A Door to Midnight

by Renee George

  “You mean we could be in Italy right now?”

  “We’re in Vermont.” Ky laughed, and his face looked almost boyish. “But yes, it could very well be Italy on any given day. These private gardens are the finest in the world. Each unique and charming. It is a guilty pleasure. These gardens remind me…well, him of a time when he saw the world differently.”

  “Differently?”

  Ky’s good eye seemed to darken. “I’ve said too much. Our time in the garden is short. Let’s talk of more pleasant things.” He offered Emily his arm, and surprised by the gesture, she took it.

  It still astonished her how firm his muscles were under his baggy clothes. It reminded her that she had more questions. She stopped after a few yards of walking, and Ky turned to face her. His height made her crane her neck to stare up at him. There was something about the scars when she looked at them. They almost seemed to move. She couldn’t fix their likeness in her mind, because, like the garden and the mansion, the scars seemed to shift and change moment to moment.

  Impulsively, she reached up. Ky flinched as if her fingertips burned, but he didn’t move away.

  “What happened to you?”

  He placed his hand over hers, pressing her palm against his rough cheek. “I have little value in this great divide.”

  “That’s not true,” she disagreed though in reality she had no idea what he was talking about. “I think you have a lot of value.” Impulsively, she went up on her toes and kissed his cheek.

  He blinked, startled by the gesture.

  No more surprised than she was, Emily thought.

  “You’re sweet, Emily.” He pulled away from her, and reluctantly, she let him. “You say that because you are kind, but I think if you look deep enough, you understand that women, in general, want empathy, gentleness, and kindness, the traits to do what is right, even in the face of adversity. Or so they believe until the opposite is presented to them. You may admire my qualities, but it is Zan you want in your bed.”

  “No,” Emily protested.

  Ky shook his head. “It’s okay to desire him. He is the razor’s edge. He is abandon. His makes you feel alive. It is the reason he is always chosen.”

  “But I chose you,” she reminded him. “When Marcus asked, I picked you as my companion.”

  “I fear you only made that choice to avoid Zan.”

  Anger sparked in Emily. “Ky! I like exactly who you are. Zan is not better than you.”

  He looked utterly amazed.

  She took his arm and patted his sleeve. “No more pity parties,” she fussed. “Tell me about the flowers.”

  * * * *

  When Zan opened the door, the next room he entered was the royal chamber at Caledon, his people’s royal palace…of sorts. On the outside, it looked like an ordinary farmhouse, and it was Marcus Tsavaras’s job to make sure it stayed hidden from the world. He wore his hair pulled back tight and presented himself as the public face of Marcus Tsavaras, a cut-throat businessman and master of doors. This was his sixth day to meet with the queen and her husbands, trying to nail down a new location for Caledon. Keeping the doors open during transport so the people of Caledon could move about the kingdom took all his effort. He was only able to make one large move daily, and the queen, Benoica Dilian, hadn’t been happy with any place they’d landed yet. Too cold. Too hot. Too boring. Too dangerous.

  He sighed.

  Still, with all her demands, she was a better ruler than her father. She had made enemies of some other worlders who had been loyal to Garrick in the fight for Caledon, but she’d won the loyalty of most her people, including Marcus.

  What made his time with the queen and her husbands so awful was that he could hear every conversation his alter had with Emily. Feel every time she was close. The arousal he experienced, his strong desire for her, made talking to the queen an uncomfortable prospect at times. His hand went to his face, surprised when she touched the scar, and even more surprised when he felt her cool lips on his cheek. He could feel the tremble in her fingers as she held Ky gaze. She wasn’t repulsed by him, of that Zan was certain, but could she love him?

  “Hey, magic man,” Benoica Dilian said. “Where’d you disappear to?”

  Her husband Trace Calder gave him a quizzical look but didn’t say anything. He wondered if the rumors that Calder’s telepathic ability worked both ways were true.

  Trace smiled. “It can.”

  Zan shut down his thoughts of Emily immediately. His emotions about her were his own, and not for public consumption.

  Benoica gave Zan a steady look. “It’s unnerving, huh?”

  “Yes.”

  She put her hands on her hips, her sage green eyes daring him to challenge her. “Sorry, dude. No one is allowed in our space,” she clarified, “without being scanned by my husband. When it comes to the security of our children, there is no such thing as too paranoid. We had an attempted breach of Caledon by that group of whackos at the last location, so I can’t afford to blindly trust anyone. I promise, as long as what you think has nothing to do with the overthrow of the government, Trace will keep it to himself. All your private thoughts and emotions are safe unless they put me and mine in harm’s way.” She walked to Calder took his hand. They entwined fingers. She studied his expression and frowned. “You can always leave the protection of Caledon if you don’t like the rules.”

  Then who would move your precious kingdom from one end of the earth to the next, he wanted to snap. Instead, he said, “Yes, my queen.” The asshole he mentally added for Trace Calder alone.

  The man didn’t react—not even a facial tick.

  Zan shook his head, wishing he was home with Emily and not here. He closed his eyes and focused all his energy until the world shifted.

  “That is always so freaky,” Benoica said. She walked briskly to the window and grinned. “This is it!”

  Trace Calder wrapped his arms around her from behind. “It’s beautiful, Tsavaras.”

  He knew they saw a breathtaking view of the blue ocean, clear skies, and tropical vegetation. “It’s a private island just off the Florida Keys.” He wondered if Emily would find pleasure in the lush scenery.

  A tall, lanky man with short, messy brown hair strolled into the room. He walked to the window and placed his arms around Benoica and Trace. Her other husband, Doctor Ian Arent, was a research biologist and wolf shifter. Zan’s lip curled. Their happiness made his stomach turn. He’d never know what it was like to feel so much love and trust for another human being, and it made him sick with envy to watch the three of them.

  “Rad choice, Tsavaras,” Arent said.

  “Can we stay for a while?” the queen asked them both.

  “Sure, Benie,” Calder said.

  Ian Arent laughed. “At least until hurricane season, then we head back to the Midwest.”

  “Deal!” The queen clapped her hands, and Zan could see the knives strapped to her sides. It reminded him she was a skilled warrior, not just a figurehead in their world. She’d fought her father to the death, and in this act, earned her throne.

  When the three monarchs stood together at the window, Zan didn’t bother taking his leave. He backed up to the door, opened it to his office at his own home, and walked through to the other side, closing Caledon off behind him. At least he wouldn’t have to deal with the royal pains for a couple of months, and now he could finally focus his full attention on Emily. He was curious to see if he could seduce her. He’d promised the first night that she was safe from him unless she invited him to her bed. Would he get that invitation tonight?

  * * * *

  Emily tossed and turned. The bed was too soft tonight, but she knew, soft or hard wasn’t the problem. She’d eaten with Marcus in the evening for the first time in a week, and she couldn’t stop thinking about him, about Ky, or about Zan. They all had the same characteristic gold eyes, the same beautiful chocolate brown curls, and the same cadence to their speech. And each one of them drew her in their own way. W
hy hadn’t she ever seen Zan or Ky with Marcus? It was as if the three of them couldn’t exist in the same room. She was beginning to suspect there was more to their relationship than just close kinship.

  When Ky had said “me” when he’d talked about Marcus, Emily wondered if it had been an honest mistake or a slip of the tongue. She couldn’t keep the niggling suspicions from her mind. The truth was a mystery to be solved, so when the knock came at the door at 2:00 a.m., against her better judgment, Emily answered.

  Chapter 6

  Zan’s large frame filled the doorway. His hair cascaded over his shoulders. His shirt was open to display his wide and muscled chest, his carved abs, and a dark trail of hair just under his belly button. The wispy dark path disappeared under the waistband of his black slacks. Emily gasped as a flush of pleasure washed over her.

  Zan’s knowing smile angered her, and that helped her to focus.

  “Does Marcus need me?”

  He tilted his head to the left. “More than you can know.”

  Why did Zan always have to talk in circles? His cryptic answers made her head hurt. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “May I come in, Emily?”

  No! Yes. No! Out loud, she said nothing.

  Zan raised a brow.

  Her breathing quickened with her heartbeat. “What do you expect from me?”

  He stroked his fingertips along the side of her face. “You ask the wrong question.”

  Emily closed her eyes and leaned her face into his caress. Her voice was breathy. “What do you want from me?”

  “I want to hold you in my arms, to kiss your ripe lips, and to taste your tender mercies as our bodies join until we both forget where I begin and you end.”

  His words held her mesmerized with their dark promise of pleasure and belonging.

  Emily wanted to strip out of her nightgown, straddle Zan’s waist, and scream, “Let the joining begin!” But how could she give herself to a man she didn’t trust? A man she hardly liked. Sure he was fantastic to look at, but Zan had very few other redeeming qualities. Unless what she suspected was true.

  “And what of Ky? Of Marcus?”

  Zan gazed down at her. The weight of his stare made Emily’s knees wobble.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Where is Ky?” she asked.

  A moment later, Ky stood behind him in the doorway. “I am here.”

  “And Marcus?” Emily said.

  “We are he,” Zan and Ky said simultaneously.

  “You are both him.” She couldn’t keep the awe out of her voice as she reached up and placed her hand on Ky’s face. Zan put his hand over the same area of his own face and closed his eyes for a second.

  “Can you feel this?” she asked.

  “Yes,” said Zan.

  Ky smiled. “Yes.”

  “How is this possible?”

  “It’s a large world, Emily, full of the strange and wondrous. I am only a small anomaly.”

  “And I want you,” Zan said.

  “Will you have me?” Ky asked.

  Emily felt the overwhelming urge to hide. Two men wanted to make love to her, but they weren’t really two men at all. As Zan had said the first night she arrived, they were two halves of the same coin. Did they really turn into Marcus? Did they truly become her two-headed host?

  Ky took Zan’s hand and their flesh began to meld into one as their bones shifted under the skin as golden fur sprouted on the back of the newly formed singled hand. When her eyes grew wide, they stopped the melding shift.

  “You really are Marcus.”

  “Yes,” they both said.

  “Do you want me?” Zan said.

  She startled at his sculpted face. His beauty brought tears to her eyes. “Yes.”

  “Truly?” Ky asked, reminding her there was another side to him.

  She no longer found herself frightened by the scars. At that moment, she’d realized she stopped seeing him as the unattractive twin days earlier. In many ways, Ky was as good-looking as Zan, even more so because of the beauty of his personality. Emily placed her hands on both sides of his face and raised up to kiss him on the lips. “Yes.”

  “My soul’s possession,” they both said. “Invite me in.”

  “I’m afraid,” she said. She’d never been with a man, and now she had two of them at her door, and while they were the same man in their thoughts, it didn’t change the fact there were two penises between them.

  “Don’t be afraid, Emily. Tonight I’ll take my satisfaction from your pleasure alone,” Zan said.

  “The taste of you on my lips will be enough for now,” Ky said. “I just want to hold you in my arms.”

  Emily stepped back to make room for them inside the door. “I want that too.”

  Ky strode to her with more confidence than she’d seen in him since her arrival. He scooped her up in his arms. Emily squealed with delight, and behind Ky, she saw Zan smile. It was the first genuine smile she’d seen from him.

  Ky placed her in the middle of the huge bed. Zan waited for Ky to stand next to him before he began to take off his clothes. Zan’s pants hit the floor almost as quickly as his shirt. His erection jutted from his groin—long, thick, and hard. Emily gulped at his size. She spotted a shiny gleam from the tip and licked her lips. She turned her attention to Ky, who was still covered from neck to toe.

  “Can I see your body?” she asked him.

  Ky nodded, his expression solemn. When he took off his shirt, he bore scars down his chest that mirrored the scars on his face.

  “I repulse you,” Ky said, raising the shirt back to his chest.

  Emily shook her head. “No,” she told him. “No.” She rose to her knees and crawled toward him. When he was close enough to touch, she took the shirt from his hands. She traced the scars with her fingertips, splaying her hands to touch as much of Ky as possible. The pattern of the scars wasn’t random. On the contrary, the marks were like a fine lattice of geometric designs, much like what she’s seen in many of the carved wooden doors. “You’re magnificent.”

  Ky shifted his feet and stood straighter, his shoulders rising as her touch became bolder.

  Zan got in the bed and positioned himself behind Emily. She could feel his length press into the small of her back. Her sex throbbed and moisture gathered between her thighs. He reached around her waist and cupped her breast with one hand, his other slipping between her legs. She leaned back against him and moaned.

  Ky knelt on the bed in front of Emily. He took the hem of her nightshirt and began to lift.

  Reflexively, she reached down and stopped him. “I’m not—” How could she tell him she was afraid he’d be turned off when he saw her without clothes on? She had the kind of body that looked good in the right clothes, but without clothes…

  Zan’s hot breath brushed her neck. “There is nothing about you that could make me want you less, Emily? I find the curves of your buttocks, your hips, and your breasts very appealing.” The low dulcimer tones of his declaration warmed her skin as her core throbbed with need.

  She looked up into Ky’s face, slowly letting go of his hands, and nodded. He smiled, dipping his head for a kiss. His mouth tasted of cinnamon and honey as he delved his tongue past her lips. Emily opened for him, welcoming his invasion. She rose to her knees and felt Zan’s hands slip under her gown and roam her naked body. A soft moan escaped her. She could feel Ky’s smile against her mouth as he feasted on her in a kiss that grew from gentle to ravishing. Soon, she had four confident hands stroking and kneading her back, her breasts, her bottom, and the pulsing bud between her thighs.

  Zan used lips and tongue and teeth to tease the back of her neck, and Emily could feel the rising edge of ecstasy in the heated pressure building in her lower body. “Oh God,” she murmured against Ky’s fevered kisses.

  Zan tilted her head back, tearing her from Ky and capturing her mouth with his own, leaving his other half to kiss down the front of her neck. Zan lifted her breast for Ky
, and she shuddered when she felt his lips, wet from kissing her, latch around her nipple. She arched, begging him for more. The wetness between her thighs saturated her panties. One of them slid his fingers under the waistband and they both moaned. “So wet,” she heard them say simultaneously.

  Her breath came fast and unevenly. “Can you really both feel the same things?” she asked.

  “Yes,” they both said. Ky put his fingers, glistening with her juices, to his lips and licked them clean. Zan hummed his delight.

  “You taste delicious,” Zan said. “Better than I dreamed.”

  “Which is saying a lot,” Ky agreed. “I’ve dreamed of you often.”

  Zan had already drawn her shirt over her breasts, so she raised her arms to allow him to take it all the way off. She leaned against him when he pulled her back to his chest, and she raised her hips so Ky could pull her panties down her thighs.

  As the cool air in the room blew across her naked skin, Emily felt suddenly self-conscious. Surely Marcus or Zan or Ky or whatever he chose to be called had been with many women. Many women more beautiful than her. How could they consider her special?

  At her hesitation, Ky said, “You are a diamond in a world full of glass.”

  Zan kissed her ear as his fingers rubbed over her sensitive clit. “You are more precious to me than anyone I’ve ever met.”

  Ky spread her legs, his fingers joining with Zan’s at her swollen sex. When his head dipped low and she felt his tongue swipe across her sensitive bud, she rolled her hips forward and a mewling sound poured from her lips. She’d never had anything like the velvet of his tongue touch her so intimately.

  “So sweet,” Zan said. He kissed her again, his tongue twining with hers, and she swore she could taste herself in his mouth. When Ky sucked her clit into his mouth, she cried out. Her hips bucked as she rode the climax. Zan held her tight, swallowing her moans while Ky continued his ministrations until she couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe.

  “Enough,” she begged.

  “It will never be enough,” Ky said as he raised his head from between her thighs. “Never enough,” they both agreed.