Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
ISABELLE
Iwas extremely warm, too warm. I wriggled under the heavy blanket until the blanket mumbled something.
I was encased by bodies.
Someone lay across me on one side. On the other side, hands were trying to pull me into a cuddle, but the weight on me prevented them from wrapping me up fully.
An arm around my hips squeezed me, another set of fingers curling against the softness of my belly, another arm wrapped around my chest. I had no way of knowing who was who, but my gut told me the man using me as an anchor and a pillow was Alex.
The gentle hold on my chest, Ben, the possessive hand on my waist, Seb.
The space was tight, and that was why it was so hot.
The whir of automatic blinds lifted the shroud of darkness in the room.
Everyone stirred where they lay, each one exactly where I had placed them.
We were in Ben’s room, Seb’s too. Alex had stayed in here with us. Not that I remembered coming to bed. I remembered our sobering conversation becoming a hearty set of complaints about the institution running the government, our shared despair.
Before long Seb began to drink, Alex too after several reassurances from Ben, and I drank liqueur chocolate coffee, which I had been extremely unhappy to have had made for me on the last night together.
After that, I must have fallen asleep.
“Morning, Sugar,” Ben whispered. His eyes closed, he licked his lips slowly, shifting in Seb’s loose embrace. “It’s a little warm.”
“I’m hot,” I moaned. “Furnace-like levels of hot.”
I couldn’t resist; I reached over and carded my fingers through his hair, caressing his peaceful features and grazing his full lips, my heart singing at the way he let me touch him now.
Leaving was going to kill me.
“Hey, if we’re moving onto the petting section of the day’s agenda, don’t leave me out.” Seb’s sleepy voice interrupted my thoughts.
“I can’t reach you,” I complained.
Seb sat up, eyes sparkling a deep green in the half light and leaned forwards, crushing Ben beneath him to lay a peck on my nose.
I snickered.
“There’s no quiet with you lot,” the weight over my stomach grumbled.
“Nothing to do with me.” I ran my hand over the bare skin of Alex’s back.
There was a lot of exposed male skin, very naked torsos.
Someone had changed me into a large t-shirt. From the hint of aftershave, I assumed Alex’s.
When Alex shifted and half stretched, his hand ruched the fabric upwards, exposing my bare legs to his touch, which quickly slipped across my thigh and over the fabric of my underwear.
One of only two pairs I seemed to have left, Seb had not been joking about keeping some.
I was sure I’d had more but failed to argue.
I had found a pair of boxers amongst my belongings after I returned from my spell with Alex at the manor, and I was not intending to return those. Fair is fair.
The warmth of bodies pressed together began to morph into a different type of heat, and I wriggled fiercely. “Nope! I need a shower.”
Alex begrudgingly released me, complaining, Ben’s contact relinquished more easily. Seb was the last to let me go.
My throat tightened and I clambered over Alex – knowing he’d be far less likely to impede my exit – and I stalked as quickly as I could to the bathroom, locking myself inside to cry into the shower.
There had been no-one left in the bedroom when I returned, the blinds lifted and the bed made.
I’d turned the temperature of the shower icy to try to calm the rising redness of my cheeks, but the glassy sheen of my eyes would give me away.
In the empty room, I took the opportunity to search for the duffel and snatched it from its storage space in one of the cupboards before I furiously but carefully stored my belongings inside.
The cash, the clothing, the brick that was my phone, followed by the important phone number and the patchy maps.
My careful review of one of the books provided by Alex showed me the error I’d made the day I arrived here. I’d carefully marked my new location on the blotchy maps I had retained and had planned out a route that felt like an age ago.
My task completed, I shifted my attention from the offending baggage to the broad window. The patter against the pane. It was raining heavily. I snarled as my heart sank.
This was perfect, truly. So why did it feel fucking horrendous?
After storing my bag where I found it, I looked back at the shelves.
My clothes were now clearly gone, but there was no need to leave the duffel on display.
No need to upset anyone any more than necessary.
Then, I wandered to seek out my men downstairs, pausing to look through the hallway windows at the downpour and the thinning snow.
Disappointment at the emerging drive hardly had opportunity to take root when I saw a huge vehicle idling outside the property. It had large thick tracks where tyres would have been, under a large steel body. Almost like an all-terrain vehicle, but on steroids.
The brightly coloured, high-visibility panels along the side indicated it to be an emergency services vehicle, and the pair of giant men wearing thick combats and black jackets with ‘MPIT’ emblazoned on the back confirmed as much. This was a missing persons team.
Their mouths moved, but I couldn’t hear what they said to whoever would have been standing under the porch, talking to them.
One of them cast their eyes upwards and I ducked quickly out of sight, my breath quickening and palms turning clammy.
The front door slammed heavily and I waited a beat for my body to calm. While the visit could have been for anything, something told me it wasn’t and I worked hard to reassure myself. A search party was already underway and had been for weeks. This was not new.
Eventually, I slipped down the stairs, listening out for voices.
The main room was empty, so I wandered to the back windows and looked outside. I couldn’t be sure, but the workshop looked dark, the outhouses closed. No-one was outside.
I crossed the room to the last place they could be. Sure enough, Alex’s study was open, the unmistakable sound of quiet arguing trickling out. I hesitated, then slipped closer to the door.
“There are fucking photos of her, she won’t make it!” Seb was pleading.
“They don’t have anything, Seb. Two snowmobiles going to the manor, a photo from a helicopter of a woman they can’t make out. It’s invasive, and fucking ridiculous, but it doesn’t mean anything,” Alex snapped.
The helicopter was a news channel. They were taking photographs?
“The fuck it doesn’t. Did you see that vehicle? She won’t make it as far as town, they know she’s around here and if we let her go they’ll find her. Then what, Alex? You know the alternative, we could do it, we could!” Seb was emphatic.
“It doesn’t matter that we could, Seb. What she said was true. Her father won’t accept anything less than the Fairchild match. He wrote the fucking book on this, Sebastian.” Alex was growling now.
Seb tried to complain, but Alex was quietly raging. How he was so quiet, I didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. I could still hear him.
“You want to think about her future? What do you think will happen to her when they find her? When they confirm she ran away? How do you think her being found with another man and claiming to be married will affect that?”
Silence greeted him.
“Best-case scenario, she’ll be brought back in line. Drugs, treatments, only the best for a disagreeable society wife.”
“Fucking hell, Alex,” Seb whimpered.
“Worst-case scenario? Institutions, Seb. Enforced compliance. If they find her, it’ll be bad. If they find her with us, it could mean the very worst of what our society has to offer. We can’t do that to her.” Alex’s voice cracked slightly.
“We can’t do that to her, Seb.” Ben joined Alex’s argument. “It’s not worth the risk.”
“She needs a chance at freedom, Seb.” I heard the clap of a hand on someone’s body. “She needs a chance.”
The door swung inward, Alex appearing in the frame, a look of grim determination on his face.
He looked between my eyes, and his lips turned down. Then he pulled me into him, wrapping me up so tightly I wasn’t sure I’d be able to breathe. Then I realised maybe I didn’t want to anymore.
The others came to bracket us, and I was engulfed, and that was how the rest of the day went.
No-one mentioning the visit, or the supposed photo. No-one speaking of the next day.
I was held almost constantly. One passing me off to another whenever they needed to move, and sometimes just because it seemed to be the end of their turn.
Morning turned to lunch, lunch into dinner. We ate. We talked, joked and laughed as if we weren’t all shattering inside.
Later I read, laughing heartily at Seb holding Ben, Ben holding me, Alex tucking himself under my legs.
We stopped for tea; the heavy darkness that fell outside hid the sheets of rain that dissolved the snow, the thing that held me here.
Then we sat at the table, caught in a pregnant silence.
“Right, fuck this!” Seb stood abruptly, the bench toppling over with the suddenness. “Here, Killer.”
I rose on command, and he wrapped me into an embrace, inhaling me before plundering my mouth with an urgent kiss.
He placed me on the tabletop and hands wound through my hair, tilting my head until my kiss with Seb broke and different lips met mine, no less demanding, teeth scraping over my lip, inhaling the gasping breaths I exhaled.
More hands tugged at my clothes, lifting and tearing my leggings down my hips. Cotton interrupted where Alex devoured my mouth and he released me, then my top was gone, leaving me in just my underwear.
I rolled my head to see Ben watching me. He worried at his pouty lips, fingers caressing the skin of my shoulder, then my throat.
My chest juddered, a lump forming in my throat, before I knew it tears spilled.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, looking from Ben to Seb, then to Alex.
“Hush.” Seb smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. His fingers caught the tears, Alex chasing Seb’s touches with gentle pecks.
“Should we stop?” Ben whispered into my ear, loosening where he toyed with my throat.
I caught his hand in mine and held it in place. “Fuck no.”
Fingers unclasped my bra, and it fell from my body.
“Beautiful.” Seb caressed my breasts, cupping their weight and then rolling his thumbs over my nipples, causing them to tighten. “So responsive.”
I swallowed heavily. His words chasing away the melancholy.
“Lift for me, Killer, I’d hate to have to relieve you of yet another pair of panties by tearing them off you.”
I growled at him but lifted obediently, only slightly embarrassed at being naked on the kitchen table.
“Good girl, Sugar.” Ben’s words had no dirty intent, but they landed on the back of Seb’s and the effect was immediate. I clenched my thighs together against the throb building between them.
“Don’t hide from us.” Alex kneaded my thigh, teasing my legs apart.
I was dragged towards Seb and the leg Alex didn’t have in his hold was pushed upwards and into my chest.
“Benji, come taste our girl.”
Ben’s hands left me before returning to grip around my thighs. He feathered a kiss against the skin there, then dragged his tongue through my folds. My eyes fluttered closed on a desperate whine. I dragged them back open, desperate to witness every second.
Ben’s tongue found my entrance and pushed inside, Seb muttering filthy words of encouragement and bringing fingers to flick across my clit.
“Fuck.” I grabbed for them, gripping hair and hands, my touch seeking out every part of them I could.
“Come here, Firecracker.” Alex folded over me hungrily, kissing my lips, and I clutched him like a lifeline, untethered by the sensations of Seb and Ben between my legs.
Dragging my hands over him, I tugged at his clothes, clawing down his joggers to free him and taking his length in my palm. I fisted him, teasing slowly.
He growled into my mouth as I worked him, his kiss becoming harsh, hips jerking into my palm.
Ben’s mouth left me, replaced by the pressure of something else. The thick hardness of his cock breached me.
Alex relinquished my mouth long enough for me to see Ben, slowly pressing between my thighs, Seb’s fingers still working my clit.
Ben’s chest heaved, his top now gone, golden skin lightly sheened with sweat. Seb was still at his back, whispering, his other hand disappeared inside Ben’s joggers and between his legs, arm flexing as he massaged his balls.
I shuddered when Alex took my nipple between his knuckles, squeezing. The surge of arousal between my legs earned a ragged groan from Ben.
Gasping, I began to moan, calling for them, each cry increasing in desperation.
“Come here, Izzy.” Alex leaned towards me and pushed inside my mouth. Stealing my breath, he thrust into my throat, easing out for me to inhale, then pressing back inside, deeper and deeper.
My eyes watered when I finally took all of him. He cursed in response to each strangled groan Ben and Seb coaxed from me.
“I need to feel it when you come,” he rasped.
My back arched with a scream and my body wracked with shudders.
Both my men cursed, their movements becoming erratic as they rocked unsteadily. Alex exploded over my tongue and Ben collapsed over me, holding me, caressing his lips across my stomach until my shuddering eased and my breathing slowed.
Alex licked along the seam of my mouth. “Izzy,” he murmured, pausing.
“I know,” I breathed, wincing as Ben left me, bereft at the loss.
“None of that, Killer.” Seb pulled me from under Alex and I smiled at him; he would always get my smiles. “Are you ready for me?”
I made a show of thinking about it, and he swept me into his arms, my legs closing around his waist on instinct.
“Naughty, Killer, teasing me,” he scolded.
The warmth of a body at my back was followed by a soft murmur from Ben. “Let me help.” His hands danced over my exposed ass, cupping and lifting, then lowering me, and then Seb was seated inside me.
I cried out, head falling back onto Ben’s shoulder as the two of them began controlling my body, allowing Seb to fuck me mercilessly.
My cries quietened, my voice turning hoarse and flesh becoming damp with sweat.
I turned my head to seek out Alex and found him, watching me.
His eyes hooded and lips parted as Ben held me and Seb worked his mouth over every inch of me he could reach until he wrenched an earth-shattering orgasm from my body before he sharply nipped the soft skin of my breast and shuddered out his own release.