I’d painted to hang in my room back in Chicago—a familiar face from which to draw comfort when I longed for the home that once was and would never be again. Lane was gone but Masey was alive, if distant, safe with my mother, I’d believed at the time.
And she was safe. And happy. Mother of a bright young boy who bore our father’s name, she was just as beautiful as ever. It shouldn’t have surprised me that Daniel was struck speechless when she met us at the door. She had that effect on people seeing her for the first time.
“Masey, this is Daniel O’Flaherty, my studio assistant and bosom friend. Daniel, this is my sister, Masey Davenport, and, yes, here’s her son Joseph, my nephew who has taken an early interest in art.”
More introductions followed. Edward’s father Dr. Wainwright, his son-in-law and protégé Dr. George Marshall, Edward’s petite sister Constance, and their three young children: the budding Egyptologist Lawrence, the equestrian Adelaide, and the intrepid Betsy, who was constantly disappearing, eager to explore any room that did not boast a bed or chiffonier.
The doctors had heard of Daniel’s wound. After lunch, they persuaded him to an examination in the empty office next door. The way his leg had been acting up, I encouraged him to take advantage of their expertise. Perhaps they knew of something that might help. It was worth a try, anyway.
The three of them returned convinced that Daniel’s germ theory practice had ultimately saved his limb and saved his life. Daniel seemed more at ease with our host, having the attention of not one but two learned men of like minds, and he was visibly more relaxed in Masey’s presence. My sister, of course, had no idea of the nature of my relationship with Daniel. To her knowledge, he was my assistant. Good looking. Talented. Blessed with Irish charm and an innate gift of gab, delivered in that delicious brogue of his.
Still, when she pulled me aside and asked if he was single, I felt my claws come out.
I drew a breath and sheathed them just as quickly. “He is not married,” I said carefully, “but he is taken, and very private in that regard. I’m sorry.”
I wasn’t, of course. Sorry, that is. Daniel was mine, and my sister had a whole English orchard to pick from without shaking apples from my tree.
With her bubble burst, Masey’s interest deflated. I could not fault her taste. And I could not wait to get home. Our sessions yesterday and today, seeing Sydney’s photograph, remembering our ménage from Friday night and how it felt to have them both inside me had me more than a little aroused. Beneath my hooped skirt and petticoats, my crotchless drawers were soaked.
Edward could smell me, I was certain of it, the way that he visually appraised me, as a jeweler would inspect a diamond that he was considering mounting. An apt analogy, it turned out. No sooner had we climbed in our hackney coach than Edward gave the order to keep driving until further notice and promptly pulled the shades on the windows, shutting the three of us inside.
He thrust a hand beneath my skirt and plowed his fingers between my legs, finding the opening in my knickers and thrusting two fingers into my breach. “I could smell you,” he said, his voice low and gravelly. “You are soaking wet. What has made you that way, hmm?”
Breath hissed between my teeth as he curled his fingers and found my sweet spot.
“Everything,” I moaned. “The posing. The pictures. Fucking. I love the way it feels when you take me at the same time. Just thinking about it makes me want to come.”
The next thing I knew, Edward had slung one of my ankles over his shoulder while my other foot dangled near the carriage floor. He scooted me to the far side of the seat as he worked to unfasten his pants. Freeing his turgid flesh, he took me in one searing thrust that blazed a path to my very core. I whimpered from the force of it.
“Easy,” Daniel said.
Edward drove into me again, just as hard, just as deep. “Make no mistake. She wants this,” he growled, hips flexing and thrusting, finding his rhythm. “She wants us. Don’t you, pet?”
I bit my lip and moaned. “Yes…” Thrust. Thrust. Thrust. “Sir….”
“Are you wet enough to handle us? Do you think you could take both of us in your cunny at the same time? I’d love to try it.”
“No!” I gasped, unable to conceive it. “God…no! You’re…all…I can…handle…now! You’ll…rip me…if you…try!”
Edward pressed his thumb against my clito
ris. “Then I want you to straddle Daniel. Take his cock in that greedy pussy of yours while I fuck you in the arse. That’s what you’ve been thinking about, is it not? Daniel and I, working the double oracle?”
I turned my head to where Daniel sat, watching us, his nostrils flared, his erection straining the front of his pants as he fought to unbutton them.
Oh, God. “Yes. Yes.”
“Come for me, and you shall have it.”
He pinched my pearl, and I exploded, my walls spasming, squeezing his length as my juices flowed around him. When the paroxysm had run its course, he pulled out and ducked his head, releasing my leg and lowering it. “Up you go,” he said, and helped me to a sitting position. “And over.”
Daniel had slid his hips to the edge of the seat, making room for me to kneel above his lap and fall on his sword like the good soldier that I was. I suffered a quick, clean little death the moment that the carriage wheel found a hole and Daniel’s cock skewered me, hitting bottom. I resurrected to feel Edward behind me, one hand braced on the back of the seat by Daniel’s shoulder, and his other hand wrapped around his erection that he pressed against me, probing my defenses, seeking my opening and finding it.
Breath hissed between his teeth as he surged upward, penetrating me, inch by inch, until he’d worked his full length inside with no oil to slicken his way, just my body’s lubrication repurposed, likely with the addition of some spittle while I was incoherent. Either way, it was just enough.
I clung to Daniel’s shoulders as Edward sought and found his rhythm. It was the third time they’d taken me this way. Theoretically it may have been the same logistics, with each man positioned as he was, yet it felt so very different, with the sway of the carriage and the jolt of the wheels with every bump or rut that they hit.
Daniel put his hands on my waist to anchor me to him, while Edward moved behind me, in me, my skirts shoved between us as he surged forward, drawing back then forging deeper, as relentless as the storm-driven sea. Reaching around me, he found my clitoris, stroked and plucked it while he teased and tormented the base of my neck with his teeth, raking it, nipping and scraping, and finally biting it, clamping down in a primal claiming as he spilled his seed inside me, marking me, within and without, as his own.
