After Marcus brings me to orgasm twice before coming inside me again, we both doze, exhausted and spent.
I wake up as the light outside is changing from a rosy glow to the hazy blue of post-sunset.
Shit. I have to work tonight.
My body feels both sated and sore, and I’m sprawled out on my back on the large bed with Marcus’s heavy arm draped over my stomach. I gaze down at his hand, at the numbers imprinted onto his skin, and a strange feeling washes over me.
That date will always be irrevocably embedded in my memory.
My entire life changed that night.
But somehow, I think Marcus’s did too.
I brush my fingers over the scars on my chest, then down my ruined arm. There are a few near my elbow that I can’t see because of the tattoos, but I know exactly where they are.
Was any part of that night fate?
Or was it all just random luck?
Turning my head to look at Marcus, I take in his sleeping form. The lines of his face are just as hard and intense in sleep as they are when he’s awake, but something around his mouth and eyes seems to have relaxed a bit. His long lashes brush his cheeks, and he looks almost boyish like this. At peace.
“You’re right. It wasn’t an accident,” I whisper, my voice hardly more than a breath.
I’ve never said that out loud. Not even to myself. I’ve spent two and a half years insisting the opposite was true, telling myself maybe I never really saw the gun before it fired—maybe I didn’t know the danger I was stepping into.
But I did know.
I saw the gun, and I knew what was coming.
Maybe I’ll never fully understand why I did it, but that doesn’t change the fact that in that moment, I made a choice.
I chose to save Marcus Constantine’s life. To exchange mine for his.
Except I lived too, against all odds.
Marcus stirs a little in his sleep, grunting softly. He’s still dead to the world, and I’m sure he didn’t hear me speak.
Good. He wasn’t meant to.
It’s a vulnerable thing, to fall asleep with someone. I can’t believe I did it with him, but I also can’t quite believe he’s done it with me. For as much as this man wants access to every part of my life, he seems just as adamant about keeping parts of his own on lockdown. I know there are secrets he’s keeping from me, and I wonder if I should’ve pushed harder to uncover them.
For a long time, I intentionally avoided asking him personal questions or trying to learn more about his life. I didn’t want to strengthen whatever strange connection seemed to exist between us, to make it any more real than it already felt.
But I think it’s a little too fucking late for that now.
With that thought at the forefront of my mind, I carefully slide out from under his arm, moving slowly to be sure I don’t wake him. I pad across the room to collect my clothes, getting dressed quickly.
I was a sticky mess when I fell asleep, but there’s no cum drying on my inner thighs, which makes me think Marcus must’ve cleaned me up again before he passed out. I don’t know quite how to feel about that, so I choose not to fixate on it, slipping the door open quietly and stepping out into the hall.
I leave my jacket, my single shoe, and my prosthesis in the bedroom, and when I pass my other shoe in the hall, I leave that one too. I’ll come back for them later. I still have a few hours before I need to be at Duke’s, and I have a very strong feeling I know what Marcus’s reaction will be if I try to take the bus home before work.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t poke around a little bit before he wakes up. Stalking can go both ways, and now it’s my turn.
My bare feet are quiet on the stairs, and when I reach the large entry room on the first floor, I stop and turn in a circle. This is the only other room of the house I’ve ever seen, and to be fair, I’ve barely seen this one.
It’s big and airy, minimally decorated in a way that feels intentional instead of just lazy. A hallway at the back of the room cuts under the stairs to lead deeper into the house, and I can see a living room through another large, open doorway.
After a moment of consideration, I head toward the hall. The house seems big from the outside, and I want to see how far back it goes.
When I’m halfway down the hall, though, I hear quiet voices coming from up ahead of me. As I draw a little closer, I recognize the distinctive crack of pool balls clacking together, and when I round the doorway of the room, I find Ryland bent over a pool table while Theo watches him line up his shot.
Ryland’s gaze catches mine at the same moment he moves his cue, and his shot goes wide. The ball bounces off the rails, and Theo crows in victory.
“What are you doing down here?” Rylands asks, cranky as ever. He straightens and backs away from the table as Theo steps forward.
“Why? Am I not allowed to go into the west wing?”
The look he shoots me makes it obvious he doesn’t get my Beauty and the Beast reference. And why the fuck would he? The guy doesn’t exactly look like he watches Disney movies for fun.
“You can do whatever you want. It’s not my house.” He shrugs his broad shoulders.
I roll my eyes. “Thanks.”
“Marcus still sleeping?” Theo asks, looking over his shoulder from where he’s lining up his shot. His tall body leans over the pool table gracefully, and the sleeves of his t-shirt stretch over the muscles of his biceps.
“Yeah. How’d you know we were asleep?”
His face splits in a lopsided smile, the faintest hint of a dimple appearing in one cheek as he grins at me. “It got quiet. So.”
“Oh.” Memories of what happened upstairs earlier flit through my head, and my cheeks heat. There were some noises I remember making, but I’m sure there were plenty of others I don’t. “Right.”
Theo’s grin widens, but it’s not just humor that makes his blue-green eyes flash. There’s heat in them too, and I can’t keep my gaze from drifting down to his crooked smile again. I remember what his lips felt like on mine, what his tongue tasted like, and warmth slides down my spine.
Fuck. What am I even doing?
I clear my throat, turning away, but that only puts Ryland’s face directly in my vision again. He’s still watching me with a hard gaze, like he expects me to try to steal some of Marcus’s shit and run off with it.
Dragging my gaze away from his accusatory stare, I add, “Anyway, I just came downstairs to—”
“—play pool?” Theo takes his shot, then straightens and grins at me. His gaze drops to my right arm briefly, and his smile flickers. “Or, uh…”
I cock an eyebrow at him. “I’ll have you know I can play better than a lot of people with two good arms.”
The smile returns to his face, brighter than ever. He holds out his cue to me. “Yeah? Prove it.”
“It’s my shot,” Ryland bitches, but I ignore him and grab the cue.
I can feel both men watching me as I line up my shot, deliberately going for the balls Ryland missed earlier. There’s a pool table in the back room of Duke’s, and I sometimes go back there after we close if I’m not tired enough to go home. I don’t usually play against other people, but I’ve gotten pretty good.
I keep my arm steady as I gauge the angle, and when I shoot, I sink two striped balls into the corner and side pockets.
Theo chuckles, and Ryland lets out a low grunt.
I hand the cue back to the taller man, and Theo’s fingers brush against mine as he takes it, sending a cascade of sparks up my arm.
“Nice.” He looks honestly impressed.
“Thanks.” I give a little shrug and step back. As he bends over the table again, I glance at Ryland. “So what’s the deal with you guys and Carson Purcell? Why do you all hate each other so much?”
His eyes narrow, and he crosses his arms over his chest. “Why? What did Marcus tell you?”
“Does it matter? I’m asking you.”
His lips press together. I can tell he doesn’t appreciate the challenge in my voice, or the implication that he won’t say anything until he knows what Marcus said. “Nothing. There’s no deal.”
“Oh, come on, man.” Theo sinks the eight ball and then straightens, sharing a look with Ryland. “She was there. She knows that’s not true.”
“Marcus said your families run in the same circles,” I say, hoping if I get things rolling, they’ll tell me more than their friend did. “That he’s always had it out for you guys.”
“Yeah. Something like that.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes again at Ryland’s clipped answer. “So what does that have to do with Natalie?”
“He’s fucking with us,” Theo says, and Ryland’s gaze snaps to him, a warning look on his face. When I turn to face the blond man, he shrugs. “Trying to get a rise out of us.”
“Why?”
“He wants us to do something stupid.”
A barrage of images filter through my mind, making me shiver.
Marcus’s fist flying toward Greg’s face over and over. The lock hanging broken from Natalie’s apartment door. The glint of a gun barrel emerging from a car window.
These men lead lives that seem to constantly flirt with violence. What exactly would it mean for them to “do something stupid”?
“Are you going to?” I reach out to take the pool cue from Theo, looking up to meet his gaze.
“No.” He doesn’t release it right away, taking a small step closer to me instead. “We’re not.”
His proximity throws me off balance, and I hold on to the cue like it’s an anchor. I still feel Marcus everywhere on my body—inside my body. I don’t understand how I can have such a visceral reaction to another man while those marks are still on me.
The two of them are so different, such complete opposites in so many ways. Maybe that’s why I find myself drawn to them both. They each speak to a different side of me.
And Ryland…
Well. Ryland would obviously rather not speak to me at all.
“So, what do you say? Wanna play another game?” Theo slips back into a casual grin, and I can’t help but feel like he’s trying to downplay this Carson thing, whatever it is. Just like Marcus did. “I’ll rack ’em.”
“Yeah. All right.” I step back, leaning on the cue. “But for every shot I make, I get to ask you guys a question.”
“Why do you want to know about us so much?”
Ryland’s hard voice makes irritation flare inside me, and I turn to him as Theo gathers the balls from the pockets and resets them. “Maybe I’m just playing catch-up. You’ve been watching me since the night I got shot, and two and a half years is a long fucking time.”
Something passes over his face, like he’s fighting an internal battle with himself. I don’t know which side won and which side lost when he finally says, “Fine.”
“What do you do for a living?”
He scowls at me. “You haven’t even taken a shot yet.”
“He’s got you there, Rose.” Theo laughs. He grabs a third cue from a rack on the wall and breaks with practiced ease, sending the balls scattering across the table.
I sink my first shot and repeat the question.
“My family owns an international chain of hotels,” Ryland says, keeping his answer as short and non-informative as possible as he takes his own shot.
“And what do you do?”
“I help.”
“Huh.” I make a face, walking around the table to scope out a good angle. “Must be a rich person thing.”
“What do you mean?”
I flick a glance in his direction. “I work at Duke’s most nights, and I temp whenever I can on top of that. Every dollar in my bank account? I know exactly where it came from. When I ask you what you do for a living, you say your family owns hotels and that you help.” I shrug. “It’s just different. I’m sure you don’t clock in and out either.”
Ryland’s posture stiffens. He shoves his rolled sleeves higher up his arms, revealing a little more of the swirling ink on his forearms as he lifts his brows at me. “Are you saying you don’t think we’ve earned what we have?”
The expression on his face isn’t even quite anger, although his voice has a sharp edge to it. It’s more like… fuck, I don’t know what. I wish I could read him better.
I backpedal a little, surprised by his response. “No. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I don’t know your life. Clearly.”
I’m surprised again by the bitterness that coats my final word.
Surprised by the undeniable truth—that I want to.
“Your shot,” Theo says, nudging me gently with his shoulder and drawing me out of my silent standoff with his friend.
We keep playing, and although Ryland never seems happy about the game, his answers do get a little longer with each one he gives.
It’s a good thing I’m pretty decent at pool. That’s how I learn that the three men all live within five minutes of each other—which explains how Theo got here so quickly that night—that they’ve known each other since they were little boys, and that Marcus wanted to be a race car driver as a kid.
“Yeah. I can see that.” I snort, remembering the way his car whipped around corners on the way over here.
Theo grins at me, clearly enjoying spilling the embarrassing dirt on his friend. “He had a helmet with a racing stripe on it and everything. He used to wear that thing all the damn time.”
I cackle, trying to picture the intense, overwhelming man with the multi-colored eyes as a little kid, running around pretending to race cars. As I do, a strange ache squeezes my chest, and my laughter fades.
The other day in the car, I felt like Marcus was looking at me differently—seeing me as a whole person and not just some ephemeral idea he’d been following around for years. Am I starting to see him the same way?
And is that a good thing or a bad thing?
“What’s so funny?”
As if summoned by my thoughts, Marcus appears in the doorway. He’s pulled on his jeans, but he’s still shirtless and barefoot. He looks casual and powerful like this, like a lion ranging around the watering hole.
Theo glances over at him and grins. “Ah, nothing. Just telling Rose about your childhood aspirations.”
“You fucker.” Marcus chuckles, his voice still a little rough from sleep. “You know I’ve got embarrassing shit on you too, right?”
“Hey. You can tell her whatever you want. I’ve got nothing to hide.”
“Sure. So I’ll just mention the time you fell off the roof trying to sneak into Emily Scalese’s house—”
“All right, all right.” Theo holds up a hand, then looks at me. “It’s not what it sounds like.”
“Really?” I shoot back, shoving down the completely irrational twinge of jealousy at the thought of a teenage version of Theo sneaking into some girl’s house. “Because it sounds like you fell off a roof trying to get laid.”
He purses his lips, then shrugs. “Okay. It’s exactly what it sounds like.”
I can’t help the amused smile that breaks across my face as Marcus strides into the room, his bare feet silent on the floor. He wraps an arm around me and buries his face in the crook of my neck, inhaling my skin before pressing a kiss to it. A fresh wave of sensation pours through my body, as if I didn’t just get thoroughly fucked by this man a few hours ago, and I tear my gaze away from Theo, who’s watching us hungrily.
“You all right?” Marcus asks quietly as he lifts his head.
I don’t know if he’s referring to what happened at my apartment earlier, what happened between us upstairs, or what’s been happening in this room with his two friends, but when I hesitate for a second, gauging my emotional state, I find that I really do feel okay.
“Yeah.” I nod.
I’ve never had people who I could just hang out with and do something as simple as play a game of pool and give each other shit.
It’s… nice.
My life was a gray, colorless blur for a long fucking time. I did things, went through the motions of living, but I barely felt anything.
Now I can’t seem to stop feeling, and even though what I feel terrifies me half the time, I’m not sure if I’d want to go back to the way things were even if I could.
Even if that were an option.
But honestly? I don’t think it is.
