16 - Date Night
MFM / Ménage / Anal
“Right then, who’s better in bed?” Bri leaned forward, both hands wrapped around her iced coffee like it might escape.
I’d been mid-sip when she’d asked and nearly choked. “I told you, I can’t rank them. It’s not that simple.”
“Oh, do get on with it. That’s not an answer.” She waited. Bri was good at waiting. Even after eight years in the States, she’d never lost that clipped British delivery. The one that made questions sound like demands.
I glanced around the coffee shop. Nobody close enough to hear.
“Graham takes his time. Like, really takes his time. He’ll spend twenty minutes just watching.
Figuring out what works.” The memory surfaced—his hands tracing my ribs, unhurried, cataloguing every response.
“He makes me feel like I’m something he’s designing. ”
“That’s rather intense.” Bri stirred her coffee. “And the firefighter?”
“Kane doesn’t study. He just knows. Or doesn’t care if he’s wrong.” Different memory now—his palm flat against my lower back, pressing me into his kitchen counter. “Rough hands. From the job, the equipment, whatever. You can feel them everywhere.”
Bri’s eyebrows lifted. “So, one’s a slow burn and one’s an actual bloody house fire. Terribly on the nose, isn’t it?”
“Hilarious.” But I was smiling. She wasn’t wrong. They were that different. That was the whole problem.
“Six weeks with the architect. Four with the firefighter.” She set her coffee down, studying me. “That’s an awful lot of diary juggling, darling. What exactly is the plan here?”
The plan. I’d been meaning to make one. Every Monday, I told myself, This week, you choose. Every Sunday, I hadn’t.
“I keep thinking it’ll become obvious. Like one of them will do something wrong, or I’ll just know.”
“And instead?” Bri prompted.
“Instead, Graham texts me photos of buildings he thinks I’d like. And Kane shows up at my door with takeout because he remembered I said I was tired.” I rubbed my temple. “They’re both so attentive. It’s impossible.”
“Poor you. Two fit men competing for your attention.” Her tone was dry, but she wasn’t wrong. This wasn’t a real problem. Except it was becoming one. “Any close calls?”
My stomach tightened. “Nearly texted Kane, ‘Can’t wait for tonight’ last week. Except I was looking at Graham’s thread.”
“Christ.”
“I caught it. But then Tuesday, I had to cancel on Kane last minute because Graham wanted to cook for me. Told Kane I was ill.” I laughed, but it came out thin. “He offered to bring soup. I had to pretend I was already asleep.”
“Starla.” Bri reached across the table and squeezed my wrist. “This is going to blow up in your face. You know that, yes?”
“I know.” I did know. I’d known for weeks. “Tonight, I’m at Graham’s. Dinner at his place, probably staying over. I’ll think about it. Figure out what I actually want.”
“And Kane?”
“Thursday. Dinner at that Cuban place he likes, then his place after.” I pulled out my phone, checked the time. “I should go, actually. Graham’s expecting me at seven, and I need to change.”
Bri stood when I did, pulling me into a quick hug. “Do be careful, darling—I mean it.”
“I’ve got it under control.” I grabbed my bag, slung it over my shoulder. “Two men, two calendars, zero overlap. It’s fine.”
“Text me when it all goes tits up,” she called after me.
I waved without turning around. The evening sun hit my face as I pushed through the door, warm and golden. Graham’s place was twenty minutes across town. Nice apartment, nice wine, nice man who looked at me like I was the most interesting thing he’d seen all day.
I had this handled.
Graham’s building had a doorman, an elevator that didn’t smell like anything, marble floors in the lobby. Every time I visited, I noticed something else that whispered money. Tonight, it was the orchids by the mailboxes. Real ones. Who puts real orchids in a lobby?
He buzzed me up and met me at his door with a glass of wine already poured. “You look good.”
“You always say that.”
“It’s always true.” He stepped back to let me in, and I kicked off my heels in the entryway.
His apartment had that stillness of expensive space.
High ceilings, a whole wall of windows, furniture that looked like it belonged in a magazine.
I’d asked him once if he’d designed it himself.
He’d said no, but he’d chosen every piece.
I settled into his couch, pulling my feet up beneath me. Graham sat close, his hand finding my knee like it belonged there.
“How was your day?” I asked.
“Long. Client can’t decide between two materials and won’t stop emailing me about it. I told him to sleep on it.” He took a sip of his wine. “Had a good session with my trainer, though. He’s been pushing me lately.”
“Is it helping?”
“I’ll be sore tomorrow, but yes.” His thumb traced a circle on my knee. “How about you?”
I told him about my afternoon. A meeting that ran long. A coworker who wouldn’t stop talking about her cat. Normal things. Easy things. His hand stayed on my knee the whole time, warm and steady.
A knock at the door.
Graham squeezed my knee and stood. “That’s a friend of mine. I invited him for a drink. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Of course not.” I straightened up, smoothed my skirt. Meeting his friends. That was a good sign, wasn’t it? Six weeks in, and he wanted me to meet people.
The door opened. I heard Graham say something I didn’t catch, then a low laugh in response. A voice I knew. A voice I knew in the dark, half-asleep, pressed against my neck.
No.
Kane walked into the living room. He stopped when he saw me, but his face didn’t change. No surprise. No confusion. He’d known I would be here.
“Starla.” He said my name like a statement. Like confirmation.
My throat closed. I looked at Graham. He was watching me with something I couldn’t read. Calm. Patient. The same way he looked at buildings he was studying.
The room tilted. I stood up too fast, wine sloshing in my glass. “I can explain.”
“You don’t need to.” Graham walked past me and into the kitchen, pulling another wine glass from the cabinet. “Kane?”
“Sure.” Kane moved into the room, taking a seat in the armchair across from the couch. Like he belonged here. Like this was planned.
Because it was. They’d planned this.
“How long have you known?” The words came out too high.
“Since Tuesday.” Graham poured the wine, handed it to Kane. “We were talking after a session. Showed each other photos of the women we were seeing.” He shrugged. “Small world.”
Tuesday. Three days. Three days of knowing and neither of them had said anything. I tried to remember the last three days. Texting Graham about tonight. Texting Kane about Thursday. Both of them acting like nothing was wrong.
“I’m not angry, Starla.” Graham sat back down on the couch. Not next to me this time. Giving me space. “We never said we were exclusive.”
“Neither did we.” Kane’s voice was low, steady. He swirled his wine but didn’t drink it.
They weren’t angry. They were watching me. Waiting. I didn’t know what for.
“So, what is this?” I was still standing. My legs wouldn’t unlock. “Some kind of confrontation? You wanted to see my face when I realized?”
“Could you blame us?” Graham’s mouth twitched. “It didn’t seem fair for just one of us to get to see it.”
Kane chuckled. Actually chuckled. Like this was funny.
I grabbed my purse from the couch. “I should go.”
“I was hoping you’d stay.” Kane set his wine down, leaned forward in the chair. His eyes on me. That same look he got in bed. Focused. Intent.
I stopped halfway to the door. My hand was shaking. I waited for the anger. The accusations. Neither came.
Graham picked up my wine glass from the coffee table where I’d abandoned it and held it out to me. “At least finish your drink.”
I looked at the glass. At Graham’s face, patient as ever. At Kane in the armchair, watching me but not moving. No one was yelling. No one was telling me I was a terrible person. They were just … waiting.
I took the glass. Sat back down on the edge of the couch. My heart was still pounding, but the panic was starting to fade. Whatever this was, it wasn’t what I’d expected.
“So, you’re not angry,” I said. Testing it.
“Yeah, a little at first.” Kane shrugged. “But we talked about it. Neither of us had asked you for anything exclusive. Didn’t seem right to stay mad about something we never asked for.”
I took a sip of wine. Then another. The warmth spread through my chest, loosening something.
“So, what happens now?” I looked between them. “We all just pretend this is normal?”
“Nothing about this is normal.” Graham sat back down on the couch. Closer than before. “But that doesn’t mean it has to be a problem.”
Kane leaned back in his chair, one ankle crossing over his knee. Relaxed. “Graham and I had a lot of time to talk this week. About you. About the situation.”
“And?”
“And we realized something.” Graham set his wine down, turning to face me.
“In architecture, there’s this principle about complementary materials.
You don’t have to choose between glass and steel.
Each one does something the other can’t.
The tension between them is what creates something worth looking at.
The interplay of light and structure, transparency and support, it’s not about picking one or the other, it’s about understanding how they work together to create a space that neither could achieve alone. ”
I blinked. “I don’t … what?”
Kane laughed. “Okay, let me try.” He leaned forward. “It’s like training. People think they have to choose between muscle groups. Chest day or back day. But the best results come from compound movements. You work multiple groups at once. The muscles support each other. You don’t have to pick.”
I stared at both of them. An architect and a personal trainer, speaking in metaphors I couldn’t follow.
“You mean …” I ventured. “You both still want to date me?”
“Yes.” Graham said it like it was obvious.
“Both of us.” Kane nodded. “If you want.”