Chapter Thirty-Two Beckett
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
BECKETT
The stats don’t lie
A T HOME , I GRAB A T UPPERWARE OF LEFTOVER LASAGNA THAT W ILL made last night and nuke it in the microwave. It’s probably not wise to carbo-load right before a potential sex date, but I’m not taking it for granted that Charlie changed her mind about anything. And I’m famished.
“I’m gonna go take a real shower,” Will says after we’ve devoured all the leftovers. “St. Anthony’s water pressure is dogshit. I think I still have shampoo in my hair.”
A shower doesn’t sound like a bad idea. And it might be prudent to get some manscaping going.
Just in case.
We disappear into our respective bedrooms, reconvening downstairs a half hour later, where I grab some beers while Will puts on a movie from the Timeline franchise.
“Yo, did you see there’s a new one coming out next year?” he calls toward the kitchen.
“What? No way.” I return with two tall cans of IPA, handing him one.
“Literally just saw it on my feed.” He holds up his phone as proof.
“Is Lykander coming back?” I demand.
Bobby Lykander is the actor who’s starred in all four of the Timeline movies, but the last one ended in his tragic death. At the hand of his younger self. Fucking devastating.
Will glances at his screen, scrolling. “He’s on the cast list, but we don’t know if it’ll be flashbacks or if this means Qualls survived.”
“He totally survived. Or at the very least, he went even further back in time to make sure he didn’t die. Obviously.”
“Obviously.”
The doorbell rings. We exchange a look.
“I’ll let her in,” I say, then wander toward the front hall.
I open the front door to find Charlie on the stoop.
My jaw drops. “What are you wearing?”
She looks confused. “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing? It’s just leggings and a sweatshirt.”
“Exactly. It’s just leggings and a sweatshirt,” I say petulantly. “That’s not your usual outfit. Where’s the thigh highs? Where’s the pleated skirt? You’re supposed to be fulfilling my schoolgirl fantasy.”
She snorts and punches me in the chest, then bypasses me to step inside. “Sorry, but I don’t dress up for you, Ice Boy.”
“You should start, sugar puff. I dress up for you.”
“Oh really? You wore those gray sweatpants for me? And this T-shirt that’s so thin it looks like it’s going to fall apart if I pull on it?” As if to emphasize that, she tugs the fabric teasingly.
I grin at her. “I actually did wear this for you.”
“Oh really?” she repeats as she trails me into the living room.
“Statistically speaking, a woman’s sexual arousal heightens by three hundred percent at the sight of gray sweatpants.”
“The stats don’t lie,” Will calls from the sectional.
“Where are your sweatpants then?” she challenges. He’s wearing loose pants in a dark plaid and no shirt. Will runs hot.
“I didn’t want to arouse you too much,” he says with a solemn look. “It’s also common knowledge that too many sweatpants are overkill.”
“Stats don’t lie,” I concur.
“Hey,” she says as she sits in the middle section of the couch, “why can’t you trust a statistician?”
“Why?” Will asks suspiciously.
She pauses for effect. “Because they’re always plotting something.”
He sighs. “Why do I like you?”
Charlie breaks out in a smile. It’s nice to see her smiling. She seemed so down last time I saw her, at least before her distraction by orgasm.
Guilt pokes at me. I want to bring up her brother and ask how she’s doing, if she’s having an easier time processing everything.
Instead, I offer her a drink. “Green tea as usual?”
She lifts a brow. “Just because I had it once doesn’t mean it’s my usual drink order.”
“Okay, what do you want to drink then?”
“Green tea, please.”
My grin’s so big, my face actually hurts. This girl is too damn cute.
I go to the kitchen to turn on the electric kettle, then lean against the doorway between the two rooms while I wait for the water to boil. This time, I find the courage to broach a serious topic.
“You feeling any better about the whole brother situation?” I ask.
“Maybe a little.” She hesitates for a second. “Harrison told me my Korean name. The orphanage in Seoul didn’t bother including it in any of the adoption papers, but he remembers it.”
“Yeah?” I’m intrigued. “And?”
“It’s Hae-Won.” Pink splotches rise in her cheeks, and I can see the emotion in her eyes. This means a lot to her.
“Hae-Won,” Will repeats, a smile appearing. “I like it. That’s really pretty.”
“Thanks.” She smiles back, but it fades fast. “I still don’t know how to approach this, though. It’s so weird, suddenly having a sibling I never knew about. We’ve been texting all week, but it’s like trying to make friends with a stranger you met at a party one time. Trying to figure out what you have in common. What makes the other person tick. And it doesn’t help that Harrison had a really, really bad childhood.” Charlie wears a guilty look. “It’s a lot of effort, and a part of me wonders if it’s worth it. Like, I went twenty-one years without having this guy in my life and I was doing just fine.”
“I get that.” I offer a shrug. “But look, I’m an only child, and I spent a lot of time growing up wishing I had a sibling. I still think about it sometimes.”
“I do too,” Will admits quietly. “As another member of the only child club.”
I glance back at Charlie. “If it were me, I’d make the effort to get to know him. You might regret it if you don’t at least try.”
The kettle clicks, and I duck back into the kitchen to prepare Charlie’s tea, hearing them continue to talk about the situation in the other room. A minute later, I bring her a steaming mug and set it on the table next to my beer. I settle on the other end of the couch, keeping some distance between me and Charlie.
“Let’s not talk about it anymore,” she says.
Will tips his head toward her. “You sure? ’Cause we’re happy to listen.”
“I know, and I appreciate it. But it’s just too much to think about. It’s going to overload me.”
“Does that happen a lot?” I ask her. “Getting overloaded?”
“I mean… Yes. I’m a STEM major. It’s senior year. I’ve got a capstone project to finish. Grad school essays that are due. I’m the VP of finance of my sorority, and we’re planning a huge gala. I’ve got a Little I’m supposed to mentor. A biological brother who showed up out of nowhere. I’m lusting over two boys—”
She stops, her mouth snapping shut.
Will grins.
I can’t stop a chuckle. “Lusting, are we?”
“Just shut up.”
We both laugh harder.
“Very mature of you, Charlotte,” I chide.
“I’m not Charlotte. I’m Charlie right now. Charlie tells people to shut up.”
“Yeah. What else does Charlie do?”
When she frowns, I realize how that sounded.
“That wasn’t a challenge,” I assure her. “I promise. No expectations tonight.”
“No?”
“We’re just watching a movie. Like last time.”
“Last time ended with sex.”
“Doesn’t mean that’s the precedent.”
“That’s exactly what setting a precedent is!” She sighs, glancing at the screen, which is frozen on a shot of Professor Qualls about to kiss the hot diamond thief he saved in the last movie. “Fine. What are we watching? Another one of your love-triangle rom-coms where you get to see boobs?”
Will chuckles. “No. It’s the most recent installment in the Timeline franchise. Number four.”
“You know, I’ve never actually seen these movies.”
I gape at her. “How is that possible?”
“I don’t have time to watch movies. Did you not hear that entire list of stressors I recited for you?” She pulls her knees up, making herself more comfortable as Will unpauses the movie. “Do you need to catch me up on the first three?”
“Nah, they’re all self-explanatory. That’s the professor who invented the time machine. The hot blond is his current love interest, but she’ll betray him. They always do. And the dude walking in right now is Professor Qualls’s son.” I nod at the bearded man gracing the screen.
“Wait, that’s his son? They look the same age—Ohhhh.” She nods. She gets it. “Time travel.”
Will snickers. “We’ve got a smart cookie over here, Beck.”
“The smartest.”
“Shut up. I’m just going to keep saying it all night. Shut up.”
I grab my beer off the table, my arm brushing hers when I straighten up. “Sorry,” I murmur.
“No, you’re not.”
My lips twitch. “I mean, I didn’t do it on purpose. But you’re right. I’m not sorry.”
Smirking around the rim of the can, I sip my IPA. I feel her watching me as I drink. When Will rakes his hand through his hair, I see her track that too.
She’s very aware of us. And I’m very aware of her. She repositions herself, stretching her legs to rest her feet on the table. Her socks are pink. So is the tank top she’s wearing underneath her oversize gray sweatshirt, which is falling off one shoulder. I wonder if she’s got a bra on beneath the tank. She wasn’t wearing one the night we met her for drinks in the suburbs of Boston, at the most random bar where nobody would see how naughty she was being. I remember the way her hard little nipples strained against her top.
My mouth is suddenly tingling. Fuck. I need to suck on something.
I take another sip, bringing much needed moisture into my mouth.
Charlie snorts at the cheesy joke Professor Qualls just made. The snort is somehow both sexy and adorable. Will’s laughing too. Deep and husky. For a second, my libido is like, what the fuck is happening? I have these two hot people beside me, and nobody’s naked. This feels like a travesty.
Still giggling, Charlie leans forward to pick up her tea. She blows on the liquid to cool it, but each time she raises the mug to her lips, she chickens out and doesn’t sip it.
Will, who’s also observing the great hot tea dilemma, finally breaks out in a grin. “Do it.”
“I don’t want to burn my tongue,” she whines.
“Do it,” he urges. “Feel the burn.”
With a deep breath, her entire body tensed up, Charlie takes the tiniest, most fearful sip I’ve ever seen. Steam moistens her face, and her nose turns red, as do her cheeks. I want nothing more than to snatch that mug out of her hand, pull down her leggings, and screw her brains out.
Yes. I am getting aroused watching a woman drink tea.
This is a first.
“Okay, that wasn’t too bad,” she relents before returning her attention to the movie.
Will is still trying to explain the plotline to her, his face becoming animated. “So basically, in the last movie, the professor found out he has a son with Maritza, the Spanish assassin he had an affair with when he time traveled to eighteenth-century Spain. He was trying to stop her from assassinating the man who in ten years would invent the cure for the rare blood disease that killed the professor’s first wife—”
He’s midsentence when Charlie leans over and kisses him.
The move catches him off guard. Catches me off guard too. I blink, and suddenly her mouth is glued to Will’s.
Before he can kiss her back, she eases away and says, “Sorry.”
I snicker into my beer.
Charlie glances at me now. “I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing to me?”
“Because I kissed Will.” She groans. “He just looked so hot while he was explaining that crazy plot.”
“Yeah, I know. Sci-fi gives him a real hard-on,” I tell her, and Will sighs.
At the word hard-on , Charlie looks at my crotch.
“Why are you looking down there?” I grin at her.
“I don’t know.” She lets out another groan. “I’m just so…”
“Horny,” I supply.
Will chuckles.
“Conflicted,” she corrects.
“Because you’re horny.”
“Yes. Yes . Okay?” Her face turns bright red. “Ugh. I don’t even know why I’m here.”
“Yes, you do,” Will says softly.
Her gaze shifts to me again. “Beckett, did you mean what you wrote in that message?”
“Which part? Actually, it doesn’t matter. I meant every part. So yes, I meant what I wrote in the message.”
A smile tickles her lips. “About how my wild and fearless side is your favorite thing about me.”
“It is.” My voice is gruff, earnest.
She looks at Will.
His expression shines with sincerity. “I’ve never been drawn to anyone the way I’m drawn to you.”
He feels it too, I realize. This inexorable pull toward her. And I feel like I’m watching it in slow motion as he curls his hand around the back of her neck and brings her face to his. My cock swells when he kisses her.
It’s a measured, exploratory kiss. I see his tongue slip into her mouth. The tip of her tongue touching his. Her body arching toward him. She presses her palm to his bare chest, running her fingers over the dusting of hair there.
My dick pushes against my pants, half-mast.
“I’m sorry,” Charlie blurts out, breaking the kiss.
He blinks. “For what?”
“I judged you.” Deep remorse fills her eyes. “I made you feel like you weren’t normal. Both of you. But…I don’t actually feel that way. I wouldn’t have matched with you on the app if I thought you guys were sleazy for being into what you’re into.”
Will nods thoughtfully. “Why were you ashamed about what happened between us? Because you felt regret?”
He has this calming effect on people. Sometimes his gaze bores into you, as if he’s reading your mind, seeing into your heart. Finding all the scattered, broken pieces inside and putting them back together for you so he can show you what the final puzzle is supposed to look like.
“No,” Charlie confesses, visibly swallowing. “I didn’t feel regret. I enjoyed every second of that night.”
“Then you weren’t feeling your own shame. It was external. You felt shamed .”
A crease appears in her forehead. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
“No. If there’s shame or guilt because you truly felt like you did something wrong, that’s one thing. But if you’re letting yourself feel like crap based on other people’s opinions… opinions they haven’t even offered… opinions you imagine they’ll have if they find out… then that’s not shame.” He strokes her cheek. “Nobody has to find out, Charlie. Nothing we do in here ever leaves this house.”
She twists toward me for confirmation, biting her lip.
“Sacred space,” I confirm, quirking a smile.
Her teeth release her lip, and her tongue comes out as if soothing a sting. I want to be the one licking her lip. I see Will’s eyes flare, and I know he’s thinking the same thing.
“So,” he says, “should we keep watching this movie? Or…”
“Or what?” she asks.
“You tell us. What do you want?”
After a long, drawn-out moment in which both Will and I sit on pins and needles, Charlie finally releases an agonized breath.
“I want you ,” she says, and then she kisses him again.
There should be a flicker of jealousy, a spark of resentment, that she keeps kissing him first, but all I feel is anticipation as I watch her lips meet Will’s.
He’s breathing hard by the time she releases him. Then she turns around and crawls on the couch toward me. It’s the hottest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
“And you,” she says, her mouth covering mine. “I want you .”
I let her have my tongue, just for a few seconds, a few teasing licks.
“What else?” I rasp. “What else do you want?”
“I want…” Her chest rises as she inhales. She glances toward the window as if to check if the curtains are drawn. They are. She exhales in an unsteady burst. “I want your dick in my mouth.”
Jesus. I don’t even know which one of us she’s asking for, but we both obey. I ease my sweatpants down, releasing my erection. I’m so hard it hurts. On the chaise, Will takes off his pants and tosses them aside, leaving him fully naked, all chiseled abs and tight sinew.
Charlie slides onto the floor in front of me. My heart stops when she grips me, her delicate fingers curling around my shaft to give it a slow, teasing stroke.
Her touch is too soft. It’s torture. I want her nails digging into my thighs. I want the greedy suction of her lips around my cock.
I watch her with a mixture of hunger and frustration. “Suck it,” I beg.
The impish gleam in her eyes tells me she’s not going to make this easy for me. She’s going to tease. Take her time. Draw every ounce of control out of me until I’m left with nothing but raw need.
Sure enough, she releases me and turns her cheek, pressing her mouth to my thigh. My hip. Trailing kisses over my abdomen.
I meet Will’s eyes over her head, and he grins at my strained expression. “I’m kind of enjoying this,” he says, gripping himself as he watches Charlie torment me with kisses. “Keep torturing him, baby.”
“Fuck you, Larsen,” I mumble.
Charlie’s laughter heats my thigh. Her tongue dances over my obliques before finally reaching the one part of me that’s throbbing for her.
She lowers her mouth to my cock. She just grazes the head before she pulls back, smiling, testing my limits.
“Charlie,” I growl. “No more teasing.”
Her tongue darts out to taste me, circling the tip, skimming over the sensitive underside. Will continues to watch us from the chaise, lazily stroking himself.
My fingers find her hair and thread through the silky black strands as she takes me deeper into her mouth. Then she hollows her cheeks and sucks hard enough to make me groan. Pleasure shoots through me like wildfire, spreading fast and relentless. My control slips each time her mouth engulfs me.
She sucks hard and fast, until I’m forced to grind out a warning. “I’m gonna come if you don’t slow down, baby girl.”
Breathless, she pumps me with her hand and offers an amused taunt. “First you want me to stop teasing, now you want me to slow down. Make up your mind, baby boy.”
Will shudders with laughter.
“Fuck off, Larsen—”
I’m cut off by the feel of her mouth sucking me deep again.
Holy hell, she’s trying to kill me. At my hoarse moan, I see her smiling around the head of my dick.
Addicted. I’m addicted to this girl. It’s like she knows exactly how to break me down piece by piece. And it isn’t just the physical connection. There’s something more dangerous lurking beneath the surface, but I can’t let myself think about it. Not now. So I bury those thoughts and focus on the heat of her mouth, the way her tongue slides along my shaft, driving me higher and higher.
When she picks up her pace again, I still her with my hand in her hair. My cock is still caught between her lips as she peers up at me. So sweet and innocent.
“I mean it. Slow down unless you want my come.”
She releases me to whisper, “I want it,” and then gobbles me up again.
I really want to fuck her, but hell, the woman wants my come down her throat. Who am I to deprive her? So I fuck her mouth, and she takes every inch, moaning around me while gazing up at me with those big dark eyes.
“You want it?” I grip her hair a little tighter as the pressure builds inside me.
She moans.
I take that as a yes.
I cup the back of her head and thrust as deep as she’ll let me. My entire world narrows to just her—her mouth, her tongue, her hand, her whimpers. Her .
My stomach clenches tight, the release tingling in my balls before spilling over, filling Charlie’s mouth. I grunt in pleasure, groaning her name as I come, my mind blank from the intensity of it.
Will chuckles as he watches me shudder. “That good?”
“Better,” I choke out.
He stands up and strokes himself as she continues to suck on me. When my heart finally stops pounding, I pull out of her mouth and collapse backward. Christ. That was…otherworldly.
Charlie is mighty pleased with herself as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. She turns toward Will, rising taller on her knees, her fingers trailing up his thighs, and she looks so naughty doing it, my cock is almost ready to go again.
To distract myself from the growing arousal, I get to my feet and come up behind Charlie, lowering my hand to her hair. Twisting it around my fist, I guide her along Will’s shaft, watching as she blows him. She’s still fully clothed, and he’s buck naked, his hips moving to meet her eager pulls on his dick. It’s so damn hot.
“Ah, look at what a good girl you are,” I encourage her. “Keep sucking. You’re making him feel so good.”
She slips one hand between her legs, cupping herself over her leggings.
I grin down at her. “You want to take those off, don’t you? You want your fingers inside yourself while you suck him?”
She nods. Her cheeks are flushed, her expression a haze of need.
“Too bad. You’ll just have to sit there, wet and throbbing. You don’t get yours until Larsen gets his.”
Will groans.
“See? He likes the sound of that,” I say with a chuckle.
His shaft is slick with her saliva, the head leaking precome that she swipes her tongue over it on every upstroke. I absentmindedly stroke myself as I watch her pleasure Will.
“You’re so good at that, Charlie,” he praises, his voice low and husky. “So sweet.” He jerks when she swirls her tongue over his swollen cockhead. “ Fuck .”
Charlie starts moving faster, but I know Will. It’s not fast enough. He likes it rougher than this. Sure enough, he replaces her mouth with his fist, pumping himself with more force. As he strokes faster, I tighten my grip in Charlie’s hair, tugging her face closer to Will’s cock.
“Open your mouth, baby. I want to see him come on your tongue. I want to see you swallow it.”
She moans and opens her mouth.
Just like that, Will shoots, cursing as we both watch her swallow it up. Charlie barely gets to her feet before we’re ripping at her clothes, breaking a record for how fast we get our girl naked.
“C’mere,” I say gruffly, wrapping my arm around her waist. I press my lips to hers in a slow kiss, enjoying the way her hard nipples brush my chest as she arches into me. I taste Will on her tongue and groan against her mouth.
Larsen needs some recovery time but apparently has no qualms making decisions for my penis. His eyes meet mine, burning with intensity.
“Get your cock hard, Beck. Our girl needs it.”
Charlie sighs happily.
Damn, I’ve never been with anybody like her before. This woman has no inhibitions when she opens herself up to a new experience. She throws herself headfirst into it, same way I do.
I really like her.
The thought lingers at the edge of my mind, no matter how much I try to push it away.
I can’t let myself go there, though. Can’t let myself admit that I might be feeling more than lust for her. Because she’s not only here with me. She’s with Will too, and whatever we have, whatever this is, it isn’t meant to be more than just…this.