Chapter 9 #2
“I’m sorry,” Rafe said quietly, once she’d managed to stop shaking.
It didn’t take her long to warm up, not with two large male hot-water bottles flanking her.
“I wouldn’t have put you in that room if I’d known it was so cold.
I’ve never noticed the temperature in there being drastically different.
I’ll get someone in tomorrow to check the AC. ”
“My room is clearly fine,” Gio said. His and Keeley’s rooms were right next door to each other, so it made no sense that hers would be unnaturally cold, while his stayed normal. “Looks like Marta and Albert were having some fun at your expense,” he added.
“I don’t know how to make them like me,” she sighed, realizing the fact she felt hurt by two ghosts was a stupid reaction to have.
Gio grinned and shifted nearer, his face so close to hers on the pillow they shared that she could feel his breath on her face. “I’m pretty sure they do like you.”
Rafe snorted. “And how did you come to that conclusion?”
Gio placed a soft kiss on her forehead, but he didn’t stop there. His lips slid along her cheek until they were right beside her ear. “They knew she belonged in here with us. I think they were doing a little matchmaking. Which means you’ve got their blessing.”
“Jesus,” Rafe muttered. “You’re as bad as Grandpa Albert was with the ghost stories.”
Keeley shivered, but this time, it wasn’t because she was cold. One of Rafe’s hands had slipped beneath her shirt and was now sliding along her stomach…upwards.
Keeley lost the ability to breathe by the time his large palm cupped her breast, squeezing it firmly.
“Rafe,” she whispered.
“Just helping you warm up.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” she asked with a breathy laugh.
His fingers found her nipple, pinching it with more force than she was used to, making her squirm against him.
She’d learned through Rafe’s kisses that he wouldn’t be a gentle lover.
And she’d read enough erotic romance to know the idea of dominance turned her on.
Regardless, she had no experience with it.
Her past lovers had been guys around her age, their skill levels about the same as hers.
As such, she hadn’t branched out much beyond missionary, doggie, sex in the shower, and sixty-nine.
Rafe and Gio were older, and she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt they could teach her a hell of a lot more.
Rafe pinched her nipple again, tight enough that she gasped.
“You went away there for a second,” he murmured. “Care to tell us what you’re thinking?”
“Or do we need to find more creative ways to keep your attention on what we’re doing?” Gio asked.
She bucked slightly when he ran his fingers over the soft cotton of her panties.
“She’s wet, so I’m going to go out on a limb and guess she was thinking about this…
about what we’re going to do to her.” Gio backed up that pronouncement by slipping his fingers beneath her panties, sliding them along her slit until he found her clit.
She’d never had a guy find it that fast. Hell, she’d had to draw a map to it for at least half her previous lovers.
Gio began to rub her clit, Rafe still playing with her breast, and she closed her eyes, sparks of electricity shimmering along her spine in response.
“Gio,” she whispered, “Rafe.”
“We promised you a night to think about this.” Rafe, ever the sensible one, stopped pinching her nipple, though his palm still covered her breast possessively.
“I don’t need time,” she said.
“Keeley,” he said, and it was clear he intended to stick to his guns. “There are some things we need to talk about before we—”
“No, we don’t.”
Gio, God bless him, was in the same boat as her—hot, horny, ready to roll.
Which wasn’t the least bit surprising. She and Gio were definitely kindred spirits, the impulsive, throw-caution-to-the-wind types, while Rafe never leapt without looking, measuring, analyzing, and then contemplating outcomes.
“How long has it been?” Gio asked, one finger sliding deeper, teasing her opening.
“A year or so,” she admitted. “JT was the last.”
Gio growled, and she wondered how such a threatening sound could be such a huge fucking turn-on. “We’re going to make you forget about that asshole once and for all.”
She gave him a mischievous grin. “You’re welcome to try.”
Gio had yet to resist one of her dares. Given that she was completely out of her depth with them in so many other ways, that one small bit of power felt like it gave her at least a chance to grab the upper hand from time to time.
Gio increased the pressure on her clit, and she trembled with need.
Yeah. So much for the upper hand.
“How many times do you want to come?” Rafe whispered in her ear, his hot breath reminding her she’d been freezing just a few minutes earlier. Lying here between them, the heat was so scorching, she was certain she’d never feel cold again.
“How many?” His question drove home exactly how out of their league she was. Because she was a one-and-done girl. Once a guy got her there, he typically saw that as the signal that it was his turn, and he could wrap things up. Not one lover in her past had ever made her come twice.
Her nonresponse was telling. Gio shook his head in disgust. “You’ve been sleeping with the wrong men.”
She grinned. “I think, given the stories I’ve told you, that should be obvious.”
Dawn was finally starting to break through the blackness of the night, the sky lightening to gray. They’d left the bedroom door open, light from the hallway streaming in, also helping to illuminate the room.
Gio glanced over her shoulder and exchanged a look with Rafe, one that seemed to be the equivalent to striking the bell at the beginning of a boxing round. He removed his hand from her panties.
Rafe released her breast, reaching for the hem of her shirt. He whisked it over her head, quickly, skillfully.
She felt herself blushing, something she rarely did. She wasn’t shy, but there was something about the way Gio’s eyes slid along her body that felt almost as sensual as if he was touching every inch.
He reached up, his fingers sliding along her side. “You’ve got a tattoo.”
Rafe shifted away slightly and pulled the covers farther down, she suspected to get a better look.
“It’s a Joshua tree,” she said. “I got it after my parents died. I was sixteen, so I used an older friend’s ID since I was underage.
Managed to hide it from Kayden until the summer between my junior and senior year in high school.
Forgot about it and wore a bikini to a pool party we were both going to.
He lost his shit. But then…when he realized what it was… ”
“Why a Joshua tree?” Rafe asked.
“My dad and I had this goal to camp in all the national parks. We had a book that we got stamped whenever we traveled to a new one. A few months before he died, we went to Joshua Tree, just the two of us. It was probably the best time we’d ever had camping.
I remember roasting hot dogs and marshmallows over the fire.
We sang songs where we’d always say the lyrics wrong.
” She broke into her Annie Lennox impersonation, singing, “Sweet Dreams are made of Cheese.”
Rafe and Gio both chuckled.
“The night ended with him telling me about a million stupid dad jokes that had us laughing so hard, we were doubled over. I swear to God, I thought I was gonna pee my pants. He was…” Keeley stopped talking when she realized tears were flowing down her face.
This was why she never strayed from the parent script on first dates.
“Oh my God. I’m so sorry. Talk about killing the mood.” She swiped at her cheeks, swallowing hard to dislodge the lump in her throat.
Rafe wrapped his arms around her once more, and Gio wiped the tears from her face with his thumbs before leaning closer to kiss the lingering wetness away.
“Don’t apologize for something like that,” Rafe said gruffly.
“We love hearing your stories, Keeley. Love listening to you talk and learning things about you that we never knew,” Gio added.
“Although, I could have done without the rundown on Big Brother. That’s two hours of my life I’ll never get back,” Rafe groused.
Keeley laughed, and she turned her head to kiss Rafe on the cheek, grateful to him for finding a way to ease the sadness with humor.
“I love your tattoo,” Gio said, running his fingers over the ink. “Love that you honored your father that way.”
She smiled. “Yeah. Kayden was pissed at first, but he understood why I got it. Two weeks later, he got a tattoo to honor our parents too. Of course, that just started the ball rolling because now, he’s as tatted up as you are,” she said to Gio, running her hand up and down his muscular arm, covered with an elaborate entwined serpent and dog.
And then, because she’d always wanted to, she bent toward him and ran her tongue along the black ink seductively.
Gio’s eyes narrowed with a hunger that had her pussy clenching. “Slide your panties down. We’re about to get serious, little one.”
She’d never felt particularly little. At five foot eight, she was the tallest of her friends. But right now, with them, she felt almost tiny.
Gio overshadowed her with his too-broad, muscular shoulders, his tall frame, his chiseled-in-steel-chest. While Rafe was leaner—his desk job no comparison to the heavy manual labor Gio did day in and day out—he still had her by a few inches and probably thirty pounds.
She shimmied out of her panties, a tricky act, since neither man seemed willing to move away and give her some room.
She inhaled loudly when Gio’s fingers immediately returned to the magic button. “Jesus, you’re good at finding that.”
He chuckled, but Keeley couldn’t share the sentiment. Not when Gio started stroking it faster, harder. She gripped his upper arms as he drove her to the edge of climax within moments. She couldn’t even get herself to this point so quickly, and she had some awesome toys.
“Gio,” she cried out. “God!”