by Kate Pearce
“I said kids, baby.”
“Kids?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“What did I just miss?” Harvey asked.
“You have kids?” Tess wanted to make sure she was really, truly understanding him. Maybe he meant kids as in baby goats. He didn’t seem like the farming type, but she’d certainly misjudged people before.
“Two sons. Matt’s nearly eighteen. Lyman is twelve.”
Harvey scoffed. “Unbelievable.”
“How so?” Ollie’s tone was even, and Tess didn’t feel any shame or anxiousness from him. Apparently, he didn’t feel the circumstance was an automatic deal-breaker.
Did she?
“Think about it,” Harvey said. “How do you think Tess is going to feel about having a stepson who’s only ten years younger than her?”
“Why don’t you ask Tess? If she’s bothered about it, I think I would feel it. I’m not feeling that from her.”
Harvey sat up and leaned his forearms against the bed’s edge. “I can’t do the feelings thing, sweetheart, so fill me in, please.”
“I…”
Harvey’s narrowed green gaze dared her to lie to him.
Her impulse was to touch him—to press her hands to his cheeks and her forehead to his. To kiss away his doubts. That was the Afótama part of her wanting to use touch to soothe, but she sat on her hands.
She had to find a balance between the two men so she didn’t bruise one while placating the other. Why couldn’t something about being queen be easy? “I’m not angry,” she said. “I guess…I’m more surprised than anything else. I hadn’t pictured Ollie as a dad, but I guess…it fits.”
Harvey drummed his fingers on the bed’s edge, saying nothing.
He was an arguer by nature, and their childhood exploits had taught her that when he was quiet, he was plotting. She didn’t want Ollie on the receiving end of one of Harvey’s plots. The last time he’d gone quiet like this was two years ago. They’d drifted apart because of a disagreement over Tess’s stalking, MMA-fighting ex. She said she was fine, and that she could take care of herself. Harvey hadn’t agreed.
Tess didn’t know what he’d done, but she’d received a five-page apology letter from her ex in the mail along with some of her important documents he’d been holding hostage. She never heard from him again. She’d confronted Harvey about it. They’d argued. She’d told him to mind his business, and that she never wanted to see him again.
Now, she knew he couldn’t help it. She’d always been his.
Touch him, stupid. She reached over and stroked his cheek.
The tension in his shoulders fell away and the tight set of his jaw relaxed. He sighed, and kissed the back of her hand. “I’m guessing their mother is out of the picture.”
“Their mother is dead. My aunt is keeping an eye on them. She’s been a big help to me.”
Tess eased down and pulled the covers up to her chin. “Two nearly-grown kids and a dead wife. I guess I don’t hold the monopoly on emotional baggage.”
“We all have some, baby.”
The kids—that she could digest. He was nearly forty. Of course a catch like him would have had a mate and a couple of kids.
Damn. She’d be competition against a dead woman for his love for the rest of his life.
“You’re sad all of a sudden. Why?” Ollie said. “Tell me and I’ll fix it.”
“I don’t know if you can.”
“I wouldn’t have come here if I wasn’t willing to try.”
“Goddamn it,” Harvey muttered.
Tess scooted to the other edge. “What?”
“This contest becomes increasingly more imbalanced when he can both hear and feel you, and I only catch bits and pieces of your thoughts.”
“I suspect that if I told you how I was feeling all the time, you’d get bored with it pretty fucking quickly. Besides, you’ve never had any problems discerning how I feel. You always seem to know.”
“That’s only because I’ve known you for so long that I’ve got you pegged. I make educated guesses based on past behaviors. It’s hardly the same thing.”
“Maybe it’s better,” Ollie said.
“How so?”
“I feel like the playing field has been leveled for me. I get to step a few feet closer to the pitcher’s mound or a dozen yards closer to the hole on the golf course. Yeah, feeling her as I do gets me up to speed quickly, but you’ve had the incredible luxury of knowing her longer. You go way back to before either of you knew what you were. That’s a very intimate thing.”
“Okay. I’m not tiptoeing anymore tonight, guys.” Tess felt like her temples had become drumheads and the voices of the wakeful Afótama were beating rhythmless beats against them. She settled under the blankets yet again and squeezed her eyes shut. “Ollie, I need to touch you. I can spare you a sliver of bed.”
The mattress gave a whine of stress as he sat, and Tess’s body rolled toward him automatically due to the temporary incline of the bed.
“Got enough room?” she asked.
“Only if you’re sleeping on top of me. My bed at home is a California King”
“If I were on top of you, there’d be no sleeping. Trust me on that.”
The other side of the bed dipped, and Tess rolled toward the middle. “Fair’s fair, I guess.”
“Here you are sandwiched, yet again,” Harvey said.
“Maybe that was my plan all along.”
“Don’t get any ideas.”
“Good ones or bad ones? I’ve got plenty of both.”
She rolled onto her back and crept her hand beneath Ollie’s shirt. Warm skin, hard muscle. He was in damned fine shape for a man of any age, and she understood why Ótama was so insistent Tess bring their warriors home. Their strong women needed strong men, and there just weren’t enough to go around.
She inched her other hand over to the other side of the bed and her palm had barely registered the sensation of Harvey’s skin when they got tossed back into the white void they’d visited earlier in the day.
They stood in a tight triangle, and both men seemed stunned into silence.
“Don’t move!” Tess said, and increased the pressure on both of their chests. “Don’t. Move.”
“What is this place?” Harvey asked. He looked around them, but there was nothing to see. Just white in all directions, as if they were floating within a sphere of it.
Tess could answer because of her earlier conversation with Ótama. “It’s the queen’s playground,” she said. “What I think becomes real in this realm. Ótama says I need to practice molding the environment into something that makes sense. I guess you’re both in my head right now.”
“This is trippy,” Harvey said, but he didn’t pull his hand away. He closed his eyes and cringed. “Shit, is that what’s going on in your head all the time? It’s so chaotic. I don’t understand any of it.”
“We’re not meant to,” Ollie said quietly. He stood there for a moment, staring at her and pondering. “I can only understand the parts pertaining to me. Is that true, Tess? Your father was born in Fallon? He wasn’t Afótama?”
“Ótama said he was like you. I was going to talk to my grandmother about it when we got back.”
“Tess,” Harvey said. “You don’t have to hide…” His gaze trailed down her torso to her belly button area, and lower—down her thighs, past her knees to her feet. “That from me. Any of it. I won’t dwell on your scars or even discuss them now that I know they’re there.”
“Thank you.” She took a deep breath and let go of both of them at the same time.
Back in the bedroom, they lay in the quiet dark and guarded their thoughts closely. Tess kept her hands to herself. “I think the playground is something I can shut off and turn on at will. Right now, it seems to automatically activate when emotions are high and I touch you both at once. It’s probably meant for the queen and her consort to exchange important information quickly at critical junctures. Perhaps before long trips or
battles.”
“I find it somewhat problematic that both Harvey and I are able to enter it,” Ollie said.
“The gods have a sense of humor I’m not particularly fond of right now,” Harvey said.
They weren’t getting it. At all. Was she going to have to beat them over the head with the idea? Probably. They didn’t seem to be on the fast track to figuring out the trio thing on their own. Were men only interested in threesomes when two women were involved?
“What they find humorous leaves something to be desired, that’s for sure,” Ollie said.
Tess rolled her eyes, sighed, and flipped onto her belly. “Goodnight.”
“I thought you wanted to cuddle,” Ollie said.
She did want to cuddle. She just wanted it to be the kind of cuddling that came with penetration and a screaming orgasm, but it would have been uncouth for the queen to say so. “Spoon me, then.”
“My pleasure.” He turned onto his side and pulled her back against his chest. Gentleman that he was, he kept his crotch a safe distance away.
Well, Tess only pretended to be a lady, so she ground her ass against his cock and let out a contented moan. “That’s much better.”
“Keep that up and I’ll give you a reason to change your mind.”
“I look forward to that reason.” She wriggled again, and he hissed into her hair.
“Tess…”
“What?” She wriggled again and grinned triumphantly in the dark at his cock hardening against her ass. She picked up his hand and helped him find her slit.
He fondled her tentatively at first, and then slipped one of his big fingers into her. She bucked against him, and his other hand clamped over her mouth. “I’d prefer to not have an audience,” he projected, but he didn’t stop finger-fucking her. His rough thumb engaged her clit, teasing the hood of it and avoiding the tender flesh beneath. If he touched her there, he’d launch her ass right off the bed.
“What if I want one?” she asked.
“Don’t tell me you’re into kink.”
“I’m into a lot of things, some of which don’t even have labels. That bother you?”
He rolled her onto her belly, yanked her nightshirt up, and pulled her ass up into the air.
She giggled against the mattress. She knew. A little teasing, and he’d take control.
“What the hell are you two doing?” Harvey sat up and slapped the lamp switch right as Ollie pressed his fat head against her opening.
He nudged her legs farther apart with his knee and slipped in past her entrance. “Cuddling,” he said. “Want to watch?”
He sounded like he couldn’t give a shit whether Harvey watched or not, but the idea turned Tess on so much that her cream dampened her thighs.
It didn’t take much when these two were concerned.
She wanted him to watch—to see his little submissive getting well and truly fucked by a man he couldn’t stand. She wanted him to ignite that spirit of competitiveness and join in, but right now, she wasn’t even sure he’d stay on the bed.
The tip of Ollie’s cock touched the end of her, and he hadn’t even sheathed himself completely inside her.
“Fuck!”
Ollie patted the small of her back. “Might want to give it a minute. You’re so damned tight.”
“Sounds about right,” Harvey muttered, and he reached for the lamp switch.
“Leave it on and enjoy the show,” Ollie returned.
“I’ve already seen it, and from a much better position than I’m in right now. I didn’t have a front row seat. I was the seat.”
Tess rolled her eyes at the I-got-there-first burn, but it didn’t matter, anyway. Ollie didn’t seem bothered by it.
He started slow, tentative thrusts into her that had her toes curling and teeth chattering in less than thirty seconds.
He was so big, that the sensation was unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Harvey had fucked her into seeing stars because he knew how to move and all the right spots to hit. He combined the pleasure with an edge, so her orgasm was powerful enough to muddle her brain for an hour afterward. He wasn’t a small man by any stretch of the imagination, but he wasn’t this big.
She was so full she was nearing the point of overstimulation where she might end up crying as she came. Her body couldn’t process all the feelings in any other way.
And she thought she would take both of them at the same time?
They would break her like a wishbone.
She giggled. She wanted to try, anyway. She wanted to be sandwiched between her two men and have her brains fucked out in every way possible. Obviously, she must have been tapped into a bit of Fiona’s psychosis. That was the only explanation for it.
“If you weren’t clamping down on me like a vise grip and begging me for it, I’d be a little bit offended by the giggling, baby.” Ollie planted his hands on her ass, spread her cheeks, and squeezed.
“She can’t help it,” Harvey said blandly.
Tess opened her eyes to serve him up a dirty look, but her gaze caught immediately on the movement of his hand, up and down, beneath the sheets.
“Don’t look so surprised,” he projected as Ollie increased his pace from torturous to brain-liquefying. “Isn’t that what you wanted? You wanted to see me lose control, right?”
Nope. That hadn’t been her end goal at all. She’d just wanted them both to touch her—to show how much fun they could have if they worked together instead of in opposition.
“Want you.”
He arched up an eyebrow. “Hmm? Is he not giving it to you good enough?”
She ground her teeth and clawed at the sheets as her orgasm built.
“Oh, that face.” His grin was devilish. “He’s so kind to let you come without permission. Go ahead and finish up, and remember—queen or not, I have no problem with bending you over my knee. Obviously, you need it.”
She came, and it would have been loudly if Ollie hadn’t reached up and put her hand over her mouth.
“Shhh,” he said. “Let’s not have the entire floor speculating on who’s getting fucked by whom. It’ll make walking out of here in the morning very interesting.” He swiveled his hips and found an entry angle that had her mumbling gibberish against his hand.
When his hot come surged into her, he unclamped her mouth and leaned over her to kiss her shoulders.
She collapsed onto the bed and locked her gaze on Harvey, whose clenched jaw and shaking shoulders told her he’d found his release, too.
Wide-eyed understanding dawn on his face, and they shared a look she didn’t need words to understand.
Harvey knew. Whether he liked it or not, he knew what they were meant to be. Three. Knowing it was the first step in coming to terms with it.
Ollie padded to the bathroom and turned on the water in the sink.
But, did Ollie know?
14
Tess grabbed Harvey’s wrist and turned it over to read his watch’s display.
He chuckled and chafed her back through her borrowed jacket. Desert temperatures left her somewhat perplexed. She’d expected New Mexico to be hot, but found that the temperatures this fall left something to be desired for a hothouse flower like her. She was cold all the damned time.
“Muriel said she’d be here at two,” he said. He took her hands and tucked them into the back pockets of his jeans, pulling her against his hard body in the process. Knowing what he looked like beneath all that neat attire made casual touching difficult. Her hands itched to yank free the back of his shirt so she could feel the taut sinews of his back—to put her face against his chest and inhale his seductive musk. To twirl her tongue around his navel and farther down to—
“We’ve got a few minutes, so why don’t we clear the air while it’s just us two, huh?” His words pulled her free of her indulgent daydreaming. He was right. They needed to discuss it.
She nodded, and he took her by the crook of the arm and led her to the gazebo in the center of the Norseton community
square. Her grandmother had thought Tess being seen out and about would be good for public relations, so Harvey had suggested the lovely little park as a meeting place. As Muriel and Jody would be joining them from across town where they’d gone to settle Fiona in, a central location worked best for all.
Shops and tidy little single-family homes bordered the square. There was a thriving community there in the middle of the desert, and few people knew about it. They had their own post office, a grocery store, and even an independent power supply. Solar panels were as common as air conditioners. Water was harder to come by, but the people were diligent conservators. There were no lush lawns or water-loving plants—just smart landscaping using what was native and sustainable. Almost everyone who lived and worked in Norseton was Afótama. The few exceptions were people who’d married into or had been adopted by the group, and some contractors who were paid handsomely to keep their mouths shut. Some were human, and some…well, Jody wouldn’t elaborate.
They sat on one of the gazebo’s five benches. Harvey pulled his jacket together at her neck, skimming her chin with his thumb in the process. “Comfy?”
“No.”
“Indulge me and tell me why.”
“It’s not because this bench is hard.” She sighed and sat up straighter. Meeting his gaze shouldn’t have been such a difficult thing, but here they were—having yet another conversation she couldn’t have imagined.
She held out a hand, and he took it. “Let me try something.”
Closing her eyes, she sought out that place she’d only visited accidentally before. Her playground was just as white and sterile as it had been when she’d fallen into it with Harvey and Ollie last night, but this time, she tried to shape it. She molded into one of the few places where she’d felt safe as a child—where she sought refuge—and one Harvey would recognize, too. It was a park, but different than the one their bodies waited in.
Their special place.
She pulled him by the hand between two dipping tree boughs, and they settled onto the accumulated leaves with their backs against a large rock.
He laughed. “Wow. Of all places.”
“Yeah.” She’d run away once when she was too young to be successful at it. Harvey had found her there and coaxed her out. Later, it became her hiding place—when she just needed to get away. It was no wonder they were halfway to matehood before puberty. He’d been her solace for so long.
