Chapter 22 #2
“Getting to do this part is important.” Henri slides down to my legs, not in a sexual way.
It’s caring, functional, and so attentive I might dig a hole and disappear through the floor with the weight of unworthiness hanging around my neck.
Well, I might, if I wasn’t so exhausted and completely spent after a marathon of threesome sex tonight.
“Turn that brain off and let us take care of you.” His thumbs find a spot in my calf muscle that feels like heaven when he works on the tension there.
“I’ve never done anything like this… after…” I blurt out. Maybe it’s because I’m overtired and too busy overthinking everything, but I confess it before I really know why I do.
When I peek at Henri, his jaw is clamped shut. His hazel gaze fixes on my leg wrapped in his hold. Running his deft fingers down to my ankle, he concentrates on lathering me with more soap and massaging all the tension away from that lower part of my legs.
“You look mad.” I breathe. “Did I say something wrong?”
Henri takes a deep breath, exhales heavily, then stands up. Wheels turn in behind his hazel gaze as he joins in on the process of washing my hair. Using the detachable shower head, he shields my eyes, guiding water over my hair to wash out the shampoo, before providing Reid with conditioner.
“The idea that men like your ex have treated you so poorly, with such unbelievable disrespect… yeah… I’m fuming. Those men who are the type to keep you as their dirty little secret? Assholes who used you and then discarded you? Yeah, that absolutely leaves me seeing red.”
Henri hooks a finger under my chin, water spray coating the three of us as he studies my eyes with a laser intensity.
“That’s the promise you’re gonna make to us this Christmas. That you’ll never allow another gutless idiot like that into your life ever again.”
My stomach gnaws away at itself, rumbling loudly to drag me back to the present.
The snowy vista surrounding me as I join the steady stream of other vacationers driving away from Mistwood.
My fingers curl around the steering wheel, rubbing over the cracked and peeling plastic.
There’s an emptiness in my gut that goes so much deeper than needing breakfast.
I’ve been driving for about an hour, mostly crying, and thinking non-stop about the men I left behind so abruptly.
The glowing welcome sign for a mom-and-pop roadside diner is framed against the specks of snow fluttering across my windshield. As I flick my blinker on and pull over, my phone immediately starts to buzz on the passenger seat.
Slowing to a crawl as I navigate the gravel parking lot, I hit answer and switch to the loudspeaker.
“Are you okay?” Reid’s voice reaches through the phone, filling my tiny car, sending wings rioting in my stomach.
“Ask her if she’s too tired to be driving.” Henri’s voice is somewhere close, but in the background.
I blink rapidly. “What—yes, I’m okay—no, I’m not too tired—why?”
More importantly, how on earth did they get my number?
Rapid muttering in French fills my ears.
“You’re pulling over?” Reid asks.
More blinking. More confusion. “Yeah…”
Concern fills his tone. “Is everything alright?”
In the background comes more tutting. “I told you she would be too tired.”
“How do you know I’m—” The rest of that question dies on my tongue. I don’t need to ask how they know I’m in the process of pulling over.
All it takes is one glance in my rearview, and a gasp drops out of me.
Reid’s truck is parked right behind my bumper. Stella’s pointed ears fill the space in the center of the windshield.
Two doors open, and two sets of broad shoulders emerge.
My hot tears return, sliding down my face, bringing with them the strangest sense of relief.
Reid opens my door and crouches down. He doesn’t try to explain anything, but simply gives me a crooked, boyish smile, with creases forming around his eyes. “You think we had plans for the New Year that didn’t involve you?” He reaches up with a thumb to swipe away the wetness from my cheeks.
“Osti. This car is an absolute piece of shit, baby.” The suspension protests loudly as Henri slides the seat back and heaves himself into the passenger side.
“What are you doing here?” My head is on a swivel, gaping at the two of them.
“We didn’t get a chance to talk about plans for the New Year.” Henri shrugs. “You choose… wherever you wanna go. Whatever you wanna do.”
I’m shaking. None of this is real. Surely? “This doesn’t make any sense. You don’t know me. I’m an anxious mess half the time, the other half I’m incredibly boring.”
“Well, I’m impulsive. I’m demanding. And I’m guilty of falling hard and fast when it’s the right person.
” Henri barely fits inside my car, but adjusts himself to lay one arm around the back of my headrest and hold me in his hazel stare.
“You deserve to be loved out loud. To be adored in front of anyone and everyone. Let us be the ones who get to do that.”
I damn near choke on my sobs.
Reid gently takes my chin and turns my eyes to meet his. “It’s rare that I find myself at ease with someone to the point I can enjoy an evening with a total stranger. You wanna know how many times I’ve had that happen in my life, sugar? Take a guess at how many times I’ve been struck by lightning.”
Struggling to breathe is the least of my concerns. That upswell of emotion now merges with the need to rapidly blink away a surge of hot tears. I grab his palm, turning it over in my hand and closing his fingers into a fist, leaving just his forefinger extended.
Once.
“Henri is your bolt of lightning, your electric heartbeat.” I sniff. That’s how it works, isn’t it?
Reid gives me a soft smile. He slowly takes my hand and does the same in return, closing my pinky and ring finger; however, he keeps two remaining outstretched. He clasps my hand and presses those two fingers over his heart.
“Twice,” he murmurs. “I’m a lucky son of a bitch, with two keys to my heart, and they belong to both of you.”
“You don’t mean that…”
“Tell us you don’t feel the same way, ma petite chérie. Tell us walking out that door was the easiest thing you’ve ever done, and we’ll respect your decision.”
I’m already shaking my head.
“It would be the biggest lie of my life.” My whisper trembles with hope beyond all hope. “That’s a secret I don’t want to carry. Truth is, I’ve never felt more like me than when I’m around the two of you, and I can’t explain how or why…”
“You don’t need to explain, sweet girl. Maybe you just need to feel? We can figure the rest out as it comes.”
“What are you saying?”
“Stay. Stay with us.”
My pulse grows wings, thrumming as fast as a hummingbird. “But…”
“Please.” Reid’s tone is almost a whisper. The strongest man I’ve ever known is out here begging me to take a chance on them, when I feel like it’s the other way around entirely.
“It’s you who would be taking a risk, taking the biggest gamble by inviting me into your lives. I couldn’t bear it if I upended your world, your life—”
Henri chuckles. “Oh, you’ve upended things, alright. In the most miraculous way. We love each other, we trust each other, and the same goes for how we feel about you.”
I search his eyes, finding only those beautiful flecks of green and amber in his hazel gaze. “It’s so fast.” My reply comes out hushed.
“They say good things come to those who wait? I’d say the three of us have been waiting a long time to find each other. Now we have… who are we to deny that? Who are we to do anything but be brave and live our best lives?”
Henri leans across the center console to kiss me, sealing those words.
“The answer you’re searching for is, yes, Henri, that sounds like the most genius idea you’ve ever had,” he mumbles and smirks against my lips, as he fills my veins with so much happiness I feel like I’m spinning.
“Be ours. Be part of our love story, sugar.” Reid swoops in and kisses me with a reassurance I didn’t know was possible to feel from something as simple as a moment such as this.
“I want that. I want you both.” Nudging my nose against his, I can’t believe this is happening.
It took less than three days to fall head over heels for them both.
Two men, who I’ve never felt more alive with than when I’m wrapped in their arms.
And it’s only one heartbeat before I know my answer.
They’re my forever.