Sharing Their Stateroom (Pranked to Gay #3)

Chapter 1

“Isn’t it great, Cade? Look at how beautiful it is!

” My mom calls back as my parents hurry ahead of me down the gangway of the Sapphire Empress.

Looking up at the massive boat, I’m wondering again why I agreed to a cruise.

It’s gigantic, like someone took a high-rise luxury hotel and dropped it in the water.

“Yeah. Great.” I adjust my duffel strap and remind myself that my older sisters just graduated from college and they deserve their celebration.

I glance back at my sisters, Lucy and Lily, who are hurrying along behind us.

Unlike me, the twins have had their lives mapped out since middle school.

Pre med, med school, residency. They’re the golden children, clearly the favorites.

In fact, the only thing either one has done wrong is pick a couple of himbo jocks for boyfriends.

And they insisted on bringing Wyatt and Jai on the cruise. They’re both big, cheerful and handsome, and my parents hate them. I don’t see why, I mean, they’ve always been nice to me and I’m a math geek.

But my mom keeps telling the twins that Wyatt and Jai were fun as college boyfriends, but they have no direction, no drive. As if a person can’t still be figuring themselves out at twenty-two.

I hate to think what my parents must think of me, a twenty-year-old math major with no career plan and no love life to speak of.

We clear security, and step into the central atrium of the ship, where thousands of people are milling about, heading for their rooms. The interior of the boat is exactly as advertised in the brochures: marble floors, glass dome, sweeping staircase, the whole thing lit by natural light pouring down from above.

“Okay guys, let’s head to our rooms, unpack, and meet back for dinner,” my dad says, pulling out the packet full of key cards. “Girls, you’re in 12114, across the hall from us on Deck 12. Cade, you’re with Wyatt and Jai in 9114 on Deck 9.”

“Seriously?” Lucy says. “Dad, I thought we talked about this.”

“We did talk about this. Boys in one room, girls in the other,” Mom says, in her non-negotiable voice.

My dad nods. “We were happy to pay for Wyatt and Jai to come along on the cruise, and you can spend plenty of time with them, but there are only two rooms, as we discussed.”

This whole decision had happened without consulting me, apparently.

I glance at Wyatt and Jai, stomach churning as I think about sharing a tiny cruise ship room with them.

Wyatt is earnest, cute, and gigantic, six-four of muscle stuffed into a faded tank top that seems designed to make sure everyone knows he has an eight-pack.

Jai is Indian-American and handsome as sin, with a face that belongs on a billboard and the cheerful confidence of someone who knows he’s hot.

Not the two people I want to share a tiny stateroom with.

“Come on, Luce, it’ll be awesome,” Wyatt says, clapping me on my back hard enough that I trip forward a step. “We’ll bond with your little brother, and go on lots of great dates.”

Jai does a sneeze thing that sounds a hell of a lot like the words, “kiss ass.”

Oh god, I’m spending the next two weeks with two frat boys who sneeze insults at each other.

My father hands over our room cards, attached to lanyards so we don’t lose them, and we finally catch an elevator, heading up to Deck 9, and separating from the others.

I wonder if my dad booked a room three floors away on purpose.

Wyatt strides ahead down the narrow, carpeted corridor.

Everything is navy blue with gold trim, which might look luxurious if it wasn’t so tight and confined-feeling.

Room 9114 is midship, on the port side, and Jai looks excited as Wyatt lets us in.

The room is bigger than I expected. There’s a king-sized bed against the far wall, made up in crisp white sheets with a blue throw at the foot. A sitting area near the balcony door holds a compact sofa. The bathroom door is open, and I catch a glimpse of tile and what looks like a tub.

“There’s only the one bed?” I ask, spinning, as if there might be a second bed hiding somewhere behind us.

Jai goes to the wall and presses a button. “Didn’t you watch the videos your mom sent? There’s a bed that comes down from the ceiling.”

With the soft whir of a motor, a twin-sized mattress lowers over the head of the bed, hovering about four feet above it on some sort of track thing. Wyatt reaches up and pulls the ladder down, and peeks up into it. “Kinda tiny up here.”

“I call the bunk,” I say. “Er, since I’m smaller, I can take it.”

“Are you sure, man? That thing looks…” Wyatt trails off.

“Like it’s meant for a kid,” Jai finishes.

“I’m fine,” I say. The phrase is becoming a tic. “I don’t mind small spaces. Besides, I’m only five-foot-five. You guys are both over six feet, I’m sure.”

And I don’t want to share a bed with one of them.

“There’s a fold-out sofa thing, too,” Jai says, poking at the sofa. “But it looks like it’s sized for a toddler.”

Wyatt drops his bag on the king bed and bounces once, testing the mattress. “We’ll just share, man. It’s no big deal. We’re friends, right?”

“Whatever. Fine. I’m going to find a way to get into Lily’s room anyway,” Jai says.

Wyatt snorts. “Their parents are gonna be across the hall, watching. Lucy has been bitching about this plan for weeks. They don’t want their precious daughters tarnished by a couple of assholes.”

Jai cracks up, shaking his head. “Too late for that, isn’t it?”

I try to ignore them as I put my duffel on the desk and unzip it, rooting around for my book.

“Anyway, it’s a free vacation, and I’m going to make the most of it. This place is like a floating party so let’s have some fun. Pool?” Wyatt asks.

“Pool sounds good,” Jai says. “It’s fucking roasting in here. You coming, Cade?”

I hold up my book. “No, I’m just going to read.”

“Oh, come on, man. Let loose! We’re on a cruise!” Wyatt says.

Jai’s pulling his shirt over his head as he says it, one fluid motion that leaves him standing there in just his jeans, his chest bare and tan and ridiculously defined. I look down at my book, which is very exciting. The hero is about to fight a dragon.

I climb into my bunk, settling at the edge with my legs dangling, and pointedly ignore the sound of fabric being tossed aside, zippers rasping, and Wyatt saying something about sunscreen. I keep my eyes on the page. I am reading. I am very focused on reading.

My peripheral vision, the traitor, registers movement.

Wyatt has his tank off now. His chest is broad and thick with muscle and there’s a dusting of dark hair between his pecs that narrows to a line down his stomach.

His gym shorts sit low on his hips as he digs through his bag, the position pulling everything tight across his back and shoulders.

Jai is facing the mirror above the desk, running a hand through his hair, which is black and glossy.

He’s shirtless too, and his body is lean and cut and perfectly proportioned.

His jeans are loose, hanging from sharp hipbones, and when he bends to pick something up off the floor, the waistband dips to show the top of his ass, the curve of it, and—

I force my eyes back at my book, and the words swim. My face is hot. The blush starts at my ears, working its way across the bridge of my nose like a temperature gauge hitting red. Why is this even bothering me. I can handle being around other guys.

My eyes dart back over to them right as Wyatt finds his trunks and steps out of his gym shorts and underwear right there in the middle of the room.

His cock swings free between his legs as he pauses to turn the trunks right side out before he pulls them up.

It’s obscenely thick, cut and pink and heavy, with prominent veins running along the shaft.

His balls hang full and low beneath it. I’m staring at his huge dick and I can’t stop myself.

My brain short-circuits, the part that handles social appropriateness fizzling out like a blown fuse.

I turn my head away and my eyes land on Jai just as he pushes his jeans and boxers down over his hips and steps out of them.

My eyes drop straight to his cock, which is long and uncut, a brown color to match his light brown skin.

The shaft is smooth and slightly curved.

It’s not as thick as Wyatt’s but it’s longer, and when he moves it bounces lightly against his thigh.

And what the fuck am I doing analyzing the cocks of my sisters’ idiot boyfriends?

They’re talking, laughing and teasing each other about something, completely unbothered by their nudity as I sit on my tiny bunk with a book open in my lap, tracking the movement of their dicks like they’re variables in an equation I’m trying to solve.

Wyatt catches me looking. His eyes find mine over Jai’s shoulder, and his left eyebrow lifts.

“Sorry. I didn’t know I’d have roommates.” As if that explains all the staring.

“Wait, Dr. and Dr. Brown didn’t tell you we’d be your roommates? That sucks,” Wyatt says. “But we’re really not gonna be in your space that much. Promise. We’ll be out doing stuff most of the time. You’ll have the room to yourself.”

He thinks I’m staring because I’m annoyed. He thinks I’m pissed about the sleeping arrangements, about sharing a room with them, about being the third wheel in my own vacation.

That seems like a good thing to let him think.

“Or you can join us, and have some fun, too!” Jai says cheerfully as they finish dressing, grab their key cards and sunscreen. Wyatt claps me on the knee as he passes, his hand warm and heavy through my shirt. “See you at dinner, yeah?”

“Probably,” I say.

“Want us to come get you when we go to the bar?” Jai asks.

I shake my head. “I’m only twenty. No bar for me.”

“Well, if you decide you want to swim, you know where to find us,” Wyatt says, and they turn and walk out.

The door closes. The room goes quiet.

I sit on the edge of my bunk for a long time. My book is still open in my lap, the pages untouched. The air conditioning hums. Somewhere beyond the balcony, the ship’s horn sounds, low and resonant, and a faint vibration runs through the floor as we pull away from the dock.

I flop back onto my pillow, knees still dangling, and close my eyes.

All I can see is their bodies, tan and muscled and completely unself-conscious in a way I have never been in my life. Their big cocks, the way they moved, the casual ownership they have of their physical selves, like their bodies are facts rather than problems.

My cock is painfully hard, straining against the fabric of my shorts, the head pressing into the waistband. My heartbeat throbs in it, dull and insistent, matching the rhythm of the ship’s engines somewhere below us.