by Lynn Tyler
Heart beating thickly, as if it had to fight the tightness in her chest just to function, she smiled thinly at the next patron waiting to check out her books. “You all right?” Marla whispered from behind her.
“Yeah,” she whispered back after the patron had left, “just missing the guys.”
“Ooohhh, missing the guys, eh?” Marla squealed quietly. “So things are going well with them?”
Lindsay nodded, her blood heating and pounding through her with her joy. Oh yes, things were going well. The nightly phone conversations she had with them, the daily e-mails and hourly texts had been both flirty and serious. They valued her ideas and opinions, actively seeking them out. Each had told her how much they missed her, how much they wished they could hold her while she slept.
“Lindsay?” Her boss hovered in the doorway of her office, a funny expression on her face. “Can you come in here for a minute?”
“Yeah, of course.” Lindsay sent a glance at Marla and walked into the office. “What can I do for you, April?” she asked her boss.
“Um, I’m not quite sure how to tell you this…”
Lindsay’s stomach jumped into her throat. This was it. Somehow, someone had found out about her budding relationship with two men and April was about to invent a reason to fire her. “Just say it,” she said with a sharp edge to her voice.
“Well…jeez, this is hard to say. I got a phone call just a minute ago. You are your father’s next of kin, right?”
An immense feeling of relief that she wasn’t about to get fired was immediately swamped by dread. She hadn’t spoken with her father in years. She had tried at first, going back for holidays and phoning weekly. But it was always the same thing. Your mother’s a bitch. I’m better off without your mother. I wish I’d never met her. And when he wasn’t raging about her mother, he was lamenting about how saintly she was and how the town had destroyed his life. It never mattered what Lindsay accomplished or what she’d achieved, he had never cared. He had hardly even realized she was home and she doubted he had ever realized that she had left permanently. “I guess,” she said slowly. “Why?”
“I’m so sorry to tell you this, but I got a call from the hospital in your hometown. Your father had a heart attack last night. He didn’t make it. Lindsay, take all the time you need to make the arrangements and see to his estate. If there is anything, anything at all we can do, please ask.”
Lindsay sat quietly, stunned into silence. What was she supposed to do now?
“Lindsay?” Marla asked quietly. “Are you going to be okay?”
She hadn’t even heard April leave. She stared up at Marla, feeling strangely hollow. “I haven’t seen my father in years.” She gulped and swallowed her tears. “I knew I probably wouldn’t ever see him again, but I guess I never realized that the next time I went home would be for his funeral.”
“Lindsay, honey, let me take you home.”
Marla bundled her into her coat and ushered her out the door. The next thing Lindsay knew, she was at her apartment and Marla had Lindsay’s address book out and was speaking to someone on her cell phone.
Lindsay hung up her coat automatically, functioning on autopilot. She crossed the room to the couch and sat down with a thump. Glancing down at the lumpy cushion, she smoothed her hand over the brown fabric. Nick had slept here, she thought inanely. Nick. And she’d spoken on the phone with Liam while sitting right here. She shook her head at Marla’s offer to get her a drink of water. All she wanted to do right now was bury herself in their bed and let them hold her. Maybe if they held onto her long enough, the pain would fade.
She didn’t know how long she sat there, caressing the spot where she imagined Nick had laid his head. It seemed like hours had passed, but the sun was still bright in the sky when the intercom beeped. Marla answered it, and within minutes, Lindsay was surrounded by the very thing she wanted most. “Thanks, Marla,” Nick was saying as Liam lifted her into his lap. “It’s too bad we had to meet this way. We’ll take care of her from here.”
Concentrating on the long forgotten French phrases being murmured in her ear, Lindsay only vaguely heard Marla saying good-bye. “I only took French until the tenth grade. I don’t understand what you’re saying,” she said stupidly.
“It’s all right, chérie. I speak English very well, don’t I?”
Not knowing what else to say, Lindsay laid her head on Liam’s shoulder and let him pet her gently. The tears she knew she should be shedding would just not come. She just felt a numbed out pain and a weird sense of disassociation. She heard Nick making arrangements on the phone and Liam speaking to his superiors about a death and needing to be away for a while. She just couldn’t make herself care.
“Kitten?” Nick appeared before her, smoothing her hair back from her brow. “I have a trial starting tomorrow that I can’t get out of, but Liam is going to go home with you, okay?”
“Why?” she asked, completely confused. They had only been seeing each other for a couple of weeks. Why would they want to get sucked into all her drama? And did she really want Liam there to see her when she faced the people who had humiliated her?
“Fuck,” Liam swore. She could tell by his voice that her question had upset him, but she couldn’t fathom why. “Lindsay. Do you remember what I said to you the night you and Marla went out?”
“The night I got drunk and cried on the phone? You said you loved me.” She searched her cloudy mind for a clearer memory of that night. “I was pretty sure you were just saying that to calm me down. I’m sorry about that, by the way.”
Liam cursed viciously, set her on the couch, and strode to the window, practically vibrating with anger and something else. Hurt? What had she said that would cause such a reaction? “Liam?”
Nick took Liam’s place and picked up her hand, though his eyes never left his partner’s back. “Give him a minute, kitten.” He sighed and turned her hand over so that he could lace his fingers through his. “You have to understand something. We always say what we mean. If Liam told you he loves you, he means it. He’s probably frustrated and hurt that you don’t believe he loves you. And not to complicate things, but I want you to know that I’m in love with you, too.”
Lindsay pulled her hand back and rubbed at her throbbing forehead. God, she was confused. They loved her. After only a few weeks, they loved her. Did she love them? She thought she did. But did she trust them? If she gave them her heart, could she trust them to be there for her? They certainly seemed sincere. Maybe they even loved her enough to weather the storm of gossip their ménage relationship was sure to bring. Maybe they would stay with her. But then, the one person who should have loved her the most, her mother, had abandoned her. “I have a headache. I think I need to lie down.”
Her emotions were swirling around in her head, a dense soup of love for her two men, confusion, fear, and panic. Before she knew what was happening, she had been lifted off her feet by a strong pair of arms and carried into the bedroom. Nick skimmed off her clothes and tucked her under the sheets.
The shaking started as Nick left the room without another word. This was it. They weren’t even going to wait for the gossip to ruin their lives. One word they didn’t like, one idea that they didn’t agree with, and they were out the door. God, she was such an idiot. She’d lost her heart to them, and now she was faced with the prospect of living without them.
She huddled into herself, not having any idea of how much time had passed, until her door opened. “Chérie? I have some aspirin for you. Can I get you anything else?”
Heart breaking, Lindsay shook her head. “Just close the door on the way out,” she whispered. “I’ll be all right.”
An awkward pause was her clue that something wasn’t quite right. She reluctantly turned her head and squinted at him, her head pounding. “Nick is arranging for a hotel room for us. He’s also called the funeral home and made an appointment for us to meet them tomorrow afternoon. I’m going home to pack for a few days. I’ll be back as
She accepted the water and pills without complaint. Curling up into a ball, she turned her back on him, unable to look into his face because of her swirling emotions. Did they really love her? And if they did, would they stay with her no matter what happened? Sure, they said and did all the right things now, but so had her mom. Even her dad had tried for a while, until he finally succumbed to his depression and left her to raise herself.
A gentle kiss landed on her shoulder, Liam’s warm breath stirring the hair on the back of her neck. She heard him sigh and walk out of the room. Low voices murmured from the kitchen, and the door closed.
No matter how she tried, Lindsay couldn’t sleep. She stared at the wall in her bedroom for hours until her bladder forced her to get up and head for the bathroom. When she came back out, a steaming bowl of soup and a small pile of crackers sat on the kitchen table. “Sit down, kitten. Liam made the soup before he left.”
Her head had finally cleared, if not her confusing feelings. The scent of the soup wafted across the kitchen and was too tempting to refuse. “I didn’t know I had the stuff to make soup.”
“You didn’t really. Liam’s good at improvising.” Nick sat across from her silently, watching her sip at the soup. She knew something was brewing in his mind, and it wasn’t long before he plunged in.
“Lindsay, why is it so hard for you to believe that we love you?” he asked quietly, no anger or frustration in voice, only curiosity.
Lindsay put down her spoon. “We’ve only known each other for a few weeks. How do you know it’s real?”
Nick shrugged and looked at her pensively. “Just because we fell in love with you quickly doesn’t negate the emotion. I fell in love with Liam after only a couple of weeks, too, and we’ve been together for five years. Has it always been easy? No. But we love each other enough to work it out. We love you enough to work it out with you, too.”
Lindsay shook her head and stared into her delicious soup, her appetite disappearing when her stomach began to squirm uncomfortably. God, he made it sound so easy. “What happens when people find out about our relationship? What will you do when judges let our lifestyle influence their decisions rather than letting the evidence speak for itself? And don’t tell me that doesn’t happen because we both know it does.”
A bittersweet laugh drew her eye to Nick’s face. “Do you really think we haven’t already dealt with that? Lindsay, we live in an enlightened society, for the most part. But let me tell you, Liam and I have had run-ins with gay bashers galore. But I’m a good lawyer, and that’s all that matters. People don’t care about my sexual orientation if I win. And Liam’s a good firefighter. Do you think the guys care that he’s gay when he is putting his ass on the line for them every fucking day?”
“A ménage relationship is different than a same sex one, Nick.”
Nick’s lips flattened, and Lindsay could see the frustration glittering in his eyes. “How is it different?”
Lindsay struggled to put her feelings to words and finally gave up. “I don’t know how to explain it,” she said with her own frustration.
“Fuck, Lindsay. You can’t explain it because you don’t believe it. Damn it, Linds, just because you don’t know if you can deal with a ménage relationship, don’t underestimate Liam’s or my ability to do so,” Nick growled.
Lindsay stared at Nick’s face, contorted with anger and irritation. “I think you should leave,” she said quietly, terrified he would take her at her word and walk out the door.
“Like hell I should. You’re running scared, Lindsay, and I want to know why. If you don’t think you can love me, then tell me, but don’t shut me out. And I’m not leaving. Not unless you are ashamed of us and what we can have. That, I can’t deal with. I won’t let Liam suffer from heartbreak either.”
God, he was right. She was running scared. Scared of the gossip that would drive them away. Scared of what would happen to her if they did leave. But ashamed of them? No way in hell could she ever be ashamed of them.
Before she could say anything, Nick spoke again. “Fucking hell, Lindsay. Just go pack a duffle with what you need for a few days. Liam will be back soon, and he’ll want to leave right away to beat traffic.”
Lindsay obeyed automatically, walking into her bedroom and yanking out a small suitcase from her closet. She shoved it full of clothes, so distracted by her thoughts that she didn’t even see what she was packing. Liam walked back in twenty minutes later and carried her suitcase out to the car. She stared at Nick’s beautiful face, into his dark, almond-shaped eyes, totally at a loss for something to say.
Nick led her to the elevator, steering her into it when she paused. Her nose itched from trying to hold back the tears that threatened to spill over. “God, kitten. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have dumped all that on you today. It’s been a hard enough day for you as it is.” He jerked her into his arms, surrounding her in warm strength.
She struggled to rein in her emotions as she clung to him, burying her face in his muscular chest. The elevator doors opened far too soon, and he escorted her to where Liam was waiting next to the car. Nick kissed her on the forehead and bundled her into the car. She gazed at the two men saying good-bye, remembering the conversation she had when she had first laid eyes on the two of them. She was living her fantasy now. Two men were hers for the taking, if she could only gather the courage to seize what she wanted.
Liam was nodding solemnly, his hand creeping up to stroke Nick’s forearm. He said something that caused Nick’s face to soften into an expression of utter adoration. When the two men kissed, Lindsay could feel the love rolling off them in waves and sighed. She wanted in on that. And they were willing to let her in. Did she have it in her to trust them with her heart?
Chapter 10
Lindsay had never been so grateful for anything in her life as she was for Liam’s presence. Liam handled most of the funeral details after running them past her. And when an offer on her father’s estate came in, he faxed all the paperwork to Nick, who had a colleague read it through and pronounce it fair.
Now, as she stood in front of her father’s casket, she was even more grateful for the big man standing at her side and the knowledge that another was waiting for them at home. The knowledge that there were two men who were ready to stand by her warmed her incredibly. They were starting to break through her walls, and for the first time, she wondered if those walls were really necessary. Liam’s warm breath brushed over her ear as he leaned down to speak to her. “You doing all right, chérie?”
Lindsay nodded and wrapped her arm around Liam’s waist, leaning her head against his upper arm. She actually felt a little guilty. She was standing in front of the body of a man whom she hadn’t seen in years but who should, by all rights, have the respect of her grief, at least. All she really felt was a deep sense of pity for him. Overwhelming all other emotions was one of joy and hope. “Let’s go back to the house, have the wake, and go home.”
She walked out without a backward glance. This would be the last time she came back. Liam had arranged for a team of professionals to come into her father’s house to organize and clear out years of junk. What couldn’t be donated would be trashed. She had made arrangements for a plot in the nearby cemetery, with interment to happen as soon as the ground thawed. Now all she had to do was put up with a houseful of people she didn’t like, accept their false sympathies, and then she could go home and get on with her life.
Liam had arranged for food and drink to be brought in from the local grocery store and immediately set about unwrapping the trays and setting them on the table, even though she had adamantly refused to feed the vultures. She took a tray of sandwiches from his hands and placed them on the pine surface. “Thank you,” she said softly.
Liam shrugged in a distinctly French manner. “It’s only sandwiches, chérie. Poor ones at that. I could certainly do a better job than these excuses for food.”
Laughing, she nudged his arm lightly. “Not for the sandwiches, although I agree that you could do a far better job. Thanks for taking care of things for me these past few days.”
Liam sobered and pulled her against him so that they touched from her shoulders to her hips. Resting his chin on the top of her head, he sighed. “I will always take care of you, Lindsay, even though you don’t need me to. And I know it’s the same with Nick.”
The people around them were forgotten as she leaned into him. “Thanks, Liam. I can’t wait to get home.”
“Yeah, I bet Nicky is getting lonely without us.” He nuzzled into her hair and tightened his grip on her. “And I can’t wait to get you back between me and Nick, right where you belong.”
A sudden silence settled over the crowd of people, thick and heavy. Lindsay raised her head and looked over her shoulder. She felt the blood drain from her face, and if Liam hadn’t been holding her up, she would have slid to the floor. Her mother stood awkwardly in the doorway, the weak winter sun framing her delicate form.
* * * *
Liam felt his smile fade as all the muscles in Lindsay’s body went slack. What the hell? She looked as if she’d seen a ghost. “What’s the matter, chérie? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I think I just have,” she said faintly. “That’s my mother.”
“You’ve never mentioned your mother before,” he said cautiously. And now that he thought about it, it was very strange that she’d never said anything about her mother before. Granted, they had spent the majority of their time making out like teenagers, but they had talked, too. Confusion and a strange sense of foreboding swept through him.
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