“Is someone going to tell me what’s happening?” Rosalie murmured.
The whole group was back from the bazar having a late dinner in the dining room at Corbin House. Rosalie was seated next to Tom at the end of the table. Burke and James were on opposite sides at the other end. Tom took his loss gallantly, letting the ladies coo over his injuries, which were thankfully minor.
He lifted his glass of red wine to his lips, taking a sip, wincing slightly from the sting of his cut lip.
“Tom…”
He smiled. “Burke and I have an outstanding debt that must be cleared. He’ll need your help to clear it.”
If the meaning in his words were lost on her, the look on his face certainly wasn’t. He meant to devour her. Her cheeks flamed with warmth as she felt her stomach do a little flip. Heavens, whatever had these men discussed? What other plans were they hatching without her?
The dinner ended and the whole group returned to the drawing room for drinks and cards. Despite the late hour, no one seemed ready to retire. Even the duchess and the older ladies stayed for a round of whist.
Rosalie sat on a sofa in the far corner of the room with a book, letting the gentle hum of voices calm her as she read. James and George sat at a table with the Swindon sisters, while Prudence and Piety played against the duchess and Lady Oswald. The third table was made up of Blanche, Mariah, the countess, and Olivia. Sir Andrew and the marchioness were the only others not playing. Sir Andrew sat asleep on the opposite sofa, his paper hanging open in his lap. The marchioness sat alone by the fire, her needlework in hand.
Burke and Tom were missing.
Before Rosalie could question their absence, a footmen entered the room, silver tray in hand, and came right for her. She set her book aside as he offered her a letter.
“This arrived for you earlier, Miss,” he muttered.
She took the letter off the tray, not recognizing the heavy handwriting. Using the paper knife, she loosened the seal and opened it. The footman backed away as she read the short message through twice.
If anyone asks, this is from your aunt. Pretend to read it slowly. Perhaps smile a bit. Do whatever ladies do when reading letters from their relations. Wait two minutes, then excuse yourself to write back. We’re waiting for you.
-B
“Bad news?” said James, his eyes narrowed on her.
She swallowed, folding the note closed. She hated lying to him, but his question drew other’s eyes. She put on a forced smile. “Not at all, my lord. It’s from my aunt. She chastises me on the silence of my pen.” She tucked the note into her pocket. “Your Grace…I think I will retire. I believe I have just enough energy left to write her a dutiful reply.”
“Yes, fine,” the duke said with a wave of his hand, not even turning around. “James, will you focus? Hearts are trump and you just played a spade.”
Not waiting for him to change his mind, she bowed a curtsy to the room and darted away.
She returned to her room to find it empty. The maids prepared it for the evening—covers pulled down and pillows fluffed, her fire blazing, candles lit on two tables, her robe laid out upon the end of the bed.
With a tired sigh, she kicked off her slippers and tugged off her evening gloves. The door connecting her room to Burke’s was closed. As she took a step towards it, she heard the unmistakable sound of a man’s low moan.
Her man.
Crossing to the door, she opened it. Her heart flipped. Burke and Tom were standing shirtless together in the middle of the room, wrapped in each other’s arms as they kissed. Their hands moved feverishly, touching every inch of the other’s skin. Tom ran both hands over Burke’s arse and pulled him closer, making both men groan.
Rosalie was on fire. All thought of fatigue utterly forgotten. Their passion set her ablaze. She was trembling with it. She wanted to see more. She wanted to see them unleashed and undone.
Burke noticed her first, his lips glistening with Tom’s kisses. The storms swirled in his eyes as he took her in. Then Tom looked her way, his gaze just as heated. They relaxed their hold on each other but didn’t pull away.
“We couldn’t wait,” Burke said, almost as if in apology.
“You shouldn’t have to,” she replied, feeling breathless. “You are so beautiful together.” She’d never seen two men share intimacy before, but it was true. Burke and Tom looked perfect in each other’s arms. “I want to see more,” she admitted.
“Come kiss us first,” said Tom, holding out his bandaged hand.
She went eagerly, feeling them each put a hand around her waist as she claimed Tom’s lips in a kiss. She felt how they were slightly swollen, the bottom one split in the middle, but it didn’t stop him from devouring her. She licked the cut and he winced.
“No more getting punched in the face for fun,” she chastised, raising a hand to touch his tender brow. “This face means too much to me to let another man crack his fists against it.”
Tom just chuckled. “I’m a fast healer.”
She turned to Burke, running a hand up his arm. “So…do you want to taste my Tom? Is that the bargain you made? You think you need my permission to take your pleasure with him?”
Burke grinned, cupping the back of her neck as he pulled her close. “My sweet siren, I want to fuck your Tom…while he fucks you. We will claim him together and make him ours until he is moaning our names and coming between us. We will give him such pleasure that he is broken and remade by it. Would you like to help me with that?”
As Burke spoke, Tom groaned, his forehead falling to his bare shoulder. Burke wove his fingers possessively into Tom’s curls. His eyes didn’t leave Rosalie’s face.
She was sure, if she were to lift her skirts and check, her thighs would already be wet with her desire. “Yes,” she whispered. “I want that very much.”
Burke leaned down, giving her a chaste kiss. “Good girl. Now, turn around.”
She turned, heart pounding in her chest.
“Tom, help her with her dress,” he directed.
Tom’s fingers were at her back, brushing over her skin as he undid the fastenings of her silvery evening gown. It was the work of moments before he slipped it off her shoulders and it fluttered to the floor. She turned back around, still wearing her stays and silk drawers.
Burke nodded his approval. “Get the rest of your clothes off and get on my bed, love. I need to tease Tom some more.”
With a smile she backed towards the bed, her hands going to the hooks of her stays. She didn’t want to miss a thing. Both men watched her as she undid each fastening. The stays slipped from her shoulders, followed quickly by her silk drawers, leaving her standing in nothing but her stockings. She bent down to slip them off, but Tom’s voice stopped her.
“Keep those on, sweet girl.”
“Get on the bed,” Burke repeated. “And don’t touch your cunt. That belongs to Tom tonight.”
She sat on the end of Burke’s bed. She’d never actually been on his bed before. He always came to her. There was something about being in this space that excited her, further proof that she wasn’t in control…nor was she the center of attention. It didn’t discomfit her. In fact, it thrilled her. Her sex may be aching with the desire to be touched, but there was something so exhilarating about knowing she had to wait her turn. In the meantime, she got to watch.
Burke turned his attention back to Tom. He had one hand on Tom’s shoulder, the other at his waist. They held each other’s gaze as Tom’s hands slid up Burke’s torso, over his chest, and cupped his face. He pulled Burke to him in a kiss that had them both sighing again. In no time it went from fevered to desperate, with Burke taking charge, dropping his mouth to Tom’s neck, his collarbone.
Tom tipped his head back, eyes shut in bliss, as Burke teased him with lips and tongue. Rosalie held in a whimper as she realized Burke was tracing his tattoos. How many times had Rosalie done the same thing? He worked his way over from the ship to the cross, his lips brushing against the anchor over Tom’s heart. Wrapping his arms tightly around Tom, Burke’s kiss turned into more, bending Tom back until he was barking out in pain.
The men broke apart, both panting. Tom raised a hand and brushed it over the anchor tattoo on his chest. Burke bit him hard enough to draw blood. Tom’s eyes were wild as he looked at Burke.
Burke swiped a finger over the bite mark, looking down at the faint smear of blood on the tip. As Rosalie and Tom watched, he licked it clean. Then he wrapped that same hand in Tom’s hair, jerking him close. “You’re mine, Tom. You’ve waited fifteen years for me. Say the words, and you can have me in all the ways your heart desires.”
“Oh, Christ…I’m yours,” Tom murmured, kissing a line up Burke’s neck, pressing himself against him. “I’m yours, I’m yours. I’m hers and I’m yours. God, please, take me and fill me, Burke. I’m dying with wanting you both. Need you so goddamn much.” He plunged his hand inside Burke’s breeches, wrapping it around his cock.
Rosalie whined with need, resisting the urge to touch herself. She was aching, weeping, begging to be filled. But she also wanted to keep watching.
The men heard her needy sound, and both turned. Tom held her gaze as he pumped Burke’s cock, his eyes hooded with desire. Burke dropped his mouth back to Tom’s chest, licking again at the bite mark. Tom shivered, his hand stilling.
“Our sweet siren needs attention now,” Burke murmured, curling his hand around to cup Tom’s backside. “I don’t touch this perfect arse again until she comes on your face.”
Tom pulled his hand loose from Burke’s breeches and all but stumbled towards her. He undid the fall of his breeches as he walked, slipping them off before he climbed naked onto the end of the bed.
Rosalie sat back on her elbows, watching him kneel over her. The longing in his face had her heart overflowing. She opened her knees in invitation. Tom climbed between them and up her body to claim her lips in a heady kiss.
“I love you, Rose,” he said against her lips. “I love you so goddamn much. I’ll never get used to saying it. It’s a gift to say it.”
“I love you,” she replied, trying to be gentle with his tender lips, but feeling ravenous all the same.
He didn’t kiss her for long before he was inching back, peppering her breasts and stomach with fevered kisses. He pressed her thighs apart, resting his forehead on her pubic bone and inhaling deep. She quivered with nervous excitement.
“God, this scent…it haunts me. And you’re so wet, you’re dripping for us. Your cunt is what dreams are made of. Burke, come look before I claim it. Look at how beautiful she is for us.”
She whined, fighting the urge to squirm as Burke came to the end of the bed, trailing his hand up her stocking-clad leg. He leaned over Tom, his eyes hungry as he looked at her spread open for them. “Let me taste her.”
Tom reached out his unbandaged hand, sinking two fingers into her. She gasped as he gave them a little twist, dragging them along her inner wall. He pulled them out and held them up. They glistened in the candlelight.
Burke leaned over his shoulder and sucked them into his mouth. “Divine,” he muttered. “The sweetest sacrament.”
Not wasting a moment with chaste kisses or teasing licks, Tom dropped down onto his bruised and bitten chest and buried his face between her legs. She cried out, gripping the coverlet with both hands, curling forward as Tom ravaged her, spiraling her so high so fast she thought she might spark like a lit candle. Thinking of the two of them kissing tipped her over the edge and her first release shivered through her. Legs shaking, she pushed on Tom’s forehead, begging for mercy.
He sank back, his hands smoothing up her thighs as he panted for breath.
“If he’s touching me, you have to touch him,” she directed at Burke.
“You don’t want to come again first?” Burke said with a raised brow, his arms crossed as he leaned against the post of his bed. He stood there as casual as can be, as if he didn’t just watch Tom feast on her.
“I want you with us,” she replied. “Please, love. We need you.”
“I’m dying,” Tom muttered, brushing her inner thigh with kisses.
“Tell me what you want, Tom,” Burke replied. “I’ve never—”
He stopped himself, but not quick enough. It was then that Rosalie realized the truth. Burke was nervous…or at least hesitant. He’d never been with a man before. He didn’t want to get this wrong.
Tom heard it too because he was turning on his knees. He pulled Burke into his arms, kissing his neck. “It’s no different than when you take Rosalie. You won’t hurt me.”
“It is different. This is different, Tom. You’re not all interchangeable to me,” Burke said, almost irritated.
Rosalie rolled to her knees and joined Tom at the end of the bed. “Burke, I love you. I know I don’t say it as often as you’d like, but I do. I love you, and I love Tom, and I love what you’ve found in each other. Be with us. Claim us both. We are yours. We want to be yours.”
With a pained expression, Burke uttered one word. “James.”
Rosalie sank back as Burke wrapped an arm around Tom’s neck. “I want this so badly, I can scarcely breathe. I want you, Tom…but I feel like I’m cheating on James. He and I are nothing, I know that. We’ve never—but he is my world—”
“You and James are everything,” Rosalie replied, trying to control the tremble in her voice. “No one who has seen you together for two minutes can doubt the affection he holds for you.”
“You are his world too,” Tom added, cupping his face. “You are more than a brother to him, more than a friend or a partner or a lover. You are his soul mate, Burke. You are one spirit made two. I’ve always known that about you. I’ve been jealous more times than I can count.”
Burke groaned. “Having him on the outside is killing me. I need him here with us. I need him to want to be here. Why can he not just come in from the cold?”
Tom was quiet, giving Burke’s arm a soothing stroke.
Rosalie bit her lip, knowing how much she was to blame for this tension. “James’ timing is his own,” she replied. “I know I’ve made things difficult…I am difficult. He wants what I’m afraid to give. And without realizing it, he punishes us all. If I give in, perhaps…”
“No,” Tom growled. “You shouldn’t have to make such a sacrifice. Your freedom is valuable to you, so it is valuable to me. I’ll not let him take it. Nothing is worth you losing yourself to gain his love.”
She nodded. But she didn’t want a cloud over this moment. She looked from Tom back to Burke. “In this moment, this feels right. We need you, Burke. Make us whole. Make three become one. And have no doubt that, when James is ready, he will be the center of our world.”
Burke nodded, licking his lips as he glanced from Tom to Rosalie. “I want you both so badly. I need you in my arms.”
“We are right here,” she whispered, scooting back on the bed and laying down. “Tom, come. Make love to me again, and let Burke take care of us.”
Tom followed her to the middle of the bed, rolling on top of her as he lost himself in the feel of her, kissing and roving with his hands, shifting between her legs until his cock was pressing at her entrance.
“Wait,” Burke said, sinking onto the bed behind them. He pulled back on Tom’s hips, taking hold of his cock. Tom groaned and it only took Rosalie a moment to realize Burke was slipping on a French letter.
As soon as it was on, Tom lifted her hips and slid home, filling her with a thrust. He adjusted his position, curling his hand under her thigh to spread her wider, letting his cock sink deeper. She shivered, gripping his hips, as he touched a point deep inside.
“Yes,” Tom rasped. “Feel you there, sweet girl.” He pressed in again, and she clenched tighter. “Right there. God, your cunt is my heaven. Burke, please.”
Burke shifted on the bed behind them. “Need to stretch you out,” he muttered at Tom’s shoulder. “I don’t want my thick cock to damage this sweet arse.”
Tom buried his face in Rosalie’s shoulder, his whole body going still.
“Tell me what you’re doing,” she whispered. “Tell me how it feels.”
“I have a finger inside him,” Burke muttered.
“More,” said Tom. “Feels so good—ah—”
“Two fingers,” Burke said with a smirk. “Move, Tom. Fuck my hand and fuck our girl.”
With a growl, Tom thrust into her once, twice.
She couldn’t contain her smile, as turned on by Tom’s cock inside her as she was by Burke taking him for the first time.
“Please, Burke,” Tom whined. “Please, I’m ready. Stop teasing me and give me what I need.”
Burke shifted into position, gripping tight to Tom’s hip. Rosalie felt Tom’s cock twitch when Burke penetrated him.
“God, yesss,” Tom said in a hiss, moving his hips in little thrusts.
“Not yet,” Burke panted. “Not—almost—holy hell, you’re so tight.”
“It’s been a while,” Tom huffed, trying to control his breathing.
“Christ, I’m in.” Burke folded over them.
“Move, Burke,” he said. “You have to move. Own me.”
“Own us both,” Rosalie pleaded.
Wasting no time, Burke began thrusting. It was a wholly new sensation for Rosalie to be so weighed down by the press of her men, feeling one moving inside her as the result of the other moving inside him. She tipped her head back and closed her eyes, savoring the feeling of union she felt in their arms.
Shifting her leg let Tom sink in a little deeper. She cried out, feeling new glorious friction. “Harder,” she panted. “Please, take us harder.”
Burke grabbed hold of Tom’s hips and began to rut, slamming into Tom hard enough to have Rosalie inching back on the bed.
“Yes,” she cried, feeling every muscle in Tom’s body go tense. “God, please—don’t stop—”
Burke adjusted his position, taking one arm and wrapping it around Tom’s throat, pulling him back until they were both nearly upright. It was all Tom could do to grab hold of her hips and tip them up to keep himself buried inside her. Something about the change in angle had her seeing stars. Her entire body coiled tight, and her mouth opened in a silent scream. Wave after wave of release crested through her, sending a ripple effect through her entire body. She gripped tight to Tom’s cock as she leapt from the height of her ecstasy, willing to take them both crashing down with her.
Tom came first, all but collapsing on top of her, his arms and legs useless for holding his weight. A few more thrusts and Burke was gone, spilling his seed inside his friend.
Rosalie opened her eyes to see both her men euphoric on top of her.
“You’re both mine now,” Burke panted. “All mine.”
“Yours,” Rosalie echoed, smoothing the hair off Tom’s sweaty brow.
“We’ve been yours,” Tom replied.
Rosalie didn’t miss the happy, sated smile that flashed across Burke’s face.
“And what did this little endeavor earn you, Tom?” he teased, leaning over them both to kiss Tom’s cheek.
It was Tom’s turn to smile. “Horatio,” he murmured, still resting his face on Rosalie’s chest. “I get to call you Horatio.”
