“I know he told me… he told me he really likes you,” she blurted and cried harder.
“And I like him. It doesn’t mean we don’t like women,” I simply stated. “Did you like when I fucked you?”
Coral’s eyes darkened and she squirmed in her seat as heat rose to her cheeks. “This isn’t the time for—”
“For what? Telling it like it is? Being honest about how I made you feel? It’s exactly the right time. And for the record, I loved every fucking second that I was inside you,” I countered.
Coral held my gaze and I saw a shift in the way she looked at me, “You know I did,” she replied and averted her eyes across the room.
“I enjoyed every inch of your delicious body, sweetheart. Now this is going to sound crude and disrespectful, but I’ve had hundreds if not thousands of women, and I can honestly say apart from one other, you’re the only woman I know I’d want over and over again.”
“But I thought you agreed because you wanted Lennon?”
“No, that’s not why I agreed. I did it because you were so insistent, and Lennon talked me around to the idea. And as for him, yeah, I do want him. And I learned today he wants me too by the way he told you of his intentions to come here. But it’s different. What Lennon and I get from each other we can’t get from any woman. That part of our sexuality isn’t about not loving what we do with you either, so get that out of your head.”
“I guess I’ll never understand,” she said sounding defeated again.
“Like other women would never understand you wanting two guys at the same time, or anal sex, or whatever their limits are.”
“So, what happens now?”
“I guess this is all down to you, Coral. It’s your call. You either like me enough that I stick around while we work this thing out between us or you set Lennon free and see what he does, but I can tell you now he won’t be moving in with me. Like I said before, I want women as much as I want him.”
“And if you had Lennon and me. Would you want other women as well? Would Lennie?”
“Its early days to answer that question for sure, but if you’re open-minded enough to experiment you’d have my full attention. I’d expect us all to remain exclusive. If you, Lennon, and I decided to try and iron the kinks out of what’s going on, who knows? We may be deliriously happy together.”
Coral scrutinized me, her eyes narrowing as the cogs in her head helped to assimilate everything I had said. I sat in silence for a couple of minutes until she looked like she wasn’t sure what to say and I tried again to reach her.
“Let me ask you this. Why is it okay for you to expect Lennie to watch you being fucked by another man, to expect him to take part in double penetration with someone else for your pleasure, yet you seek to curb Lennie from getting what he needs from a sexual relationship? What’s restraining your mind from accepting that? Jealousy? What do you think is going to happen? Do you think he’d leave you—for me? I can tell you now Coral, neither Len, nor I, are gay. We’re not going to run off into the sunset together. But we do have feelings each of us wants to explore with one another.”
“I’m scared this is all so—”
“Different… it’s different to what you know. And we get that. Trust us and we’ll do you no wrong, Coral. I’ve seen how these relationships work. Trust is the most important factor and every one of us should have an equal part to play,” I replied with a level of confidence I felt about that.
The last thing I wanted was to undermine her and I knew she was already carrying some level of hurt because of Len’s doubts about himself and way he had continued to sleep with other women.
Coral stood up and wandered around for a couple of minutes deep in thought. She tugged at her bottom lip and wore a furrowed brow. Eventually she exhaled, shakily. “Alright, best we go find Lennon if we’re all gonna give this a shot,” she said.
Uncertainty marred her beautiful face, but my heartbeat leapt at her words because her approval was the first step toward what I felt could be something good. “That’s my girl,” I replied and wondered if that statement would still ring true after we gave our threesome a try.
Chapter Eighteen
Talking Straight
It was another three hours before we found Lennon, but the look of surprise on his face when he saw Coral and I together was worth all the traipsing around and waiting in the car while Jed trawled the clubs and bars following his trail to the last of Lou’s clubs. There was no way I was walking into any of those places because I knew dance venues full of horny women were the last place I’d get to sweep in and out of in a few minutes without being mobbed.
Thankfully, Jed was discreet and sent a cocktail waitress to the VIP section to lure Lennon away from the rest of his band then Jed told him I was waiting in the car outside for him. When he opened the SUV door and saw the both of us sitting there waiting, his eyes almost bugged out of his head.
Jed took us back to Len’s, and I asked him to leave and come back the following morning. I was grateful he never insisted on waiting and left as soon as we went inside.
“Thought you’d gone home,” Len said to Coral in a flat tone. It was the first words anyone other than me had said on the short ride over to his place from South Beach.
“I got as far as the airport then realized I couldn’t leave things as they were. And… I was insane with jealousy when you told me you were going over to Rick’s.”
Len looked from Coral to me, “How did you find her?”
“She found me. Turned up around 1am looking for you.”
Len looked at his watch and it was gone 4:15 am. “You went to his place? What did you guys do there?”
“If you’re asking if I fucked her, the answer is no.”
Len’s lips drew a firm line, and he shook his head. “I meant did you talk? Iron anything out between you.”
My suspicious mind had acted before I’d thought about what I’d said. I was so used to being accused of tapping women that I’d given him an automatic response. A silent staring competition ensued between Coral and I as I willed her to speak her mind. I could have simply relayed all that went on, but it was her story to tell.
Coral told Len why she hadn’t gone home and the conversation she’d had with me and while she wasn’t one hundred percent sold on how Lennon wanted to live his life, she accepted she’d been selfish in her thinking that she could have both of us while at the same time putting conditions on Len’s love life.
Len glanced at me and nodded his head then thanked me for explaining his position to his girl. Taking Coral’s hand, he led her to the sofa and sat down beside her. “I love you, Corrie. I don’t know how else to make you feel that. In the past eleven years I’ve never taken a girlfriend. I’ve tried to forget you and couldn’t. I’ve fucked other women during our times apart and wished every one of them could have been you… but I never tried to hide that and I told you to walk away if you couldn’t deal with it. However, the reason I wouldn’t commit was because of this,” he said gesturing toward me.
Nothing much surprised me after twenty years in the music business, but I was more than a little stunned when Coral never flinched when she heard him admit about the other women he’d been with. I guessed it was something she had come to accept.
“I’ve always known what we had was complicated, and I hated that you had those women. For the past eleven years my gut has churned every time you went out on stage because I wondered if that was the night you’d meet the girl who would stop you from coming back to me.”
Her words tugged at my heart and I figured for a second that Len was hardhearted for letting her go on like that for all those years. Lily had once asked me why there was no woman in my life and it occurred to me women like Coral were exactly why. There was no way I’d ever have left someone pining at home, being eaten up with worry about what I got up to in her absence. But Lennie had been completely honest about what he was doing.
“I’ve got something to say and when I�
��m done, you can say what you want. Lennie… I love you, dude. I’m not in love with you yet but I’m kinda infatuated with what could be happening here between all of us. Coral, I apologize on behalf of Lennon. He’s led you on for all these years and had I known about you I’d probably have whooped his ass for him treating you the way he has. He should have let you go and you should have moved on… but he didn’t and neither did you, and here we are.”
Len had the good grace to look embarrassed and bowed his head to the floor.
“Yeah, hang your head as well you may. You should be ashamed you didn’t have the balls to leave this sweet woman be.”
“I know,” Len replied, and I could see genuine remorse once I’d called him out. He was a truly tortured soul and he wouldn’t commit unless it was for life. In a weird way, I had to respect his position.
“Apologize to Coral and if you ever cheat on her from this day forth, I’ll kick your ass until it bleeds you hear me?”
Len pulled Coral onto his lap because sitting next to her was no longer appropriate for how I’d made him feel about her. The way he held her in his arms I could tell she was precious to him, but being precious wasn’t enough—she had to mean the world.
“Baby, I have always had a thing for you. If you hadn’t gone to Cali, we’d have probably shacked up together, but you went because you wanted to make your own way in the world and I had to stay back East and make mine without you. There have been plenty of times when we’ve tried to cut ties, and a few months later we’ve found ourselves back in bed fucking each other’s brains out.”
“It’s my fault too, Lennie. I gave you permission to do those other women. Sometimes when you tried to let me go, I talked us up like those girls were no big deal to me and made you think I was cool with it all.”
“I’ve never even asked if there were other men, Corrie. Truth is, if you’d said yes it would have eaten me alive.”
For almost two hours they talked as a couple and I listened, then we talked at length about what it would mean if we decided to get together. If I was being honest it was all a bit heavy for me, but I figured at my age it was time to decide what I wanted from life… and Lennie and Coral were the best bet I’d had in a very long time.
They made me feel things I couldn’t remember feeling before, and they made me understand how unhappy I’d been with Jody for a lot of the time I’d been seeing him. The thought struck me, none of the three of us were that different.
Waking to the sound of my cell as it played Highway to Hell much louder than I was used to, I stretched and groaned as smooth limbs tangled around mine and a heavy arm secured me tightly to a hard, masculine chest. I squinted at a crack in the drapes as a shard of light streaked through the room and stopped on the left cheek of Coral’s peachy ass.
Fumbling around in my jeans I swiped the screen, knowing already it was Jed who was calling, as it was my signature tune for him. “What?” I snapped.
“Ten after four, Boss. You have a 7pm at the Hyatt Regency for another interview before the big day tomorrow. I left you as long as I could.” I cut him off without a reply and untangled myself from the others. Coral never moved, and I reckoned after the way Len and I fucked her like some competition hungry tag team she’d be out for a few hours more.
However, as I went to leave the bed, Lennon grabbed me by my arm. “Oh, no you don’t. You’re not getting away that easily.”
“You’re right, I’m not. Get your ass out of bed, we got less than three hours until the press gig at the Hyatt Regency," I replied.
“Shit, Rick, I’ve got another hour or two in bed at least yet, the Hyatt’s only ten minutes up the road.” He made a leisurely stretching noise and snuggled up to Coral. A pang of jealousy shot through me for the first time since we’d made our pact because they were lying there together, and I had to leave because I had to go home, shower, and change.
Leaving them together gave me something else to think about on the way back to the penthouse. Exactly how this would work between us because Len’s place was in Florida whereas Coral and I were in California. What happened when I was on the road and Lennon was home or vice versa?
Not sure how he pulled it off, but Lennie was at the Hyatt before me. When I walked into the lounge where Gibson, Alfie, Lily, Lennon, and their PAs were sitting, my eyes instantly sought out Len. My heart skipped a beat when I saw him staring back like he wanted to devour me, and his feet had already begun to move in my direction.
We’d only left each other a couple of hours before but I’d missed him dreadfully. I stopped to wonder for a moment whether everything that had happened with him and Coral was rebound for me, then quickly dismissed the thought because the feelings going on inside me were greater than those I’d felt with Jody.
Perhaps that was because Len wanted what I had always wanted and that was not to hide how we felt about each other. But these were our colleagues, and I needed a little more time to get used to the idea that this was really happening between Lennie and me… and Coral for that matter. It was hardly the time for new revelations about our love life, plus we had a big ass job to pull off without the need for distractions.
No one in the room knew anything about us so we behaved as we normally did and stepped in for a hug. Len’s hips tilted forward to brush his hard-on across mine. I was sporting a semi myself and naturally leaned toward him as well. He mumbled in my ear so as only I could hear.
“You look and smell good enough to eat.” I wrapped my arms tighter around him and squeezed him a little.
“All right, when you two have finished dry humping each other we’ve got some stuff to run through before we face the press,” Gibson bellowed and instead of separating I clung to Lennie and looked over his shoulder.
“Is that a tad of jealousy I detect in your voice?” I asked Gibson, playfully.
“Nah, pussy is more my flavor, but whatever floats your boats, guys. Come on, we’ve got to get through this,” he replied with a straight face, waving a few sheets of A4 in my direction. Lennon and I glanced at each other and separated. It felt incredible that neither of us showed any embarrassment about being together. Not that anyone else noticed because we were just two old friends hugging to them.
Alfie and Gibson bantered back and forth about a few other bands and their individual quirks which made us laugh then Gibson cleared his throat.
“Right, guys, here’s the deal. Tell me if I’ve missed anything. He began to run down the list of all the bands, the catering, and event products available to purchase.
Coral had designed a logo for the event when she and Lily had their brief meeting, and the PR people had used it in the production of all the exclusive merchandise available for the gigs. They had even persuaded some fast food outlets to add it to their soda cups as extra advertising for the event, but the thing that surprised me the most was when he told us we’d already secured almost $30million dollars in TV rights deals from media companies around the world.
Alfie had another idea which everyone was on board with and that was an open mic stage for some of the bands around the state which could use a little love. Lily and Len were delighted by the idea as it was during a festival that XrAid found fame.
With twenty-one bands performing on the main stage, it was agreed if local acts signed up for a spot they could showcase themselves to more than a handful of people. Details were quickly hashed out and state-wide radio and TV stations were informed to announce the extra information.
An hour later, we faced the press again confident we’d dotted all the I’s and crossed the T’s. The buzz around the event was everything I’d hoped for and we still had artists calling us, offering donations themselves to be part of the action. Everyone took their seats in the same place as before but instead of Cody next to Alfie, Lennon sat on the end next to me.
It felt great to be shoulder-to-shoulder with him in front of the world, even if they had no idea what we were to each other. A few times Len paid a compliment about the b
ands that were involved and was extremely complimentary toward my band, Cobham Street. When he spoke about how talented he thought I was I felt oddly pleased.
It was a weird moment because compliments were ten-a-penny in my line of work, but this meant something different to me, coming from him. It wasn’t just that but the way he said it, the sincere look he gave me in front of everyone and his hand slipped to touch my thigh under the tablecloth.
The intimacy between us, in that room packed with people and right under the noses of all of our friends felt electric. He smiled warmly, and I felt breathless as my heart swelled and pounded in my chest, and for a second I had wanted to kiss him.
The whole exchange only lasted a second or two, but time appeared to stand still as we exchanged glances and held our own small silent conversation before the next question was directed at me and we moved right along with the rest of the interview.
Chapter Nineteen
Not What You Think
Lily slipped her arm into mine as we left the hotel afterward, “Earth to Rick,” she said in her sweet little English accent.
“Yeah?” I replied as she dragged me away from my thoughts, but my eyes continued to follow Lennie who was deep in conversation with Gibson and Alfie.
“Are you okay? You’re really distracted this morning. How much weed have you smoked?”
I chuckled and looked down into her huge bright eyes, “What the fuck, Lily? How to give a guy a compliment, huh? And for your info I haven’t smoked that shit in months… been on a health kick.”
Lily burst out laughing, “Rick, a health kick to you is only having twelve shots a night and two women as opposed to twenty shots and your own harem. I could have sworn you’d been smoking before you got here this morning because you’re acting that dreamy weird way, like you're preoccupied. You always do that on weed.” she replied.
Exhale and Move On Page 16
