Chapter 27
ASHLEY
Carly: Girl, why the fuck didn’t you tell me Royce’s hot uncle was in town? That man is so fine, he could cross-examine me any day of the week.
Ashley: Dude!! Don’t you have a boyfriend?
Carly: Who? Edmund or Spencer?
Ashley: OMG you’re terrible!
Carly: Oh REALLY? What’s that saying about pots and kettles again?
H eath’s grandfather had moved fast. When curiosity—and anxiety—got the better of me after we arrived on campus later that day, I convinced Royce to go with me to check the basement.
The whole place was spotless and didn’t even stink of bleach.
It was scary impressive and made me want to ask how they’d done it. This could be useful knowledge to have…
The next few days passed with weird levels of normal , despite me having to quit my job at the country club.
Carter was the one who’d suggested it initially, but ultimately I’d made the decision simply based on my gut.
The idea of going back to work, after how easily I’d been taken while my guard was down, made me break out in a cold sweat.
I’d have to get another job at some stage, but for now…maybe I could lean on the guys a little more.
“My uncle is in town for some case he’s working,” Royce told me that weekend as we left our Philosophy class. “He asked if I’d meet him for dinner…and he wants to meet you.” He added that last part with reluctance, and I glanced up at him with confusion.
“That’s a bad thing? I thought you had a good relationship with him?
” He’d always spoken really fondly of his uncle, who had fought for Royce’s right to know his mom even from behind bars.
For all I knew, he seemed like a good guy.
But Royce looked like he’d really like it if I declined this invitation.
He huffed a frustrated sigh, ruffling his blond hair with his free hand—the one not draped over my shoulders while we headed out to the parking lot. “I do. He’s great.”
“Okay…?” I prompted when he didn’t elaborate. “But you don’t want me to come to dinner?”
“I do…” he groaned, seeming torn. “It’s fine. It’ll be fine. If you want to, I mean? I know Carter said you guys had plans?”
Ah crap. That was tonight. “I’ll ask if we can postpone it till tomorrow. Even if you are being a bit cagey about it, I want to meet your uncle.” I fished out my phone and popped off a text to Carter quickly.
Royce blew out a heavy sigh, watching me send the message. “I’m so gonna regret this.” He muttered it under his breath like he didn’t mean to say it out loud, but it only got me more curious.
“Why?” I pushed. “What are you so worried about?”
He rolled his eyes as we reached his car and he opened the passenger side door for me. “You’ll see,” he replied with a short laugh. That was all he gave me, shifting the subject to our class lecture once he was behind the wheel.
Arriving back at the apartment, we ran into Carter on his way to the gym, and he bullied Royce into joining him. They both made a half-assed attempt at convincing me to join them, but I made a quick escape to my room before they could win me over.
We had a good couple of hours before we needed to leave for dinner, and Royce had been firm that it was a casual dinner and not to get dressed up, so I had plenty of time to chill out and catch up on the TV show I’d been watching lately.
“Heath!” I called out when I went to grab a snack out of the fridge. “I’m going to watch the next episode of Squid Game . Are you joining me?”
“Give me like fifteen minutes?” he yelled back. “I’m almost finished with this essay.”
“Okay,” I replied, grabbing a soda out and heading for the couch.
“Don’t start it without me!” he shouted. “I’ll be quick!”
I chuckled, flopping onto the sofa and getting comfy. “I won’t. Chill!” I had plenty I could doom-scroll to fill fifteen minutes anyway.
Before I could even open my social apps, a new message dinged on my phone from Carter. Warm fuzzies fluttered through my chest as I opened the message and found a video that he’d taken of Royce in the gym, shirtless and stretching his legs in a way that should be illegal.
I bit my lip and replayed the video again, groaning when Carter flicked the camera to the mirror and winked at me seductively. Bastard knew what he was doing. Actually, that reminded me—after everything that had happened, I’d never watched the video he’d sent during our night in the forest.
Clicking out of the gym video, I scrolled back up our thread to find the last video he’d sent, then bit my lip as I glanced around. I was alone in the living room, but still…maybe not safe to play with sound. Whatever he’d sent, he’d asked me to watch alone.
To be careful, I hopped up and grabbed my noise-canceling headphones out of my bag, sliding them onto my head as I returned to the sofa and got comfy on my belly along the leather couch.
Heath needed fifteen minutes to finish his essay and the video was stamped with four minutes thirty-eight seconds, so I was good.
Why then did I feel like I was doing something incredibly naughty when I hit play on the video and found the unmistakable line of Carter’s lower abdomen come into view?
It was dark in the video, hard to make out the finer details, but I knew his body well enough by now that my mind could fill in the blanks as his hand wrapped around his dick in the video.
I found myself utterly entranced as I watched him jerking himself off with something black threaded around his fingers, his breathing a soft, husky whisper. I needed to hear more…I wanted to know if he was saying anything, so I frantically dialed up the volume to get more clarity.
Ah-hah! Knew it.
Now that I could hear him better, he was definitely dirty-talking to commentate the video clip with the explicit purpose of making me feel immersed in the moment.
And holy shit, it worked. I couldn’t catch every word; even at full volume, it was too quiet to get much more than the general vibe, but it was enough to realize that black fabric wrapped around his hand—and his dick—was a pair of my panties.
That realization had me blushing so hot, I needed to fan myself with my free hand, while also debating a quick trip back to my room to grab a vibrator.
“What are you watching?”
The abrupt question made me jump at least a foot in the air, which was impressive since I’d been on my belly.
It was also enough to knock my headphones off and realize that there was nothing at all quiet about Carter’s dirty talk on the video.
My headphones simply hadn’t paired, and I was blasting Carter’s heavy breathing and filthy descriptions through my phone speaker.
Nate stared down at me in amused shock as I fumbled my phone to frantically turn it off, then search for some kind of plausible explanation for what he’d just heard.
“Was that porn, Layne?” he asked with a wide grin. “Did I just catch you watching porn on your phone, dirty girl?”
My face was hot enough to fry a fucking egg. “Wh-what? No! I wasn’t. That’s not— ” I squeezed my eyes shut, screaming internally because, fucking hell, not only was I now flooded with adrenaline, my heart pounding in my chest, I was also incredibly turned on. What an unfortunate combination.
“No?” Nate challenged. “Lemme see, then.” He reached for my phone, and I damn near dove off the couch to keep it out of his reach. Nate wasn’t a quitter, though, and followed my dive with full commitment, resulting in the two of us wrestling on the floor as he tried to pry the phone out of my grip.
“Just show me,” he laughed between grunts of exertion as I thrashed and bucked to try and throw him off.
His fingers peeled mine off the phone one at a time, careful not to actually hurt me but at the same time…
he wasn’t giving up. “Come on, Ash, what’s the problem?
If you weren’t watching porn, just show me. ”
A helpless, little whimper escaped me at his teasing tone, combined with the casual use of my name, and my grip weakened ever so briefly. Nate was ready for it, though, snatching my phone free and rolling away like a fucking crocodile with its prey as he unlocked my screen.
“Ashley Layne!” he gasped dramatically, getting a whole eyeful of Carter’s dick on the screen.
My jaw dropped in shock. “Wait, how do you know my lock code?”
“I know everything about you, silly Duckling. I dunno what your definition of porn is, but this sure seems like?—”
“It’s not porn. It’s Carter.” I cut him off with an eye roll.
Nate’s eyes snapped to mine, like he was checking whether I was lying or not, then he fucking yeeted my phone across the room like it had bitten him. “Okay, Jesus, karma really is a bitch, huh?”
I offered him a shrug. “I tried to stop you.” I needed to climb over him to retrieve my phone, but he grabbed my hips to stop me getting any farther. Instead, I found myself straddling his waist as he lay back on the carpet to gaze up at me with a lopsided smile.
“Let’s ignore the fact that was Carter and circle back to the fact you were watching porn. You know, if you have needs, you can always?—”
“Shut up,” I groaned, covering my face with my hands as embarrassment flooded through me all over again. “I didn’t know what the video was!”
“But you were enjoying it, weren’t you?” he murmured, the teasing melting away as he adjusted his grip on my hips to pull me closer.
My heart was already racing, but all of a sudden, the mood had shifted enough that I dropped my hands away from my face to meet his eyes. “Nate…did seeing Carter’s dick turn you on?” Because there was no denying how hard he was between us already.
Now it was his turn to roll his eyes. “Definitely not. But remembering how pink your cheeks were and how intently you were watching that screen? Maybe I should encourage those kinds of videos…”
The heated moment broke as Nate’s phone rang loudly, and I flinched sharply out of the trance his gaze had so effortlessly snared me in.
“Ignore it,” he said in a husky voice, but I’d already glanced at the screen where he’d left it on the coffee table.
I shook my head, grabbing the phone to hand to him. “It’s Max.”
He sighed heavily as I climbed off him, and he answered the call with a grudging greeting while I went in search of my own phone. Carter had sent me several more videos of him and Royce working out in the gym…and it gave me an idea.
Nate shot me a lingering look, then hung his head in defeat as he made his way back to his room, listening to whatever Max was saying. Heath should have almost finished his essay by now…maybe he wanted to take some videos for me to send back to Carter?