Forbidden Attraction [The Callens 5] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

by Melody Snow Monroe

  “I would like that, but at the moment, I need money to live.” He cocked a brow. “My folks only pay for my education. I’m trying to get into med school, but I do need to eat, and I won’t want to live at home until I’m thirty.”

  His lips pressed together. “I wish I could help you. I trust neither Taylor or Jackson have any suggestions.”

  “We aren’t together anymore.”

  He nodded, acting as if he knew the whole story. “Let me tell you about myself.”

  She wasn’t sure she needed to hear his memoir, but she didn’t want to be rude. “Sure.”

  “I don’t think the fact I was born prematurely had much to do with anything, but at two pounds at birth, I was a handful. Not only did I have to stay in the neo-natal extensive care for weeks, but the cost nearly killed my mom. I’m sure some of my learning disabilities came from that. Short story, when I was seven, my mom died of cancer. My dad had to work two jobs to support us. He was a laborer and ended up in trouble. When I was thirteen, he was arrested. He still has ten years to go before he’ll be released.”

  She couldn’t believe this man ended up a stockbroker. “Go on.”

  “Because of my disabilities, my reading sucked. I did poorly in school. I was in foster care from fourteen to eighteen.” He ran a hand through his neatly cut hair, and that messed it up a bit. “Once I left the system, I couldn’t get a good job. Figuring I needed more education, I got a tutor at the Y and learned to read well. That skill allowed me to get a two-year junior-college degree. I realized that was quite good at math and business. From there I got a job at an investment firm.”

  “Wow. That’s impressive.”

  He learned forward. “I didn’t tell you that because I want you to feel sorry for me. I’m telling you because I am now rich, and I don’t have a four-year degree.”

  Her face heated up. Did the world know about her hang-ups? She felt about one foot tall. “Thanks for telling me.” She stood. “If I can’t find a job, I’ll be sure to volunteer.” She shook his hand and raced out, embarrassed at her shallowness.

  Not wanting to go home, she drove to the Eatery for a rich cup of coffee. She needed something soothing, like a chocolate chip cookie. Here she thought she had her whole life figured out, and at one dinner, her life seemed to collapse. She always knew she wanted to be a doctor. She thought she’d marry a surgeon or maybe the CEO of some big corporation. But she fell in love with two men who worked hard for a living.

  She took a big bite out of the cookie, and the sugar actually calmed her nerves. She looked around, but she fortunately didn’t recognize anyone. She needed time and space to figure things out. The one thing she realized was that she’d been a fool.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “What else did she say?” Jackson wanted to pry the information out of Tara, but apparently she didn’t know more than what she’d been told.

  “Nothing. I swear. As soon as she delivered the message, she hung up.”

  He’d tried Jenny’s phone for two days and hadn’t been able to get a hold of her. He and Taylor had wanted to rush over to her and explain that they hadn’t been trying to deceive her, but they decided she needed time to come to grips with her real issues. She might claim it was about them not having a degree or that she feared they couldn’t support her, but her real issue stemmed from something deeper. In the meantime, he wasn’t a particularly nice person to be around.

  The timing couldn’t have been worse. Now that Taylor’s parents were coming home, he and Taylor had been putting some things in storage and trying to arrange the back room to accommodate them until they found a house. He wished Jenny had stayed at the table long enough to let them explain what they meant about needing to save money.

  As Taylor kept saying last night, if she really loved them, she’d come back. Jackson didn’t know how long his heart could stay broken.

  Throughout the night, he kept glancing in the crowd, hoping maybe she’d stop by and apologize. Not that he needed her to say she was wrong, only that she wanted to be with them. He didn’t care what she said. He just needed to see her.

  Knowing Jenny, she’d be crying her eyes out, and for that, he felt terrible. He and Taylor had barely spoken to each other. Each thought she left because of what the other one had said. Now, he was a complete mess.

  Taylor was still at the house, but when Jackson closed the bar, he decided to stay in the back. They’d hooked up a makeshift shower in the bathroom. They had two very small rooms and a sitting room. The liquor had to be stored along the side wall, and the glasses and extra tables and chairs in a storage unit out back. Even if Jenny walked in right now and said she’d take them back, this arrangement wouldn’t work. Maybe the two of them should discuss renting an apartment until a home became available.

  Shit.

  Just when his life was great, he had to tell her the truth. The only bright side was that at least now all the skeletons were out of the closet. What good did it do if Jenny wasn’t in his life?

  He had Tuesday off and decided to continue removing his gear from Taylor’s parents’ home. The band asked for some changes in the designs for the upcoming show, so he couldn’t spend too much time drowning in sorrow.

  To his surprise, Taylor was at the house.

  “Hey.”

  Taylor carried a box to the front door and placed it on the ground. “Any news?”

  “No.”

  “What are we going to do?” Taylor hadn’t shaved today, and his clothes looked like he’d slept in them.

  “Besides call and leave a thousand messages?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m not going over to the ranch. She’ll come to her senses.”

  Taylor headed toward the upstairs. “We need to move on.”

  That was a shitty attitude, but maybe one he needed to adopt. They’d lived in this house for over six months and accumulated a lot of crap. The first thing they needed to move was the sculpture. It fit so well in the foyer, but he was certain Taylor’s parents wouldn’t think it made a good addition to the house.

  He propped open the door and rolled the statue outside. Not wanting to scrape the paint on his truck, he went inside for a towel and some rope to keep the sculpture from rolling around. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a car pulling down the drive. His pulse spiked. It was Jenny. He debated shouting for Taylor but decided to let her take the lead.

  She stopped the car and got out. In her hands was a plant with purple flowers. Dare he hope this implied an apology? She walked quite slowly toward him, and his gut churned. This didn’t look good.

  “Hi,” she said.

  He tried to decode that one word. It didn’t hold a lot of cheer, but she didn’t sound pissed either.

  “Hi.”

  “I’m glad I caught you. I was hoping to find both of you here.”

  “Taylor’s inside.”

  She handed him the plant. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do with it as they were in the process of leaving. He set in in the truck bed.

  “It’s a hyacinth.”

  “It didn’t look like an elephant.”

  She laughed, and the sound made his cock harden. “Don’t you know that hyacinths are an apology plant?”

  He had to chuckle at that one. “I’m a guy. How would I know that?”

  She looked at the ground. “You’re sensitive. I just thought you might.”

  Shit. Now he’d upset her. He closed the gap between them and hugged her. He held his breath, praying she wouldn’t push away. When she didn’t, he exhaled. A slow bubble of joy traveled up his body, and his cock sat up and took notice.

  “You want to come in?”

  “I’m still welcome?”

  Now she was walking nonsense. “I know Taylor will be happy to see you.”

  As soon as they got inside he shouted Taylor’s name. “Jenny’s here.”

  He expected the pounding of footsteps. Instead, there was only silence. He wrapped an arm around her wai
st and led her into the living room. “He’s a bit hurt.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t mean to get so upset.”

  “Can I get you a drink?”

  “Got a Diet Coke?”

  “Sure.”

  Once they were seated, he waited for her to spill her guts.

  Taylor finally made an appearance and stood near the entrance. Jackson nodded at Jenny. “Don’t be a dick. Come in and sit down.”

  He huffed out a breath and dropped onto the chair opposite Jenny.

  “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.” She took another swig of her drink. “I know I hurt you both, and I’m sorry.”

  “If you were so embarrassed by us so much, why did you ever go out with us in the first place?” Taylor’s voice came out a bit too aggressively.

  “The two misunderstandings came at me so fast that I reacted poorly. I know, Taylor, that this was your family home, but I assumed that since you were living here and wanted to decorate it, that you owned it.”

  He spread his legs wide. “Even if I had inherited the place, it wouldn’t have meant I earned the money to own it.”

  “True. I guess I didn’t think it through.”

  Taylor might have been forgiven for the transgression, but he never would be. “I should have told you I never graduated, but I knew your reaction.”

  “Yeah, but I understand why you didn’t. I was a bit vocal about my need to date someone with a degree.”

  She got that right. “I would have graduated if my dad hadn’t died.” He watched the color leave her face. “Dad owned the bar. When he got sick, he asked if I’d take over. I wanted to make him happy, so I dropped out of school. At the time, I thought how cool was this that I was in charge of running the Watering Hole.”

  “Oh, my. I thought that when the Watering Hole became the Raging Bull Saloon, you’d bought him out.”

  “No. My dad was sick for two more years. He helped guide me, but when he died, I wanted to change the name.”

  “But you never thought about going back to finish your degree?”

  “With my workload? No. Besides, I’d been out of school for so long and was doing so well, I figured why did I need a degree in business? I might have known more than my college professors who’d probably never run a business on a daily basis.”

  “I can see your point.”

  “I didn’t drop out because I wasn’t doing well in school or because I didn’t like school.”

  She nodded. Her eyes watered, and he wanted to hold her and give her comfort.

  She bit down on her bottom lip. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. I don’t think a college degree really matters.”

  “You serious?” Hope flooded through him.

  “Yes. What matters is whether a person has the drive to succeed.” She looked over at Taylor. “I happened to run into your stockbroker. He told me his story about how he never went to a four-year college. That man had drive. After a lot of soul searching, I realized that it wasn’t the paper I wanted the person I love to have, it was the bragging rights.”

  “Bragging rights?”

  “I think I wanted to say my husband went to Harvard, or that my husband has a master’s in biochemistry. I can see now that that’s bullshit. It was all about my ego and my insecurities. I was being childish, and I’m sorry.”

  “Given how proud your dad is about graduating, I can see where you’d get your belief system.”

  The tears streamed down her cheek, and he couldn’t take it any longer. He stepped across to her and cradled her in his arms. “We forgive you.” He glanced up at Taylor to see if he agreed. From the grin on his face, all was good.

  She sniffled. “Maybe we can get a three-bedroom apartment together and save money. I know that things are tight for all of us. Living in the back of the bar has to be hard.”

  Taylor joined them on the sofa. He picked up her hand. “Honey, whatever gave you the idea we were poor?”

  “You said that now that your parents were coming home, you two had to live in the back of the bar to save money.”

  Taylor glanced up and him, and then let out a laugh. “Well, we are trying to save money, but it’s for one of those houses we showed you.”

  Her body stiffened. “What do you mean?”

  Before she broke up with them, Taylor and he had discussed how they’d ask her. He might as well spill the beans now. “We never would live in a house like this.” He waved a hand around the Moore mansion. “It isn’t us. We could have bought a place a long time ago, but we were waiting for the right woman to come along before we decided what we wanted. We wanted her to have an input, too.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  She probably just wanted him to spell it out so that there was no misunderstanding. “We have enough money to pay cash for the house, but we didn’t just want to buy any house in case you wanted to, say, live in the countryside instead of near town.”

  Her eyes widened. “You were waiting for me to tell you which house I liked before you bought one?”

  “Yes, but then you got mad at us, and we decided to live at the back of the bar until you came to your senses.”

  Her gaze dropped to the ground. “I’m so sorry I got upset. I was a jerk. My dad always said to marry an equal, but I never understood what he meant. I thought he meant my men had to be as well educated.”

  “Well, that would limit the dating pool a bit.”

  She laughed. “I know. I fell in love with you two for who you were. Can you forgive me?”

  He stroked his chin. “Taylor? What do you think?”

  He shook his head. “She caused us a lot of pain. It will take some serious lovin’ to make up for it.”

  Her face brightened. “I am so ready.”

  * * * *

  This was too good to be true. The idea that her husband, or in this case, husbands, had to have a college stamp of approval was just plain wrong. Her two men were more ambitious and brilliant than the people in her MCAT group. Why she ever doubted them, she didn’t know. Caring about what others thought was her ego talking and not her heart.

  Taylor stood. “Let me have a hug.”

  She jumped in his arms and kissed him. The moment his hard cock pressed against her belly, her pussy flooded. Her palms clasped his hard pecs and her pulse rose. Hands pulled her back.

  “Remember, we get to share.”

  She laughed at Jackson’s antics to get her to break the kiss. “I know.”

  Taylor stepped away. “Jenny, do you mind waiting here? Jackson and I need to prepare something special for you.”

  “I can’t turn down that request.” She plopped her butt down on the sofa.

  “It may take a while. Watch some tubage.”

  She laughed at the lengths they planned to go to. The two men disappeared out the back and headed toward the garage. Once the hedges blocked her view, she ducked into one of the many bathrooms to check that her makeup was perfect. Crap. Her eyes were bloodshot. She couldn’t do anything about that, but she could detangle her hair that had whipped in the wind. She never should have rolled down the windows. What had she been thinking?

  “Jenny?”

  That was fast. “Coming.” She hoped all three of them would be coming soon.

  The men looked quite proud of themselves when she walked into the living room. Taylor and Jackson both held out their hands.

  “Come with us.”

  Making love in a bed apparently was so out of the norm for them. They led her outside. Instead of going into their workspace, they brought her to a formal garden. She really hadn’t noticed how beautiful the landscaping was before, not that she was totally focused on it right now.

  She wasn’t sure what was up, but she didn’t really care. As long as she could be with the two men she loved, she was happy. Never did she expect to see what looked like a maze behind the garage.

  “How fun!”

  “Wait until you see how fun it’s going to get.” Jackson winked, and excitement sizzled
up her spine.

  They entered a space in the tall hedges and must have made eight to ten turns before arriving at the destination. In the center, they’d placed a blanket. Several condoms winked in the afternoon sun.

  An idea sparked in her mind. She let go of their hands. “I’d like for both of you to sit on the blanket.”

  They looked at each other. “We were thinking the other way around.”

  “Don’t worry. You’ll get what you want in the end, but grant me these next few moments.” She had no idea if she could pull this off, but she was going to try. They deserved to be treated special.

  They kicked off their boots and stretched out on the blanket. My, but they made a handsome pair. What had she been thinking even considering tossing these two magnificent men aside?

  Here goes.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Jenny inhaled, pulled off the hair tie, and shook out her hair. The wind picked up the ends and blew it all around. With one hand she held the strands in place while she jutted out her hip, attempting to strike a sexy pose. She tossed the tie to Jackson who expertly caught it.

  Jackson put two fingers to his mouth and whistled. “I’m liking this. Never thought we’d get a show.”

  Taylor grinned. “Keep going, honey.”

  Even though her fingers were a bit on the trembling side, she unbuttoned the top button and then the next. She wasn’t sure how to make her moves more seductive, so she dragged her tongue across her top lip twice.

  Taylor reached down and adjusted his pants. Maybe her first-time-ever striptease was working. She continued undoing her shirt while she kept her gaze on their eyes. As soon as she unhooked the last button, the wind whipped opened the top, exposing her bra. She threaded her arms through the sleeve and held out the top. Now what? With her hands clasping each sleeve, she dragged the shirt across her chest. After turning around, she bent over and dragged the material across her ass.

  “That’s for you, Taylor.”

  “Oh, yeah. Can’t wait to delve into those cheeks.”

  That made her blush. She dropped the shirt onto the lush grass and turned around. She wanted to watch their eyes as she continued to strip for them. Removing shoes was not sexy, so she toed them off quickly. She walked over to Jackson and lifted her foot.