19. Chapter 18 – Lex
Chapter 18 – Lex
I made it all of two feet off the bottom of the stairs before I met the crowd, who delivered me a hard stop. I had made it up to the pool table loft when I got to the place, because I purposely skirted the actual bar, and in turn, avoided the people not interested in moving out of the way as they waited for their own drinks.
Which was why I had asked for Brody’s help.
Don’t think it didn’t taste like acid to do it, either. The only reason I involved him and not Knox, who was just as big and dominating as Brody when he wanted to be, was because I wanted to get Brody away from Hannah for a minute.
I needed to feel him out and figure out just how far he was going to let this whole thing go. I knew he called the shots, so I’d go straight to the source.
“You’re stubborn, you know that?” His deep, gravely voice tickled my ear, startling me slightly before his gigantic body engulfed me in the crowd.
“Don’t act like you’re surprised.” I threw back at him, trying to ignore the way he smelled, as he put his hand on my hip and pulled me in behind him.
“I’m not.” He shook his head, looking back at me as his fingers slid through mine and tightened, dragging me behind him through the masses. “Try not to let your visceral need to be independent get you lost in here.”
I didn’t reply, because my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth as the crowd shifted and I was pressed up against his massive back. I wasn’t a small woman, necessarily. Sure, I was short without my heels on, but I wasn’t fragile.
Hannah was fragile in a soft and feminine way .
I grew up in the middle of mosh pits punching punks in the dicks for the fun of it.
But pressed up against Brody as the crowd swallowed us up with every step closer to the bar, I felt—feminine. Small and protected.
And it was a fucking head trip. Luckily, talking wasn’t required as the band kicked off their set and the drums began the beat to the classic rock set they started.
“Beer or cocktail?” Brody yelled over his shoulder as he pushed a frat boy looking kid out of the way and took another step forward.
“Whiskey. Maker’s if they’ve got it.” I yelled back, and he glared at me for a second before facing forward again. The crowd heaved once more, and someone shoved into my back, plastering me against Brody’s.
I could feel his growl at the contact, and it went straight to my stomach.
Okay, not quite. It went lower than that, but I didn’t need to label it to be fucked over it.
He pulled my hand, still tight in his, around the front of him to settle on his stomach as he shoved through the last few rows of people and made it to the bar. “Come here.” He pulled me around to his front and pinned me against the bar with his body pressed against mine, sandwiching me.
Protecting me.
Touching me.
Burning me. From head to toe, I burned from how he felt against me. Not once in my entire life had I wanted a man to touch me. Never.
But Brody?
I was nearly weak from how it made me feel.
“Tito.” Brody hollered, flicking his fingers up in the air, and the bartender ran right over to us.
“What can I get you, boss?” The young kid asked, leaning over the bar toward us. I didn’t miss the way he looked at me in Brody’s arms with question in his eyes.
“A bucket, and a bottle of Makers.” Brody replied, and I shook the spell he weaved over me off long enough to find my voice.
“A bottle?” I questioned as the kid ran off to get his order .
He laid both hands flat on the bar top and leaned down to my ear. “Do you see a better way to carry a glass of whiskey through that crowd?”
“Guess not.” I mused, turning to talk over my shoulder. Which left our faces really fucking close. “Why’d you invite me out tonight?” I asked before I lost the nerve.
“I didn’t.” He swallowed, flicking those dark eyes back over the bar to where the kid stacked bottles of beer into a bucket. “Knox did.”
“Whatever.” I sighed, hating how he ruffled my feathers with his touch and his words. Just once, I almost wanted it to be easy to communicate with the neanderthal.
“If it had been me who reached out, would you have accepted?” He asked against my ear, and I almost lied, just to test him.
“No.” I replied and then looked over at him again.
“Exactly, that’s why Knox was the one to do it.”
“Why are you okay with this?” I questioned.
“Because it makes Hannah happy.” He answered instantly. “And I’ll always do whatever makes that girl happy. Because she is the literal fucking sun in my world, and without her warmth, I don’t exist.”
My chest ached at such a bold declaration from the man who seemed so gruff. As he revealed the softer part of him where Hannah was concerned, I didn’t see it as a weakness like I might have with someone else.
I saw it for what it was.
Devotion and commitment. And it perplexed me more than anything else he’d ever said before.
“Why are you okay with this?” He countered, glancing around us, keeping himself aware of his surroundings in the crowded bar, before looking back down at me directly, “Why are you okay with giving yourself for just a small part of someone else in return?”
“Because that’s all I want.” I swallowed, trying to muster up the courage to act tough like I’d been doing every day of my life. “I want nothing more than simple fun.”
“Well then,” He nodded and picked up the bucket of beers and the bottle of whiskey that had materialized in front of me during our conversation, “I guess we understand each other a little better now.”
“I guess so.” I moved to duck around him as he gave me a little breathing room, but he stopped me with his hand flat on my stomach as he tilted his head down to be directly in my line of sight.
“Make no mistake, Alexi,” He spoke my name like a lover would, and I hated it, “At the end of the day, Hannah is ours. And we’re willingly sharing her with you because we know that there isn’t a chance in hell of it destroying what we’ve spent a decade building. But if I think for even one minute that you’re in this for the wrong reasons,” He clenched his teeth together and the muscles along the side of his face tensed, “I’ll fucking destroy every single thing you have. Understand?”
I panted under the intensity of his warning. Who the fuck did he think he was, going from the protecting oaf who declared to love his girl more than anything in the world while physically holding me to his body, to the dominating asshole I knew he really was that only cared about being in control.
“Got it.” I gritted out between my own clenched teeth. Once again, he pulled the power card and put me back in my place.
Well, now I had a renewed needed to show Brody fucking Sinclair just who was in charge.
Because it sure as fuck wasn’t him.
“Corner pocket.” I declared, pointing to the one directly between Hannah’s thighs as she leaned against the table, watching me play.
I pulled back and gently tapped the ball, sending it directly where I wanted, and the smile she gave me was the perfect reward for it.
The girl loved playing pool, and she made the game seem so sensual even though there was no physical touch occurring with each shot taken.
“Good shot.” She purred across the table as she tipped a beer back against her perfect pink lips.
“Let’s up the ante.” Knox announced, nudging me with his shoulder as he stood next to me, “Make tonight a little more interesting.”
“What did you have in mind?” I questioned, glancing over at Hannah as she turned her attention to Brody, where he sat against the wall at a table. Silently asking permission from him.
“Truth or dare.” Knox grinned deviously. “If you make a pocket, you get to pick a person to go. One shot at a time.”
“We’re in a public bar.” I raised my eyebrows at him, “I don’t know what kind of truth or dare you play, but mines not very decent.”
“We’re on the second floor.” He nodded out to the crowd below. “Stand far enough back from the edge and you can hide.”
I rolled my eyes at him, down for whatever either way, and looked at Hannah. “You decide.”
“I lost the last time I played a game of stakes against you.”
“In the end, I think you won.” Flashbacks assaulted me, and I could taste her skin on my lips and hear the noises she made as she came.
She licked her lips and then reached down the side of the table and hit the button to release the balls back to be racked. “I go first.”
She wanted to play. And I wanted nothing more than to play with her.
“Game on.” I whistled, walking around her, brushing her with my body as I grabbed for the triangle. “I can’t wait to see what kind of nefarious dares you come up with.”
“I’d be careful tempting the devil.” Knox chuckled. “One time, she made me do the naked mile down Main Street of our hometown.” He shook his head, “At noon.”
“Cruel.” I grinned at her, where she shrugged with a smirk. “I like it.”
“He’s hung and has a ten pack.” She joked, “He had nothing worth hiding.”
“Hmm.” I hummed, racking the balls, trying desperately not to remember just how hung Knox was from our night together. The way his cock filled my hand when she tricked me as she moved on to Brody, tempted me.
She took the balls and set them how she liked them and then walked around the table in her sexy little pink outfit. It matched her personality perfectly, and it was alarming how much I liked both of them. Pink had never been my color before. Yet tonight, I wanted to bathe in her pink.
“Something tells me we’re going to regret this.” Knox leaned over my shoulder and whispered to me as she bent over the table and lined up a shot to break the balls.
“I think she’ll make it up to us.” She landed a solid in a pocket and grinned at us as she stood back up.
“Lex. Truth or dare?” She held her pool stick to the side of her body and stared right at me.
“Dare. For you, every single time.” I replied confidently.
“Kiss me.” Her voice was breathy, and I could feel the switch in her demeanor as she took a mostly friendly and kind of flirty game of pool and turned it into the gateway she needed to initiate physical contact.
“If you want a kiss,” I said, my voice laced with a playful invitation, “come and get it.” I would have gone to her, but I wanted to make her positively melt and didn’t want the bar below to get the free show. I pulled her body flush against mine and then I guided her until Knox and I sandwiched her between us. He was a giant and shielded us from any prying eyes as I leaned in to give her the reward she chose.
I licked her bottom lip before seductively sucking on it and kissed her like my life depended on it. She moaned and ran her tongue against mine, nibbling on my lip in return. I growled and pushed forward until our hips were grinding together as I wrapped my hands around the back of her neck, kissing down the side of it as she leaned against Knox for support.
Once again, I left Brody out for the fun of it. It didn’t appear Knox minded as he started kissing the other side of her neck, each of us teasing her until she gasped and held onto me like she was teetering on the edge of a cliff and needed support .
Needed us. I never wanted to share a woman with a man before. Yet with Knox, it intensified everything, knowing he was making her feel good at the same time.
“The noises you make when I touch you drive me wild.” I bit her earlobe as she buried her fingers in my hair, holding me to her. “I want to make you come again. It’s all I can think about.”
“God, Lex.” She panted and pulled my head back and kissed me. It was one of the first times she’d been assertive with me, and I grinned like a fucking fox against her lips as she went wild for me. “I want to touch you.” She purred, “I need to touch you.”
“You have to be a good girl to get that.” I teased as I slowed down my touches and Knox pulled back with pupils the size of saucers as he fought to contain the need inside of him, too.
Hannah drove her men wild, that much was clear.
And I was jealous of that ability, if I was honest.
“So is that it?” Brody called from the same stool he sat in the whole time. “One shot and the game is done?”
“You actually want to play?” Knox scoffed as he palmed his erection and adjusted it. “We all know where we’re hoping this goes.”
Brody’s scowl darkened, “My turn.” He rose and grabbed his stick as he leaned over the table.
Hannah sighed as she detangled herself from between Knox and me with an almost sad look on her face as she grabbed her beer and took a long drink off it.
I knew she wasn’t sad because our little game got disrupted. She was sad because Brody had a problem with it.
And that made me angry.
He was dangling the freedom in front of her and then getting pissy when she took it.
Knox sat down on a stool and pulled Hannah between his legs, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on her shoulder as she snuggled in. He was reassuring her without using words.
Their entire communication style was wordless most times .
And it was fucking infuriating as an outsider trying to understand the rules.
Brody lined up and sank a ball with no hesitation, before it finished spinning in the pocket, he pointed his stick at me. “Why do you pretend to be a lesbian when it’s clear you’re bisexual?”
“Brody.” Hannah gasped.
“ I get the choice between truth or dare.” I countered, fighting off the urge to break the stick over his head. “And I choose dare.”
“Fine.” Brody countered, “Kiss Knox.”
“Dude.” Knox groaned, standing up and sliding around Hannah to warn his boyfriend. “You’re stepping out of line here.”
“No, I’m not.” Brody shrugged, all the while staring right at me. “She wants a dare, that’s the one I choose.” He swallowed, and I already knew what was going to come out of his mouth before he opened it again. “Unless you’re too scared to play a simple game.”
“Fine.” I threw back at him and grabbed the front of Knox’s shirt, pulling him down to my height, and kissed him.