Chapter 36
Bryce
Vodka splashed into my crystal tumbler.
“Thanks.” I toasted Hunter, then said in private tones, “Now, pour yourself one. You look like you could use some loosening up.”
I got a noncommittal grunt in response.
He’d grown stonier with every bite of his Chinese takeout.
He kept stealing sour glances at Dagger, no doubt wondering what he might dare Serenity to do. I myself was curious, but mostly because I was struggling to figure out what my own dare would be.
Even now, as Hunter poured himself two fingers of raspberry gin, he flicked wary eyes toward his twin and added an extra splash of liquor.
I’d thought the food would mellow the mood before we played, but for Hunter, those emptied paper boxes had become numbers on a countdown clock.
Probably best to just get on with it.
“So,” I said, “are we ready to play?”
Serenity set down her finished chocolate liqueur glass and clapped. “I am.”
From the couch, Dagger threw her a wink. “That means everybody else better be ready.” He jumped his brows at Hunter in a knowing challenge.
I sighed internally, already bracing to play mediator and aching for the days when the three of us used to laugh together as easily as breathing.
“Serenity picks first?” Seb proposed, nursing a Bloodweiser as he moved to the couch with Dagger.
“Okay,” she chimed, wiggling down into the loveseat, eyes shining with a childlike giddiness that drove home just how much this meant to her.
Dagger leaned toward her. “If you want to know if they’re telling the truth, Cowgirl, you just ask me, all right?” He tapped his temple. “Between my time on the force and my jaguar senses, I’m a regular human lie detector.”
“Now everyone’s going to pick dare, so they don’t have to get strapped to the Dagger polygraph machine,” Hunter griped.
“Not if we make the dares the prize,” Seb said, forearms draped on his knees.
“What have you got in mind, gamer boy?” Dagger asked.
“Well, Serenity picked this game as a way to get to know each other, so we should mostly stick to truth.”
She swiveled her head between us, lingering a second longer on Hunter, the skin between her eyes pinching. “Well, not if it won’t make it fun for everybody.”
Seb waved a hand. “No, see, we’ll keep the dares in, just add a little ‘red light, green light’ to the mix to keep it interesting. You ever play that?”
“Mm-hmm,” she said, smile growing. My heart ached for her. All that enthusiasm over a kid’s game; it all came from being robbed of half her formative years. If we had the chance to give her a taste of that simple joy tonight, we’d all better take it. Hunter could suck it the hell up.
“Great.” Seb stood and crossed to the chair, offering Serenity his hand. When she took it, he led her toward the hall to the bedrooms. “So, you stand at one end of the room”—he posted her against the wall alongside the doorway—“and we’re all on the other.”
He gestured for the guys to follow him as he headed for the front entry wall, and I hopped off my barstool.
“You ask us questions you want the answers to,” Seb continued to Serenity, “and Dagger makes sure we tell the full truth. If we do, we take a step closer to you, if not, we take a step back. The person who reaches you first gives you the dare of their choice. And then we can restart the game.”
“Sounds fun,” I said, coming to stand between him and Hunter.
“Wait, does that mean I have to ref?” Dagger asked through a frown, stopping midway to us with hands in his pockets.
Seb’s face fell. “Oh, damn. Yeah, that’s not fair.” He thought a second. “How bout… you play on the honor system?”
“That doesn’t seem fair either,” Hunter grumbled.
Dagger rolled his eyes, but there was nothing flippant in his broadening posture. “If you’re so worried, let our jaguars talk. Yours will sense if I’m lying.”
Hunter’s flexed jaw muscle ticked. “Let’s go with the honor system.”
Dagger’s head cocked like a predator on a scent—a sudden, sharp twitch.
Not even Carrot wanted any part of that standoff. She headed into the hall with a sassy tail swish and a disapproving backward glance. But Serenity stepped right into the fraught silence.
“How about you promise me?” She came up behind Dagger, palm running down the back of his tattooed arm. He turned into her smile like a plant to the sun, and she cupped his jaw. “You promise to tell me the whole truth?”
He picked her up by the hips, surprising a happy yelp out of her as she settled on his forearms like a swing, her legs around his waist. With her at perfect eye level, he leaned his forehead against hers and made a goofy show of widening his eyes, unblinking as he said, “I promise.”
I looked over at Hunter, who breathed slowly through his nose. “All right. Fair enough. But we need some ground rules on the dares, so no one crosses any lines or makes anyone uncomfortable.”
Dagger set Serenity down, and she turned to Hunter. “I agree. I…” She flushed and started over, hiding her sheepish smile behind a shrugged shoulder in an adorable gesture that made me want to kiss her until I couldn’t breathe. “I don’t mind a little fun in my dares… but I-I’m new at this stuff.”
“How about rule number one is all clothes stay on,” Hunter said eagerly, like he’d already won the game by setting that one boundary.
“What, are we in middle school?” Dagger scoffed, then thought better of it. “Er, sorry. Out of line.” He glanced Serenity’s way. “What do you think?”
“What about, my panties stay on?” Serenity asked.
“Deal,” said Dagger and Hunter over each other.
“Okay, I’m ready to play.” Serenity bounced back toward her place on the far wall. She froze halfway there and looked over her shoulder at Seb, a nail between her teeth. “What if I run out of questions before you guys get to me?”
Seb hardly missed a beat. “Let’s say you can pick one of us to ask a question in your place at any time.”
“Okay.” She tapped her chin and narrowed eyes on all of us.
My stomach tingled with nerves that I soothed with a burning sip of vodka.
“Hmmm, who to choose.” Her eyes crinkled, and she went still for a second. “Oh, okay, Seb. You first.”
I blinked, surprised. I hadn’t realized they talked in their heads on purpose these days. The way they’d described it at first, it seemed accidental.
Serenity wetted her lips, practically humming with nervous anticipation. “Have you ever been in love?”
He let out a little huffing laugh. “Yeah, for about three months my freshman year of college. We had some fun times. She was exciting. But she, uh… was mostly with me out of pity.” At Serenity’s confused look, he expounded.
“She was a full vamp, and I realized after a while that I was her poor little half-vamp charity project that she liked dragging around on a leash.”
“True,” Dagger said, who’d leaned forward to see his face better.
Sebastian took one deliberate step forward.
“Is it cheating if I ask him another?” Serenity asked.
Seb looked back at me and the twins in deference.
“What if follow ups are allowed, but they don’t get you closer,” I proposed.
“Works for me,” Hunter said.
Dagger tipped his chin to Serenity. “Go ahead, gorgeous.”
“Did you ever sleep together?” she asked Seb.
“No.”
“True again.”
Serenity tapped a delicate nail on her lower lip. “Okay… Bryce.”
It took a second to compute because I’d been staring at her mouth. “Hmm?”
Her hazel eyes captured mine, her lashes lowered bashfully. “Tell me your biggest secret fantasy.” I saw her breath hitch in her chest, and my heart almost stopped. “When you imagined what you’d like to try, if you didn’t have your condition, what was at the top of your list?”
My nails warmed, glowing flame red. God, my condition wouldn’t even let me hide my yearning and embarrassment. “Well…” I swallowed.
I didn’t have the vastest vocabulary for sexual acts. I mostly lived vicariously through relationships in movies, rather than much porn. But both could begin to feel more like torment after a while, building desire for things I could never have.
Palms sweating, I soothed myself with her shy gaze. She was new at this too.
“It almost feels greedy to ask for anything specific, when I never thought I’d even be able to hold someone’s hand, but uh…
” God, it felt so crude sitting on the tip of my tongue, with Serenity over there looking like a vision of happy innocence.
But Dagger would call me out if I changed my answer.
I could feel his scrutiny like a drill bit in my cheek.
“I guess anal would be at the top of my list.”
“Booty guy, huh?” Dagger said, nodding. “I’m a boobs guy.”
“So that means he’s telling the truth?” Serenity asked, looking me up and down while twisting a strand of her hair. I felt her eyes like the blissful brush of her fingertips. Even across the room, she gave me goosebumps.
Judging by the low, lustful growl that rippled up Hunter’s throat, the obvious arousal in her voice and stance were affecting him, too. Or maybe his shifter nose scented even more than I could see.
“Yep. Move ahead, Mr. Monopoly.” Dagger waved me forward like an usher.
I took my earned stride forward, surpassing Hunter, who snapped to attention when Serenity said his name.
“What did you think of my dance, that night at the club?” She narrowed her eyes. “And don’t just say ‘it was good’ or ‘I wasn’t a fan.’ I want to know what you really thought.”
Hunter looked at her with an intensity that made me feel like we were all watching a private moment. “I thought you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. You owned that stage, and I would’ve watched you for hours. What I didn’t like so much was all those other howling fools watching you.”
“True,” Dagger said.
Hunter stepped forward.
Serenity’s nose crinkled in a little cringe. “Is it bad I kind of like it that you were jealous?”
Hunter chuckled.
“Oo, follow up!” Serenity said. “Were you upset about Bryce watching?”
Hunter took a breath, mulling it over. “Actually, no.”
Dagger gave an affirmative nod.