Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Me:
Can I come eat my body weight in ice cream on your couch?
My heart forgot where it was supposed to live.
Keri:
Did it end up getting lost in your pussy?
Me:
Worse. I think it was found.
Keri:
Enough said. I’ll get the gallon tub rather than a pint.
Three Days.
Three days were all it took for me to discover just how miserable my life truly was. I can’t begin to form words, to find a way to explain it to these men, because nothing makes sense.
You don’t discover your soul mates and fall in love in three days.
I’ve had the flu for longer than that length of time. I’ve binge-watched an entire five-season TV series. A team of astronauts could set course for the moon, and I’d still have tumbled head over heels for Reid and Henri faster than you could say NASA, we have liftoff.
And yet, here I am, floating in space with the imminent descent to Earth about to turn me into a fiery piece of space debris. Perhaps I’ll incinerate to ash on re-entry and no longer have to think about any of it.
I’m not ready to face the reality of my shitty apartment, with neighbors who blast teeth-rattling drum and bass through the walls at two in the morning, and my ever-so-lonely existence.
Because no matter how hard I try, no matter how many times I attempt to look in the mirror and tell myself I should be grateful for what I do have, it doesn’t work.
I’m not happy. I’m nothing remotely close to being happy.
I’m a discarded cork bobbing around in the ocean as a flotilla of party cruises steams past. Everyone else is having the time of their life, and I’m barely keeping my head above water.
Space? Ocean? Whatever.
I cup a handful of water from the faucet to my face and then pat my skin dry with a towel. Doesn’t matter if I’m in a deep-sea trench or screaming into the inky void of zero gravity; either way, I’m unable to breathe.
I’m in love, and it’s pure torture. This is what the poets write about. The realms where musicians uncover their muse. Entire sections of the library devote shelf space to this awful, gut-churning feeling. The utterly painful power of a heart that both beats and bleeds for the ones I cannot have.
There’s nothing to be done, except to square my shoulders, take a deep breath, and pray I don’t make a scene by flooding their kitchen with snotty tears before I’ve even got one foot out the door.
My secret wish for a storm to end all storms that might keep me trapped here until long after the New Year never eventuated.
Isn’t that always what happens in romance novels? Doesn’t the heroine get snowed in and gets to enjoy having her back blown out while waiting for the weather to clear?
This was fun while it lasted, but reality calls. My landlord texted me earlier to confirm I can safely return to my apartment. I’m going to head back home to my crappy little life and probably sob about it to Keri and Sasha until my eyeballs bleed.
These two men have been the closest thing I’ll ever touch to a Christmas miracle, and I have to go before I ruin that.
My gift? Tarnishing things.
I’m well aware that I’m running because I’ve already broken up one marriage. The semantics don’t matter. Dale is scum—nothing changes that—but I made choices. He used me, and I didn’t have the guts to walk away as soon as I sniffed that first hint of his slimy behavior.
The stain on my record is indelible. I’m not about to let my shitty past come back to bite Henri and Reid. I don’t want to do the same thing to the guys; I couldn’t live with myself. My greatest fear is being the one who comes between them.
“You’re all packed?” Reid’s voice is flat as he finds me putting the last of my things into my bag. My cowboy lingers, watching me from the doorway to the spare bedroom. His hair is messy in that early morning way it tends to be, and he’s wearing his glasses, amber eyes still muted with slumber.
I slunk off to get dressed in here before they woke up. There was no guarantee I could find the strength to leave their arms if I stayed in that bed a second longer.
“Well, my car is here. I might as well start the drive back early. The weather is alright, the roads are open... I can be home by lunchtime.” I focus intently on zipping up my weekender. The way that word sounds foreign on my tongue. Home. It doesn’t feel like it’s that for me at all.
When I start to carry my bag and walk toward the door, I keep a tight smile fixed in place, but it’s a terrible act. Not even Stella coming to say good morning can muster a happy expression, with only a fraction of a slow wag this morning at the very tip, but her bushy tail hangs low.
Henri doesn’t say anything, but pulls on a worn hoodie as he joins Reid. The two men I absolutely do not want to leave behind both follow me all the way through the house. I don’t know if it’s any consolation that they look as grim as I feel.
I don’t want them to say anything. This is going to be hell as it is.
Words will only twist the knife deeper.
Reid lets me get to the precipice of reaching for the front door, but catches my wrist and lifts my bag out of my grasp, setting it on the floor.
His massive arms wrap around me, surrounding me in all the warmth and masculine scent of him.
He still smells faintly like the shampoo from when the three of us showered together in the middle of the night.
My head tucks against his chest, and there’s a rumbling noise there, a sound that doesn’t make it out in the form of words as such.
The noise is more like a discontented hum than anything.
All too quickly, I have to pull back, because I’ll stay here hugging this man for hours if I allow myself half a second to waver.
He cups my jaw and lowers his mouth to gently kiss me, in an achingly soft press of our lips that sends me to the brink of tears within record time. As he draws back, I hear him clear his throat, and I shake my head. Pressing my fingers to his lips, I silently tell him no.
No words. No making this harder than it already is. No need to try making sense of why this feels so difficult when we only met two nights ago.
What I do allow is the briefest moment of indulgence. I reach up and lightly brush a fingertip over the rim of his glasses, committing how handsome he is to memory. A tiny smile settles on the corners of my mouth as I find myself snared in his amber gaze for a long moment.
Henri reads everything perfectly, sliding his palm around my waist in order to cover my body with his from behind. He buries his nose into the side of my neck and takes a couple of deep inhales.
“Joyeux Noel, ma petite chérie,” he whispers against my skin. Pressing his mouth there to embed those words into my veins.
I swallow hard and nod.
When he lets me go, it’s with a lingering glide of his touch. His fingers pinch the hem of my sweater, holding on briefly before his hand drops heavily to his side.
“This was perfect.” I nibble on my bottom lip while picking my bag back up.
“The most perfect fake boyfriend experiment I could ever dream of or imagine. I hope you know, you’ve both made me realize I deserve to live my life for me…
not what other people think about me. That was the best Christmas gift you could ever give. ”
“Don’t forget the orgasms.” Henri jokes, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. There’s none of his usual lighthearted tone behind those words.
A soft laugh puffs from my mouth. “How could I ever?”
When I dare to take a proper look at Reid, his features are stormy with unspoken emotion. That chiseled expression of his tightens, a tic flickers madly in the muscle lining his jaw.
“Bye, big guy.”
It’s the best I can do, all things considered.
Stella nudges at my thigh, and the moment I crouch down to say goodbye to her sweet little face, that’s when I know it’s time to run. The tears are coming in hot and fast, pricking behind my eyes.
Blinking rapidly, I gulp to fight back the rising tide. It’s all too much for me to bear, and I bury my face in Stella’s soft fur to hide my wobbling bottom lip.
“Bye, ma cocotte,” I whisper and place a kiss on her forehead, using Henri’s favored nickname. She swishes the tip of her tail side to side against the hardwood floor.
Stay. Stay. Stay.
Is it absolutely foolish of me to hope that’s what each of those back-and-forth glides of her tail tries to tell me?
Three days.
Three hearts.
Three goodbyes.
It was perfect while it lasted.
“This is ridiculous. You don’t need to wash my hair.”
Considering I can barely lift my arms, my legs have turned to rubber, and my eyes are losing the battle to stay open… I don’t actually have much of a choice in the matter. Yet I mumble my protests with water sluicing down my body all the same.
“Quit arguing.” Henri chuckles softly. A sexy cascade of droplets merges to form elongated rivulets down his muscles. I wish we had more time so I could commit every plane and indent to memory with my tongue.
When showering with two men, there’s no room to argue. Literally. Their walk-in shower is grandiose, but Reid takes up enough space for two all on his own. He fills the space behind me, slowly lathering shampoo through my hair and using those incredibly skilled hands to massage my scalp.
I’m leaning all over him. Boneless with pleasure after everything we’ve done tonight, this morning, yesterday… God… all the moments I’ve had with the two of them blur together.
Yet, I continue to feebly protest the mere fact that they’re washing my hair for me.
Well, Reid is currently washing my hair and giving me a head massage that might actually leave me drooling, while Henri stands in front of me, soaping up my arms and rubbing his thumbs to knead and ease tight tendons and knotted muscles I didn’t even know I had.
“Oh, yes. That’s right. Rugby star-boy here likes to call the plays. No wonder you’re being bossy about this, too.” I grumble.