Chapter 41
forty-one
Avonna
Two Weeks Later
It’s too quiet when they’re both gone.
It isn’t peaceful. It’s a void. A bruise inside my chest.
I told myself I’d soak in some me time. Let the silence warm me like a sunbeam. Light incense, brew the ridiculous loose-leaf tea Linus bought at Fallon & Byrne tasting of, “notes of hay smoke and cherry pit.” Fold the laundry threatening to avalanche off the bedroom chair.
Give my body a rest from…
Instead, I’ve been pacing.
Wearing one of Liam’s soft black shirts, sleeves too long, hem brushing an inch below my bare pussy.
My nipples catch on the fabric every time I breathe.
They’re sensitive, needy. I’m not even trying to tease myself, but my body doesn’t know the difference between want and memory.
Every brush of cotton might as well be a mouth.
God, thinking of their mouths on me makes me wet. I’ve had them both now dozens of times and I’m not sure how I’d live without them.
Linus maps me with his tongue, every pass methodical, every pressure intentional. He listens to the tiny sounds I can’t hold back and licks my clit like a ritual.
Liam possesses me. His mouth is pure hunger and heat. He knows exactly how to lick my clit with careful greed. Devouring me with a pressure bordering on too much until it isn’t.
Linus touches me with intention. Liam touches me with instinct.
Linus uses two fingers when I’m tender, three when he wants to draw out every tremor, curling them with precision until I’m shaking. Liam fucks me like he needs to feel how deep I can take him, coaxing my body open for something bigger, something powerful, something he knows I’ll beg for.
And their cocks—God.
I feel myself creaming thinking about them.
Linus glides into me with purpose. The weight of him inside me feels grounding, like he’s pinning me to the world. Liam drives into me with fervor, like he’s breaking something open I didn’t know was closed.
They’re so different.
The strangest, most impossible thing is their differences don’t compete. My men fill places I didn’t know were missing. Linus gives me depth. Liam gives me edge. Linus steadies me. Liam ignites me.
Two sides of the same need. Two tastes of the same hunger.
I pace. My body doesn’t know how to choose which memory to yearn for.
It’s something deeper than sex. Bone-itching. Soul-pulling.
They’ve already given me two orgasms today and I find myself horny as hell with no one to take the edge off.
Linus is at the office attending to some emergency scheduling thing for the office move to Los Angeles.
All of the paperwork is in place, thanks to my dear friend, Marcella.
He was already zipping up his jacket and cursing traffic before Liam and I finished blinking awake.
Kissed us on the temples. Said he’d be “back by dinner, more or less, unless someone dies or sets the fuckin’ place on fire. ”
Liam bolted right afterward. Said he was meeting Padraig and his brother, Connor, who are both passing through town on their way back to Seattle.
I’m sure it’s true, but I know his deer-in-the-headlights look now. He smiles too quickly and says he’s popping out for a walk, but his phone is already in his hand lit up with Padraig’s name. They talk every day, multiple times.
I get it. News about Koko leaving is spreading through the industry.
In between fucking me and Linus, he agonizes about everything Fireball aspires to be and everything it has yet to become. Linus and I pretend it’s the only thing he’s conflicted about.
Anyway, I’m not in the mood to get myself off, so I decide to distract myself with music for a while. In the studio, my guitar leans against the wall by the spare bed like it’s the only other thing in this house with a heartbeat. I pull it into my lap. The body is cool and solid against my skin.
I strum once.
Twice.
The chords come immediately. The melody’s there, raw and waiting. I hum as I play and the words fall into place like I’ve been singing them in my sleep:
They told me not to love the fire
But God, I fed it anyway
Kissed mouths that weren’t mine to savor
Let them ruin me, every day.
Now there’s ash on all my sheets
Bruises where the halos slipped
I’d still take their holy touch
If they asked me to burn again.
I stop.
Whoa. I like this. A thread of something real. Something I need to follow all the way through. Not subtle. Not even metaphor.
Linus and Liam. Fucking them. Cherishing them. Loving them.
I’d take the weight of the three of us every single day. Our complicated history. Untangling old wounds and griefs. The twining of our bodies, hearts and souls.
Being with these two men feels more like home than anything I’ve ever known.
The front door clicks open.
I hear boots on the floorboards.
Only one pair.
Liam steps into the bedroom doorway, hair damp from the drizzle outside, windblown, cheeks flushed. His coat’s open, shirt sticking to his chest. My fingers are still on the strings, the last line lingering in the air.
His gaze lands on me sitting on the floor, legs crossed, wearing only his shirt with my pussy exposed. Something flickers behind his eyes. Lust. Hunger. Tempered with something hesitant. Careful.
“My brothers are on their way back to Seattle. Connor’s filming a documentary on the band.” His words rush out. “Padraig is hitchin’ a ride on the private jet.”
I nod. “How is he?”
“Wound up.” Liam shrugs out of his coat and slings it over the chair. “Keeps goin’ on about how it’ll be a nightmare to find someone new. Thinks we’ll end up stuck in singer purgatory.”
I tilt my head, watching him.
“He’s glad I’ve reconnected with Linus,” Liam adds, voice softer. “I told him about the management offer. Thinks we’ve got half a chance if we sign with Isis.”
A smile tugs at my lips. “So, no pressure then.”
Liam snorts and smirks.
God, I love it. Stupid how much.
His eyes flick to the guitar I’m cradling. “Did I interrupt? Are you writin’?”
“Trying.”
“What about?” He tries to sound casual, but I see how firmly he grips the back of the chair. Like he’s bracing.
I answer honestly. “How I feel about what’s happening.”
His face shifts. Something cracks a little. “Aye?”
I spread my legs wider so he can see exactly how it’s affected me.
He shoves the door closed and it clicks shut behind him. Rain clings to his hair as he approaches, moving like he’s not sure he should be this close to me without Linus here, but isn’t about to resist.
“I half-expected you to go back to the States with your brothers.” I blink up at him.
“Didn’t feel right.” He slides down to sit beside me on the floor.
His eyes are shadowed, but I have to ask, “Did you tell them about what’s going on amongst the three of us?”
He shakes his head.
I don’t press. It’s not my place.
Not yet.
I nod and return to the guitar, strumming the opening chords again, softer this time.
“Play it for me?” he asks after a beat.
“It’s only a germ of an idea.” I look into his eyes. “Maybe worth finishing, though.”
His knees brush mine. He doesn’t reach for me. Doesn’t need to. The silence isn’t awkward. It’s thick with everything we’ve lived the past few days and the hope it will continue indefinitely.
“I know you’re still figurin’ everything out. I’m not trying to insert myself where I don’t belong.” He shifts slightly.
“I…” I trail off, choosing my words carefully. “When we were on the road, writing together, it felt natural. The way you and I fit. I feel like I already knew the chords to your voice.”
He watches me.
I keep going. “I’m not saying you need new energy. I’m not saying I’m the answer. But if you ever might consider me… I’d be interested.”
His gaze drops to my hands. My fingers twitch against the strings.
One hand reaches for his. His thumb brushes mine once. Solid, but tentative.
I set the guitar down next to me. “I’m interested in all of it.”
He turns toward me. His lips brush mine before either of us knows who moved first. Soft. A taste. Then again, deeper. He cups my cheek. My fingers curl into his hair as I pull him closer. We kiss like we’re discovering the shape of something new.
The two of us.
He pulls his shirt off. My breath catches at the way his body looks in the gray Dublin light. Lean, tattooed. I lift my arms and allow him peel his shirt from me. He kisses my collarbone, then the swell of my breast, then lower, kneeling on the floor before me.
His mouth finds my soaked pussy. He licks a stripe up the center and I gasp, thighs twitching, fingers digging into his waves. “Nnnh—Liam…”
He groans against me, tongue circling my clit. “You taste—fuck—so sweet.” His voice is ragged.
I rock against his mouth, riding the rhythm. His fingers dig into my thighs, holding me steady. His moan vibrates through me.
“F-fuck—I—God—don’t stop—”
I unravel around him, hips bucking, a soft wail dragged from the center of me. “Aahhh—yes!”
He climbs back up, mouth glistening, eyes wide and hungry. I pull him into a kiss, taste myself on his lips. Then I nod.
He understands.
He lines himself up, guides the tip of his cock against my opening then pushes in, filling me inch by inch. My legs wrap around his waist, ankles crossing. He sinks in fully and stills, forehead hovering above mine.
“Feels like I never left,” he murmurs.
“You didn’t.”
He fucks me like he’s confessing how he feels with every thrust, every grind of hips. I meet him stroke for stroke, cupping his face, kissing his mouth through it all.
When he comes, he cries out, low and guttural. “Fuck—Avonna…”
I follow, tears stinging behind my eyes.
We stay this way, breath slowing. Liam deep inside me, the heat of him nestled between my thighs. His heartbeat steady against my ribs.
The sound of keys startles both of us.
The front door creaks open. Boots. Damp footsteps on the wood.
We don’t move.
Linus opens the bedroom door. Hair tousled from the wind, jacket open. His eyes immediately zero in on the two of us on the floor. Liam’s cock buried inside me.
His mouth curves. “Huh. Didn’t take long.”
Liam lets out a soft huff against my throat but doesn’t shift. I don’t blush. There’s nothing shameful here. We’re not cheating.
Linus shrugs out of his coat and starts to undress without a word. His shirt hits the floor, belt unbuckled with a clink, trousers peeled away. His cock is purple at the tip. He watches as Liam eases out of me, then helps me up onto my feet.
The three of us cross the hallway to our bedroom and crawl into bed. Liam reclines against the headboard and I settle my back against his chest. He cradles me so I’m facing Linus.
I spread my legs to show him my pussy filled with Liam’s come.
“You want my cock too, love?” His Dublin growl radiates low and warm.
“Yes,” I breathe.
He guides himself to my entrance, the thick head sliding through everything Liam left behind. He pushes in.
“Fuuuck.” He grips my hips. “You’re full of him…”
My howl is helpless, high and sharp, hips rocking back. Liam kisses my shoulder, my neck. Holds me firmly when Linus starts to fuck me with rolling thrusts, each one deeper than the last.
They’re all around me. Liam’s chest warm at my back, fingers working my nipples, while Linus drives into me from the front, watching every reaction he wrings from my body.
“God—yes—please…”
“You’re ours,” Liam whispers. “Aren’t you?”
“Yessssssss,” I exclaim as Linus slams deeper, rhythm steady, his cock sliding through Liam’s come coating my channel. My body shakes at the intensity of the moment and I lose myself in an epic release.
Linus follows, thrusts stuttering as he spills too, thick and hot.
When he collapses, Liam shifts so I’m enveloped between them.
They hold me, fingers brushing mine, mouths soft against my skin. I feel their heat. What they gave. What I took.
I’m home.
This is everything I ever dreamed of.
More.
It’s real.