12. Dakota
DAKOTA
The address Dante texts me is a brick walk-up on the edge of town, third floor, blue door. I climb the stairs with my heart doing things it shouldn’t, palms damp against the strap of my bag.
He opened a door inside me last night. The cross. The cuffs. The way he held me after, like I was something rare instead of something used. I haven’t slept right since. Every time I closed my eyes, I felt phantom leather on my wrists and his mouth at my throat.
I knock.
The door swings open, and Dante stands there in gray sweats and nothing else, his chest still damp at the collarbones like he showered five minutes ago.
“Baby.” He cups the back of my neck and kisses me like he’s been waiting all day to do it. “Come in.”
I step inside and freeze.
Cruz is on the couch. Beer in one hand, shirt riding up to show a stripe of inked stomach, and his face does the same thing mine just did. The two of us stare at each other while Dante closes the door behind me.
“What the fuck?” Cruz sets the beer down. “Dante.”
“Sit down, sweetheart.” Dante’s hand stays on my neck, thumb stroking the soft place under my ear. “Both of you. I want to talk.”
I let him guide me to the couch. The cushion sinks under me, and Cruz is right there, close enough that his thigh presses mine, his cologne mixing with the soap smell coming off Dante’s skin.
“You ambushed us.” Cruz isn’t smiling, but he isn’t angry either. There’s a careful look in his blue eyes, like he’s running odds. “Why?”
Dante drops into the armchair across from us and leans forward, elbows on his knees.
“Because I’m done pretending.”
He looks at Cruz first.
“I fucked you behind the park last week. Against that column. And I haven’t stopped thinking about it.”
Cruz’s mouth curves slowly. “Didn’t think you’d lead with that.”
“I’m leading with everything.” Dante’s gaze swings to me, and my stomach drops into freefall. “And last night I had her on the cross at Eclipse. Tied her up. Took her apart.”
My face goes hot. I look at my knees.
“Christ.” Cruz exhales like he just got hit. “Both of you. In one week.”
“Both of us.” Dante leans back. “And here’s the thing. I don’t want to stop. With either of you. And I know you’ve been with her too, Cruz, so don’t sit there acting blindsided.”
Cruz huffs a laugh and rubs a palm over his beard. “Locker room was something else.”
“So this is what I’m asking.” Dante’s voice drops, steady as the man himself. “The three of us. Together. Not me and her, not me and you, not you and her. Us. Are you in?”
The room goes silent except for the hum of the fridge in the next room.
I look up. Cruz is watching me, not Dante.
“Sweetheart.” His big hand lands on my knee, gentle. “What do you want?”
The question undoes something. Nobody’s asked me what I want in a long time. Not like that. Not like the answer mattered.
“I want it,” I whisper. “I want all of you.”
Dante’s eyes soften, but he doesn’t let me off the hook.
“Baby. Tell Cruz what you told me last night. About Gerald.”
I freeze.
“Dante!”
“He needs to know who he’s protecting.” Dante’s voice is warm, patient but brooks no argument. It’s not open for debate, he wants us all on clear footing to move forward. “He needs to know why we go slow with you. Why we ask. Why nobody touches you without your expressed consent.”
Cruz’s hand tightens on my knee, careful.
I look at the coffee table. The condensation ring under his beer. The cracked corner of a coaster. Anywhere but his face.
“My stepfather.” The words come out flat because that’s the only way I can get them out at all.
“He’d come into my room when my mom was so drunk she was passed out.
Touch me. Do worse. It stopped when I was old enough to fight him off, and yet, two weeks ago he tried to get into my bed and I broke his nose and dislocated his shoulder and left. ”
I keep my eyes on the table.
“That’s why I’m here. That’s why I came.”
The silence stretches. I can hear Cruz breathing, slow and deliberate, the way he does between rounds when he’s reining himself in.
Then his hand leaves my knee, and for one ugly second I think I’ve ruined it.
But he slides closer, wraps his huge arm around my shoulders, and presses his mouth to the crown of my head.
“I’ll kill him.”
He says it so casually, like he’s offering to grab groceries.
“Cruz, don’t be crazy.”
“No, sweetheart, listen to me.” He pulls back enough to meet my gaze. “Give me a name and an address. I’ll drive down tonight. He won’t be a problem for you ever again.”
“Cruz.” Dante’s voice comes out low, measured. “Breathe.”
“I am breathing.”
“Breathe more.”
Cruz drags air in through his nose. Lets it out. Pulls me tighter into him.
“Sorry, sweetheart. I just…” His jaw works. “Anyone who puts hands on you. I can’t sit with that.”
“I broke him,” I say, and my voice is shaking and I hate it. “I did. He’s not coming.”
“He might.” Dante is watching us both. “But that’s a problem for another day. Tonight I want to know if you’re in, Cruz. Eyes open. You know what she’s carrying. You know what you’re signing up for. We worship her. We don’t push her. We ask, every time, until she trusts that we mean it.”
Cruz nods, slow.
“I’m in.” His thumb strokes my shoulder. “Sweetheart. I’m so fucking in.”
Something in my chest cracks open and warm light spills through.
“There’s more,” Dante says.
Cruz raises an eyebrow.
I find my voice. “Dante said that this could involve Brady and Eli too. Maybe. Eventually. All five of us.”
Cruz drops his head back against the couch and groans, and his free hand goes to the front of his sweats and presses down.
“Fuck. Fuck. My dick is harder than a rock right now. You know that? All five of us, the team, fucking each other? That would be so damn good. Sweetheart, you’re trying to kill me.”
I laugh. It surprises me, a real one, scraped out of my throat.
“I want it.” My cheeks burn. “I want them too. The idea of it…”
“Yeah?” Cruz turns his head, a dangerous grin on his lips. “You like that, sweetheart? Knowing four of us would line up just to make you feel good?”
I bite my lip and nod.
“Christ alive.” He shifts on the couch and I can see the shape of him pushing up against the cotton. “Dante. What are we doing about this? Right now. Because I’m not going home like this.”
Dante stands. The lamp light catches every line of him, the tattoos winding down his ribs, the dark trail below his navel.
“Bedroom. Both of you.”
Cruz is up before I am, hauling me with him, his arm still locked around my shoulders.
“Wait.” I plant my feet. They both stop. “I want to watch.”
Two pairs of eyes land on me.
“You want to watch,” Dante repeats, careful.
“You two.” I can’t believe I’m saying it. My pulse is in my throat. “I want to see you two first. Before anything else. I want to watch.”
Cruz’s grin spreads wide and filthy.
“Sweetheart. You’re as kinky as me. Such a perfect fucking girl.”
He cups my face in those huge hands and kisses me, soft, then less soft, his stubble scraping my chin. When he pulls back I’m dizzy.
“Sit,” Dante tells me, gesturing at the bed when we get to the doorway. “Make yourself comfortable. Touch whatever you want, baby. Including yourself.”
I climb up onto the bed, kicking my shoes off, folding my legs underneath me. My jeans feel suddenly unbearable. I unbutton them and push them down, leaving my underwear. The cotton’s already damp.
Cruz watches me like I’m his new favorite meal.
Then Dante grabs the back of his neck and pulls him in.
They kiss standing at the foot of the bed and it’s nothing like what I imagined.
Cruz is bigger, broader, but Dante is the one steering.
His hand on Cruz’s jaw, his other on Cruz’s hip, walking him backward half a step then pulling him in again.
Cruz makes a sound low in his throat that I feel between my legs.
I slip my hand inside my underwear.
I’m soaked. The first stroke of my fingers makes me gasp, and both of them glance over. Dante’s mouth quirks. Cruz’s eyes go dark.
“Look at her,” Cruz breathes. “Fuck, look at her.”
“Eyes on me, Bennett.” Dante grips his chin and turns his face back. “She’s watching. Give her something to watch.”
Dante shoves Cruz’s sweats down. No underwear. Cruz steps out of them, kicks them aside, and he’s already hard, thick and heavy against his stomach. Dante palms him once, slow, and Cruz exhales like he’s been punched.
Then Dante drops his own sweats too, and they stand there pressed together, Dante’s hand wrapping both of them at once, working them in slow strokes.
I rub myself in tight circles, biting the inside of my cheek.
“Fuck, yeah.” Cruz’s head tips back. His hand covers Dante’s, both of them stroking together, their cocks sliding alongside each other. “That’s it.”
The wet sound is obscene. I’m so wet my fingers are slick and the sheet under me is going to be a mess but I don’t care.
Dante drops to his knees.
I make a small sound.
Then Cruz’s hand goes into Dante’s hair and Dante opens his mouth and takes him deep, no hesitation, his throat working around the length of him.
“Oh fuck. Oh fuck, your mouth—”
Cruz watches Dante like he’s never seen anything more beautiful. The big rough hand in Dante’s curls is impossibly gentle. He cups Dante’s jaw with the other, thumb stroking where Dante’s stretched around him.
I push two fingers inside myself and rock against my hand. My thighs are trembling.
Dante pulls off slowly, kisses the head, and looks up at Cruz with his mouth wet and dark eyes shining.
“You good?” he asks.
Cruz smirks. “I’m fucking phenomenal.”
Dante laughs. Stands. Comes around the bed to me and his hand slides up my thigh.
“Baby.” His voice is rough now. “How are you doing?”
“I want—” I swallow. “I want more.”
Dante’s thumb sweeps the inside of my thigh.
“More like what, baby?” His voice has dropped into that register that makes my insides melt. “Tell me. Specifics.”
“I don’t—” Heat crawls up my throat. “I don’t know how to—”
“Yes, you do.” He leans in and presses his mouth just below my ear. “You’re a smart girl. Use your words.”