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“Holden and Riley?”
Ivy snorted causing Zahara to pull the phone away from her ear slightly. “Unless you have another pair of mountain men stuffed in some closet I don’t know about.”
“You’re such a smart ass. I don’t know. I haven’t really discussed it with them.”
“Don’t you think that might make for an awkward parting if you don’t and soon? I mean, just sayin’.”
Zahara rolled her eyes. “Look who is full of such sage advice. Wanna talk about what’s going on with you since you for a change.”
“But being serious for a sec, sis, maybe you should stay. It’s safe there.”
Her sister was right, but that meant Ivy would be left all alone in Houston. She couldn’t have that. Zahara shuddered at the thought of seeing those dead black eyes and that sneering smirk of his again. Maybe if she had been the kind of woman he wanted. Quiet, dainty, and a good little politician’s wife with a servant’s heart, things would have worked out differently.
She tensed at the memory. Her chest filled with a silent sigh and when she let it out the world seemed a shade darker than usual.
Picking the wrong man to get engaged to left a woman’s soul tainted. It just did.
“You’re right about one thing. I need to tell them.” Staying wasn’t an option, but that didn’t make it any easier.
One week wasn’t a lot of time to mentally prepare to leave Savage Ridge and all the connections she had forged, Procrastinating the inevitable didn’t help.
Her final paycheck cleared in five days and there wasn’t anything else tying her to Savage Ridge. Except them. The two obsessive, mountain men who somehow managed to whisk her into a very extended trio romance.
But casual sex didn’t translate into commitment.
Neither Holden Savage nor Riley Ashwood made a move beyond enjoying her company in the evenings and she didn’t voice anything to the contrary or try to hold them back as they slipped from her bed long before morning.
It didn’t bother her.
She swallowed the lie, the lump hardening into a ball of weighted dread before she could swallow it. She dreaded the sound of the deadbolt sliding into place as they retreated yet lived for the whispered promises of their return. Both men occupied her thoughts every free minute of the day which meant one cold hard fact: she’d formed a connection despite her efforts to the contrary. How did she end up in this mess?
Two sets of sexy whiskey-colored eyes and husky voices is how.
“You there? Did you hear my question? Entertain me a little while before I have to go to class. Dish on what makes the men up there so damn special?”
Special? Sometimes she had to stop and wonder too. Zahara pressed the phone close to her mouth and whispered, “I swear there’s something in the water. The men here are well hung, well-built and fuck like they are made to pleasure women twenty-four/seven. Which by my experience, they are, and if you wanna know how I know all the men are well endowed, two words: Risky Whiskey.”
Silence fed through the line before a string of bubbly laughter met her ear.
Snickers and a few sputtered laughs sounded from a few tables down. She dared a look over her shoulder. Heat climbed the back of her neck as Damon shot her a quizzical look from across the bar with a smirk on his face as if sensing the Savage crew was being talked about.
Lord help her, that Savage smirk as she liked to call it. Every single one of the Savage siblings had it and used it like a weapon of mass destruction on the poor female population of Savage Ridge.
Whether tourist or homegrown, the effect was the same on everyone that came in contact with a Savage. She should know. Holden used his all the time to get out of things he didn’t want or, more recently, things he wanted to get into, such as her panties. Riley was the perfect partner to complete their trio with his warm golden eyes and heart-melting ability to peel her clothes off with his tender words. The man didn’t talk much, but lawdy, he knew exactly what to say to her when it counted and when he had his hand in her pants, fingers slid between her cum-drenched folds and working her clit, she was his to command.
What could she say? She was shameless in that respect.
With a single shoulder shrug, Zahara wiggled her eyebrows at Damon, turned on her heels and shuffled to the last table in her section.
Still gasping for air, Ivy asked through all her laughter, “How did you ever land two of those bad boys?”
She scanned the booths next to her to make sure it was all clear of eavesdroppers, not that many could hear over the racket from the front of the bar. Everyone in town knew her business with Holden and his best friend Riley, but she didn’t have to openly talk about it in front of them and feed the gossip. Men could sling dirty laundry better than the potluck ladies any day of the week.
“I can’t believe it either, but it’s just a passing thing. Not like it’ll last forever.” She flicked her towel and wiped at a ketchup splatter before gathering leftover bread baskets. “It’s just a little fling to clean my palate.” Another fact she repeated to herself more and more.
“Right. A totally typical move. You know. Happens to all of us.” Ivy’s voice dripped with sarcasm.
“After Mom died, I had to raise you. Followed by a rotten ass engagement. What’s holding you back?”
