48. Sage #2
The apartment smells like butter and oregano and something sweet. Music is playing—low and warm, classic rock, Holden’s playlist. Candles glow on the coffee table, which means Milo raided my bathroom cabinet.
“Kitten!”
Milo appears from the kitchen, dish towel slung over his shoulder, grin already at full wattage.
He opens his arms and I don’t hesitate—I drop my bag, cross the room in a few steps, and launch myself at him.
He catches me easily, lifting me off the ground, my legs wrapping around his waist, and I kiss him before either of us can say anything else.
He makes a sound against my mouth, one of surprise, delight, hunger, and he kisses me back with the full force of Milo, which is to say, too much and exactly right.
His hands grip my ass and he spins us once, like we’re in a movie, and I laugh into the kiss because this man is ridiculous and wonderful and I am so, so gone for him.
“Missed you,” he says against my lips.
“It’s barely been a whole day.”
“Longest few hours of my life.”
“You’re dramatic.”
“You love it.”
I do. God help me, I do.
“Got any of that ferocity for me, wildcat?” Holden’s voice, low and amused, drifts from the living room. “Or should I just watch?”
I slide down from Milo, my feet finding the floor, and turn.
Holden is leaning against the archway, beer in hand, wearing all black, like he’s been carved from something dangerous and expensive.
One eyebrow is raised, the corner of his mouth kicked into not quite a smile—more a dare than an expression.
I cross the room to him. Slowly. Deliberately. Feeling both their eyes on me and liking it more than I should. When I reach him, I take the beer, set it on the table behind me, and slide my hands up his chest to the back of his neck.
“Good evening, detective,” I say.
“Wildcat.”
I kiss him. Long and deep. His hands settle on my hips, and I feel the exact second he asks without words.
I answer by hooking my fingers tighter behind his neck and pulling him closer.
Then he lifts me and pins me against the wall. The air leaves my lungs in a little gasp that’s all excitement and adrenaline. His mouth is on mine again, brutal, claiming, and his body presses into me so hard I can feel every inch of him—hard muscle, heat, want—between my thighs.
He grinds his hips against me and the sound I make is not human.
“Oh, fuck—” I bite down on his lower lip and he groans, sinking his fingers deeper into my hips, hiking my skirt up. In the periphery, I catch Milo watching, hungry and delighted, his smile huge, a spark of something feral in his eyes that makes the back of my neck prickle.
“God, you’re loud,” Milo says, and the sound of his voice just amps up the voltage in my nerves. “I love it.”
My body goes white-hot and liquid. Holden’s teeth find the spot where my jaw meets my throat and clamp down, just shy of painful, and I moan, loud, right in his ear.
He growls low and it vibrates through my whole chest. I can feel how badly he wants me—the pressure of him through his jeans, grinding into my inner thigh hard enough I know there’ll be a bruise tomorrow.
His hands fist in my hair, angling my face so he can claim every sound out of me, then drag down my ribs, my waist, hiking my skirt to palm my bare ass.
“Fuck, you’re so fucking eager,” he murmurs, voice thick. “Need you tonight, wildcat.”
Before I can answer, he’s lowering me to the floor. My knees almost buckle beneath me and Holden has to steady me so I don’t fall.
Milo wolf-whistles. “And that’s only the opening act, folks. Somebody get me popcorn.”
“How about we take care of our girl first?” Holden says. “She’s had a long day at work and needs food.”
“I need a lot of things,” I say, dragging my palm over his chest. “But food does sound pretty good.”
Milo claps his hands together. “Coming right up!”
The evening unfolds slowly, the three of us falling into a rhythm that feels both brand new and strangely familiar.
Milo has made pasta from scratch, because apparently his talents extend beyond breaking and entering and emotional terrorism, and we eat at the kitchen table while the conversation ricochets between them.
Milo tells a story about the hardware store. Holden counters with something obscene from a police file. I laugh until my stomach hurts, and somewhere between the pasta and the garlic bread, I realize this is the first time in years that I’ve felt completely, uncomplicatedly happy.
Not the complicated happiness of sex, or the fragile happiness of a stolen morning with Micah, or the fierce happiness of Milo’s obsessiveness and Holden’s claiming. Just . . . easy. Three people who like each other, eating dinner, being stupid.
After dinner, we migrate to the couch. The movie is Milo’s pick, some horror film he swears is “a masterpiece of modern cinema.” Holden calls it “unwatchable garbage.”
I end up in the middle, because of course I do. Milo on my left, his arm slung across the back of the couch behind my shoulders. Holden on my right, his thigh pressed against mine, solid and warm.
The movie is terrible. Truly, magnificently terrible.
“This is art,” Milo insists.
“This is a war crime,” Holden replies.
“You have no taste.”
“I have excellent taste. Which is why I’m not enjoying this.”
I’m barely watching the screen. I’m too aware of the heat on either side of me: Milo’s fingers tracing lazy patterns on my shoulder, Holden’s hand resting on my knee, his thumb doing that slow circle thing that makes my brain short-circuit.
The energy has been building all evening, a slow tide we’re all pretending not to notice.
Milo’s fingers drift from my shoulder to my neck. Holden’s hand slides an inch higher on my thigh.
I stop breathing.
“You know,” Milo says casually, eyes still on the screen, “this is the part where the girl usually makes a terrible decision.”
“Is that right,” I manage.
“Mm-hm. She goes into the basement alone. Opens the creaky door. Walks toward the noise.” His fingers brush the sensitive skin behind my ear. “Very unwise. Very entertaining.”
“And what should she do instead?” My voice is steadier than I feel.
“Personally?” Milo turns his head and looks at me.
His eyes are dark and bright and completely, devastatingly serious beneath the grin.
“I think she should stay exactly where she is. Between the two people who’d never let anything bad happen to her.
” His gaze flicks past me to Holden, just for a second.
Something passes between them. An agreement. A green light.
Holden’s hand tightens on my thigh. “What do you want, wildcat?”
I look at Milo. Then at Holden. Then back at Milo.
“Both of you,” I say. “I want both of you.”
Milo’s grin could power a city. Holden’s expression doesn’t change, but his eyes—God, his eyes go dark in a way that makes my whole body clench.
“Good answer, kitten,” Milo murmurs.
Then he kisses me.