Chapter 25 A New Pact
A NEW PACT
Trina
It’s one thing to talk about me while they’re playing with me in bed. That’s something they know I like. It’s a bedroom kink they’ve unlocked.
But to do it behind my back?
I park my hands on my hips. Like a mob heavy, Nacho sits next to me and barks in my defense. My little enforcer.
“You’re making plans for me without me?” I ask with narrowed eyes. Maybe I am overstepping as a guest. But so be it. If I cross a line, I’ll stay with—ugh—Cassie.
That’d be better than two men thinking they can make decisions for me.
“I thought you were asleep,” Chase says with a gulp.
“And that makes it okay?”
“We didn’t want to bother you,” Ryker adds quickly. That’s unlike him, to give a snap, emotional answer.
But I don’t care.
“Oh. By all means then, continue arguing about the ground rules for this bad idea. I’m not bothered at all.”
Ryker groans, dragging a hand down his face. “I didn’t mean that,” he says, sounding devastated.
But is he devastated I heard them? Or devastated over what he said?
“What did you mean then?” I point to Ryker.
“Because you said it was a bad idea.” I wheel on Chase.
“And you mentioned that damn pact. And yet no one asked me a thing about any of this,” I say, with a fire fueled by my own irritation but stoked by this surge of emotions I’ve been feeling tonight.
By this new overflow of them for their kindness, their humor, their sexiness.
Hell, I’m learning about hockey for them, and now they’re talking about me behind my back, and it feels like it could be Jasper all over again.
Like everything is a lie.
Like I’m the one being tricked.
My lower lip quivers, and clearly I’m not just angry. I’m hurt.
“Sweetness,” Chase says, advancing toward me.
I hold up a stop-sign hand. That pet name won’t soften me.
“Don’t,” I say, sounding wobblier than I want to. “What the hell is this pact for real? That first night you said it was a pact that you wouldn’t let a woman come between you? But is that the truth? Is it like a pact that you could both score me or something?”
My stomach roils at the awful thought. It’s a whole new way of being used. What if they made a pact they could both fuck me, then discard me after a week?
You idiot. They did.
I need to go. I turn around before anyone can answer, but Chase is lightning fast, grabbing my wrist, spinning me around.
“Oh god, no,” he says, sounding awful, then sighing heavily.
Ryker comes closer too, cautiously, like they both think I’m a wounded animal. Maybe I am.
“Trina, we dated the same woman once and we didn’t even know it,” Chase says, blurting that out like it costs him something.
Wait. What? That’s the pact? “You did? How does that even happen?”
Chase swallows roughly, looking almost embarrassed, but Ryker takes the question. “I was seeing her and then she went after Chase too. She was playing both of us,” he says, like he’s trying to keep his voice even, but I can tell that was hard for him to say.
“What do you mean exactly?”
“It was this whole thing,” Chase says, wincing as he lets go of my wrist. “Like a social experiment. She wanted to do what men have been doing all along,” he says, sketching air quotes.
“And she engineered everything so she was dating four guys at the same time to see if she could actually pull it off. She specifically went after the two of us because she knew we were friends and wanted to drive a wedge, and she gave us different names,” he says, and he sounds ashamed. Like he was made a fool. And he was.
“I hate her,” I say, flipping from hurt to anger in a heartbeat. I despise that she hurt my two guys.
Chase’s lips quirk up. “You’re possessive.”
“Well, I don’t like that she fucked with you.” At my feet Nacho barks in solidarity. “My dog doesn’t either.”
“We didn’t either,” Ryker says, sounding tougher now.
“So what happened with her?”
Ryker lets out a long exhale. “She talked about it on some podcast. I never listened but my sister did for us and told me. It sucked, but she never named names. Ivy said it was her thing. She’s kind of a provocateur and she does these different social experiments, usually about dating.
Claiming she’s a model, and seeing how men respond.
Or pretending she’s rich. Or making herself look older to see how guys respond to older women versus younger women.
She never uses names since it’s not about the people—it’s about what she pulls off.
It’s this whole thing. It’s her shtick. So we all moved on. ”
My spine tingles. I want to throttle her. “If I ever see her…” But then I focus on the more important issue. Them. What happened to them. “So that’s what the pact was about?”
“Yeah,” Ryker says with a nod. “I was falling for her and it sucked. Then I thought Chase was fucking my girl, and that messed me up. I was just in a really bad place. When we found out what was actually happening we didn’t want it to ever happen again, so we made a pact to be open about this stuff. Women, dating, and so on.”
That makes so much more sense now. “I knew the pact was about your friendship but the way you were talking tonight, it sounded different. Like it was about me,” I say softly, letting out a long, relieved exhale.
Chase tilts his head, stroking my arm again. “In what way?”
I sigh, feeling like the foolish one now. “I don’t know.”
“Yes you do,” Ryker presses, reaching for my other hand and threading his fingers through mine in a reassuring touch. “Be honest. That’s all we have here.”
Ugh. He’s right. I look up, meeting both their gazes. “I thought it meant you made a pact to see if you could both…fuck me. Like I was a game.”
Ryker squeezes my hand emphatically. “You are not a game.”
“You’re not some challenge we gave each other. You’re not a bet,” Chase adds, clearly determined to make me see that.
I feel stupid for thinking the pact was about me but comforted they don’t see me as a prize to be won or traded. “Good,” I say softly. “And I’m sorry you went through that. But I have to know something. Do you think this is the same thing?”
I sure hope they don’t because it doesn’t sound at all the same to me.
Chase jerks his head back and forth, adamantly.
“No. Not at all. Neither one of us was together with her in the way we are. This thing with us?” He runs his fingers along my arm, then looks to Ryker and back to me.
“It’s totally different. And we’ve all been honest from the start.
The photo today just threw me for a loop.
I guess I’m fake dating you and he’s not, and that’s weird,” he says, sounding so apologetic.
I hate that he was worked up.
I hate that Ryker was hurt.
And I hate, too, that we have to worry so much about what others might think.
But I try to picture my parents’ reaction if I told them I was dating two men, and it’s too uncomfortable an image.
My mom would want to know who was putting a baby in me.
My sister would kidnap me and steal me away to deprogram my latest manifestation of hot mess-ness.
“It’d be weird if I was fake dating both of you,” I admit, kind of sad, unexpectedly.
“That might be a little strange,” Chase says with a helpless shrug, and that’s the reality.
“My family would flip out,” I say heavily.
What we have here works behind closed doors.
I don’t think it could ever work in public.
But behind closed doors, I want to feel like we’re all in this together.
Even if it only lasts a few more nights.
So I lift my chin and say, “I’m a part of this.
Whatever this thing is. We’re all part of it. Don’t make rules about me without me.”
Chase nods, obvious contrition in his gaze. “We won’t.”
Ryker comes closer. “I’m sorry. Forgive us.”
I love the way he says I and us in the same vein. Like all those parts fit perfectly together. They seem to, for me.
I laugh and all my anger is gone. “You’re forgiven. But now you can show me how sorry you are in bed.”
Chase’s eyes sparkle. “Anything you want.”
I tug on Chase’s loosened tie and Ryker’s knotted one at the same time. I catch the scent of ocean and forest drifting off them respectively. “Have I mentioned how much I like this whole suit thing?”
Chase’s lips quirk up in a lopsided grin. “You didn’t have to.”
Ryker’s eyes lock with mine. “It was obvious the night we met you.”
Well then. Way to know my kinks.
* * *
A few minutes later they’re out of their suits, dressed only in boxer briefs, and they’re sliding under the covers with me. Ryker strokes my hair and Chase holds my hand and my dog settles against my chest.
This isn’t on my list.
But maybe it should be.
Because this position settles my fears completely. It soothes my heart and my mind.
I feel wanted in a whole new way because neither one of them asks me for sex tonight. Instead, they’re giving me comfort. And that does something to my heart I wasn’t expecting. It expands for both of them.