by Katee Robert
No matter which way I go, I’m going to walk out of this apartment bleeding from a soul wound I might never recover from. No matter what decision I make, I’m going to hurt a man I care about very deeply.
“Trust me, princess.” He says it like he has everything figured out, like he has absolutely no doubt we’ll reach the destination he can already see in his head. Beast gives the blanket another small tug. “Do you want to use your safe word?”
There’s only one answer and everyone within hearing range knows it. I made this choice and I will honor it. A small part of me even wants to. This situation isn’t playing out at all like I expect, but I can’t deny that I feel like a moth to their flame. But no matter what happens, I will not be burned up. “No.” I lift my chin. “But if either of you ever pull a stunt like that again, I’m out. You want me here and you want me honest, but you don’t get to play verbal punching bag with me in response to that honesty.” Drawing this line in the sand is a risk, but I can’t stop myself.
“Agreed.” Beast nods and rises, tugging me along with him.
Beast leads me to the table and stands behind me, his hands on my shoulders. “Gaeton.” His voice has lost its warmth and is all snap, which the other man responds to. Gaeton looks over my shoulder at Beast, once again completely ignoring me. Beast squeezes my shoulders, but I can’t tell if it’s supposed to be a warning or a reassurance. “I brought you something.”
Now he finally focuses on me, but there’s absolutely nothing in those dark eyes. He looks at me like I’m a stranger, and not necessarily a welcome one.
Gods, that hurts.
Only Beast at my back prevents me from retreating.
Gaeton leans back in his chair, the very picture of an arrogant prince. “Doesn’t look like breakfast.”
“Doesn’t it? Take a closer look.” The barest movement behind me and then Beast grabs my hips and lifts me onto the table. I can’t help a little squeak of surprise, but I stifle it immediately. I might enjoy submitting, but I’m not going to give either of them the satisfaction of reacting when they haul me around. With a firm grip, he guides my feet to the arms of Gaeton’s chair. It’s built wide to accommodate his body, so it leaves me spread almost uncomfortably. If not for the blanket, I’d be entirely exposed.
I don’t expect they’ll let me keep covered for long.
Gaeton doesn’t move. “Hard to see this present of yours while she’s all wrapped up.”
A dark laugh from Beast. “A present isn’t a present unless you have to unwrap it. There are rules, my friend.”
“I’m not your friend.” But he says it in a contemplative sort of way, as if he’s no longer sure it’s true. Gaeton brackets my ankles with his big hands and finally, finally, meets my gaze. “I’m sorry.”
“Gaeton.” Beast injects a bit of warning into his tone, but doesn’t shift from the spot against the wall at Gaeton’s shoulder.
Gaeton ignores him and gives my ankles a small squeeze. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “I was a dick.”
“Yes, you were a dick.” My heart takes a dizzying leap and I press my hands to my chest as if I can keep it from its fatalistic freefall. It takes me two tries to speak. “You’ve always been arrogant. This morning is the first time you’ve ever been cruel.”
“You sure it’s the first time I’ve ever been cruel?” He skates his hands over my calves and knees, stopping a bare inch below where the blanket covers me. “Sure as fuck seems we don’t know each other nearly as well as we thought.”
I’m afraid to ask what he means, afraid to dig deeper into the same realization I had last night. We dated for nearly two years and I might know that he likes red, that his favorite food is takeout from the hole-in-the-wall restaurant around the corner from his apartment, that he really enjoys spending his evenings cuddling and watching soapy dramas on the TV, but those are all surface level things. There is so much he kept from me. So much I kept from him. Something like panic takes hold, and I try to shrug out of the blanket. It’s a distraction, and not even a good one.
Especially since he pins the fabric to my legs so it gets caught around my upper arms instead of dropping to the table.
Gaeton’s expression goes predatory. “You don’t want to talk about this.”
“No, I don’t.” Honesty is as heady as it is terrifying. Something has been knocked loose inside me, and it’s bubbling closer and closer to the surface; things I can’t say, that I need to keep silent. I promised honesty, but I didn’t promise that I’d cut myself open for them without prompting.
His thumbs skate over my knees, a contemplative touch that makes me shiver. There’s no softness on his face, no warmth to take shelter in. He looks at me like I’m an enemy he will fully enjoy taking apart. “Say what you mean, Isabelle. I can see you fighting it. Stop playing the perfect princess and spit it the fuck out.”
I try to clamp my lips together, to keep the truth inside, but it’s carried forth on a tsunami of hurt and there’s no stopping it. “You lied to me.”
He flinches. It’s a tiny movement, barely perceptible, but there nonetheless. “I never lied to you.”
“Really, Gaeton? Really?” I look over his shoulder at Beast. “You both lied to me the entire time we were dating. You held yourselves back, you presented me with one side of yourself and nothing more. You kept this from me.” I try to motion around us, but my hands are mostly trapped by the blanket. “You both decided you knew what I needed and you didn’t stop to talk to me about it. Not once.” My throat goes hot and tight, but I can’t stop now that I’ve started. “You touched me like I was some breakable precious thing because you knew best. You were starving me and neither of you cared, because all that mattered was playing Prince Charming to the princess you put on a pedestal. You can hate me for not being able to choose, but how was I supposed to make a choice when neither of you gave me anything approximating an honest relationship?”
Gaeton leans forward. “Isabelle—”
But it’s too late. I can’t stop. I’m not even sure I want to anymore. “And what the fuck did you think was going to happen if I did choose? That you’d just be happy with sweet, vanilla sex for the rest of your life? That we wouldn’t start resenting each other for the parts we weren’t allowed to show? That eventually one of us wouldn’t set the whole relationship on fire just to feel something?”
His brows lower. “I would never cheat on you.”
“No one can make promises when they’re starving. Maybe you wouldn’t. Maybe I would be the one. Did you think about that?”
“You’re a good girl, Isabelle. Forgive the fuck out of me for wanting to treat you like it.”
“No. You don’t get to do that. You do not get to whore-or-virgin me. I’m a person and people are complicated. You don’t get to decide what’s best for me.” I finally look up at Beast and he’s standing there like I just pulled out a gun and shot him in the chest. “Neither of you get to make that call, especially without talking to me.”
Gaeton lets go of my legs and sits back. “I’d say we learned that the hard way.”
“Did you?” I carefully set my feet on the seat of the chair on either side of his legs. “If these two weeks are about punishing me, then I’ll shut up and we can get back to it. But if you really want me to choose and to have a future that won’t fall apart inside of a year, then you have to see me. Not just the good parts. Not just the parts that hurt you. All of me.”
He’s frowning at me as if maybe he might be doing exactly that. Gaeton is a smart man. He might play the fool because, more often than not, his size and boisterous attitude make people underestimate him, but there’s a big brain and an even bigger heart under all that bluster. It doesn’t make him less dangerous, though. If anything, it makes him more so, because once he decides to give his loyalty, there is no horrendous act he won’t commit to protect the people he cares about. Once upon a time, he felt that way for me. Now, it’s not so simple.
He sets his arms on the
arms of the chair, his thumbs brushing the outer edges of my calves. “What do I see, Isabelle?” He says my name like a promise.
I’ve come this far. I can’t shy away now. I let the blanket drop away and carefully move to straddle him on the chair. He makes no move to hamper or help me, just lets me take up this position while he watches me closely. I settle my hips against his and have to bite back a whimper at the feeling of his cock hardening against me. I frame his face with my hands, enjoying the way his whiskers prickle against my skin, enjoying the faint flush beneath his freckles even more. “I am a princess. I’m spoiled and proud and loyal. I value freedom above all else, sometimes to my detriment. I am not perfect, and I don’t want to be with someone who needs me to be perfect to love me.” I rock my hips a little. “I’m also a little slut who loves to be fucked dirty, with a some degradation thrown in for spice.” And I love you. Both of you. The last I manage to keep in. There’s only so much vulnerability I can stand in a single twenty-four hour period and I’ve long since maxed mine out for this one.
“I see you.” Gaeton loosely clasps my hips with his big hands. It brings into focus how much larger than me he is, how different the power dynamic feels with me naked and him fully clothed. He strokes his thumbs over my lower stomach. “You want this cock, Isabelle?”
I don’t know if I believe him that he sees me. I don’t think a single instance of honesty can combat years’ worth of half-truths and lies. It doesn’t matter in this moment. Letting myself be swept away by anticipation feels good, like letting go of a weight I’ve carried for so long. I’ll have to pick it up again sooner than I’d like, but for now I’m fully present and holding my breath waiting for what happens next. “Yes.”
“Yes, Sir.”
I wet my lips. “Yes, Sir. I want your cock.”
He releases my hips and drapes himself over the arms of the chair, a king on his throne. “Then take it.”
I reach for the front of his pants with a shaking hand. He makes no move to help me, simply sits there and lets me draw down his zipper and pull out his cock. I give him a slow, exploratory stroke, and meet his gaze.
Gaeton gives me absolutely nothing. Instead, it’s Beast’s voice that comes from behind him in answer to my silent question. “Don’t make him repeat himself.”
Understanding dawns, bringing with it a delicious burst of pleasure. I brace one hand on his shoulder and shift closer, guiding his cock to my entrance. He’s a bit bigger than Beast, so I have to work to take him deep, fighting inch by inch down his length while he holds perfectly still and does nothing to help. The only sign he’s affected is a faint flushing of his cheeks. Once he’s sheathed completely inside me, I pause, enjoying the feeling of being so full of him.
“Really, little slut? Surely that’s not enough for you.” I can feel his words in my chest, a rumble that’s delicious and oh, so wrong. He cocks an eyebrow at me, as if I’m not impaled on his cock right now, as if we’re simply having a conversation he’s already grown tired of. “You interrupted my morning with your needy pussy, practically begging me to fill you up. Get yourself off. Now.”
There it is, that delicious sting of humiliation. It feels dirty to ride him like this while he sits there and tolerates it. Like I’m just as much a little slut as he calls me. My breasts brush his shirt with every stroke, and the physical reminder of his being clothed while I’m naked only makes this hotter. I want it to last forever, but I also want to come all over him right now. I grind down, working my clit against the exposed bit of skin where his pants have gaped open. “Gaeton,” I gasp.
That’s when I look over his shoulder and meet Beast’s gaze.
The strength of it shocks me so much, my rhythm hitches. I might have expected jealousy if I thought about it at all, but it’s nowhere in evidence. He looks at us like he owns us, like we’re two players acting out his favorite fantasy, as if he’s enjoying this moment even more than I am.
“He’s watching, isn’t he?”
I glance at Gaeton. “Yes, Sir.”
“Mmm. Hold on.” He barely gives me a chance to obey before he lifts and rotates the chair a full one hundred and eighty degrees. I can’t see Beast any more, but I feel his attention lick down my spine and settle on the spot where Gaeton and I are joined.
I start to look over my shoulder, but Gaeton makes a rumbling growly sound. “No, little slut. You’re here for this cock. You don’t get to make eyes at him while you’re filled up with me.” The words almost sound jealous, but Gaeton’s eyes are full of heat as he looks over my shoulder at Beast. He refocuses on me. “Finish what you started, greedy girl.”
I brace my hands on his shoulders and start fucking him again. I expect him to stay silent, but he keeps spilling out sinful words into the bare space between us. Lower, this time, as if they’re just for me. “Lean forward, Isabelle. Give him a good view of the way I fill you up.”
I obey, the new position putting my face kissably close to Gaeton. I look at his mouth, but I can’t take this step on my own. Maybe it’s silly to put so much importance on a kiss when he’s had his mouth all over me, when he kissed me last night, when his cock is currently stretching me uncomfortably full, but I can’t help it. I shift closer still, my cheek brushing his with every stroke.
“He’s watching. Teasing him with the way you ride my cock gets you hotter, doesn’t it? Do you think you can tempt him closer?” His lips brush my ear and I whimper. “Maybe you want him to take your ass. He’ll hold perfectly still and you’ll have to work that tight little body over both our cocks. Using us like toys while you sob and beg us to fuck you properly.”
Pleasure spirals tighter and tighter through me. “You’re so mean.”
“Am I?” His mouth brushes my neck. “Maybe so.” His lips trace my jaw. “Maybe mean is exactly what you want, Isabelle. Someone to put you in your place and fuck you dirty just like you need it.” He’s right there, so close to my mouth that I can taste his exhale. “Maybe one cock will never be enough for you.”
“I—”
He grabs my hips and slams me down on his length. I cry out, but Gaeton kisses me, eating down the sound as he works me over his cock, taking exactly the angle I need to get off while he plunders my mouth. He overwhelms my senses. Higher and higher I climb, until I’m sobbing against his lips, a wild thing that can’t get enough, will never get enough, so hungry for pleasure that I could eat the whole universe.
And then I’m weightless and everything goes to static as my orgasm takes me. I’m vaguely aware of him following me over the edge, driving up into me until he grinds out an orgasm of his own. I slump against his chest, but I’m still straining to meet his kisses, an addict with my first real hit in twelve long months. Gaeton kisses me like I’m his world. Everything else might have changed, but that hasn’t.
I’m still trying to drink down a year’s worth of that feeling when an arm bands around my waist and yanks me off Gaeton. I cry out, reaching for him, but Beast hauls me around to the table and bends me over it, his hand in the middle of my back forcing me to down until my cheek presses against the cool wood. “Turn around, Gaeton.”
Gaeton moves the chair around to face us. He’s tucked away his cock, though there are wet spots from my orgasm all over his lap. He resumes his bored expression as Beast kicks my legs wide. “I suppose she’s not satisfied,” Gaeton growls.
“Let’s see, shall we?” Keeping me pinned to the table, Beast shoves two rough fingers into me. Despite my determination to stay still, I roll my hips, trying to take him deeper. He makes a disappointed sound. “So needy, this one.”
“Insatiable.”
Beast hooks a hand under my leg closest to Gaeton and lifts it, bracing my knee on the table so that I’m spread obscenely. Gaeton makes a noise, and even without the tableau, I know he can see everything Beast is doing to me. Beast gives me another few strokes. “How many orgasms do you think it would take to satisfy our princess?”
“Only one way to find out.�
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Beast cups my pussy with a possessive hand, his fingers playing over my clit. “Shall we make things interesting?”
That surprises a laugh out of Gaeton. “Only you would be fingering this woman and offer to make things interesting as if that isn’t enough.”
Beast spreads me, his fingers tracing my pussy like he wants to memorize every inch. “How about a bet, Gaeton? How many orgasms do you think our Isabelle can stand before she begs for mercy?” He gives my clit a little slap that has me jumping. “I think twelve.”
“Give her a little credit. Fifteen, at least.”
Fifteen orgasms? I don’t know if I can survive it.
“If I’m right, I fuck your ass again tonight.” Beast’s hand spasms the tiniest bit on my back. “If you’re right, you can take mine.”
Suddenly Gaeton doesn’t sound as amused. “And if she holds out past fifteen?”
Beast leans over me, pressing against my back, his cock hard against my ass. “Then as a reward, we both fuck her at the same time.”
My trepidation turns to anticipation. I arch back against Beast. “I can handle more than fifteen.”
His laugh vibrates against my back. “We’ll see, princess. We’ll see.”
Chapter 13
Beast
Control is the only god I worship. It’s always been that way, because my survival has always depended on it. Sabine Valley makes Carver City’s politics look like children playing dress-up, and Cohen was right in the middle of all of it. Watching his back, being with him, meant I couldn’t fuck around. I learned to set my eyes on a goal and be utterly ruthless in doing whatever it took to achieve it. It wasn’t enough back then, but that same drive propelled me up the ranks when I came to the Man in Black’s territory.
