AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Yes, Barrett should’ve been outraged, should’ve been concerned, at the very least. He was my husband, the father of our daughter. Yet here was this man sitting across from me who I just met last month, and he was literally pissed on my behalf about something that happened years ago.
I couldn’t seem to breathe right. My skin felt tight with the fiery need rushing through my veins. His reaction stirred a longing deep inside me, one that wanted to feel protected and safe.
“Yeah, well,” I finally got out, “my soon-to-be ex-husband wasn’t nearly as offended on my behalf as you are.”
Trap’s lips parted, chest rising with his deep inhale, but a waitress in a pale yellow uniform and white apron approached, cutting him off. After we ordered drinks, Trap eyed me as she walked away.
“What?”
“Were you ever happy with him?”
“Bar—” I cut myself off. “My husband?” He nodded, brows pulled inward. “Yeah, at first things were great. We met in college. It was kind of a whirlwind type thing. And it was even okay after Gracie was born, but then the company took off, and everything changed. I was working a lot, and so was he with investors and running the company as the CEO. It was a gradual split, but I wasn’t aware of who he’d become in those years until recently.”
I offered a hesitant smile to the waitress, who dropped off the drinks and disappeared again.
“Is that why you haven’t said anything about what we talked about that night around the fire?”
The plastic straw between my lips popped free when my jaw dropped. “Is that what you think? That I still have feelings for him?”
His broad shoulders rose and fell. “It’s crossed my mind.” Stretching both arms out along the back of the booth, he fixed an intense stare on me. “So, is it?”
“What? No.” I practically gagged. “No, no. Ew.” A corner of Trap’s lips twitched at my dramatics. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
His brows flew up his forehead. “Us?”
“To make the first move. I’m completely out of my element, so yeah, I’ve been waiting for either of you to make that first move.” Hell, I’d even taken up shaving every day, hoping I’d find myself sans pants with either of them.
“Sorry I’m late.”
I jerked my head up to Shade, who hovered at the end of the table. Wearing a thick flannel shirt, dark jeans, and work boots, he looked every part a rancher. A very sexy rancher.
The seat popped me in the air when he sat beside me, scooting closer until our thighs touched.
“You’re just in time,” Trap said, tearing my attention from the way Shade’s shirt stretched tight across his chest. “Georgia here was just telling me how she’s been waiting for one of us to make the first move.” Both their hard stares burned into me. I scrunched my nose and gave an exaggerated grimace. “I was about to explain that we didn’t want to pressure her, that the ball has always and will always be in her court.”
Shade grunted in what I could only assume was agreement.
The thin napkin wrapped around the silverware slipped between my fingers as I fiddled with a corner. “I haven’t done this since college. If you’re waiting for me to make the first move, then we’ll be waiting a while. It’s not that I don’t want you two. It’s that….” I blew out a breath. “I don’t think I can put myself out there.”
The fear of them rejecting me, of this turning out to be some cruel joke, rode me hard. Plus, I wasn’t kidding. I hadn’t been with anyone other than Barrett since college. Out of practice in all this was an understatement. Even when Barrett and I were basically roommates and coworkers, I didn’t seek other men to sate what my body needed.
What I desperately needed.
I loved sex. Had since Timmy Jones fucked me in the back of his Buick in high school. There was something about being in someone’s arms, that wonderful moment when nothing mattered but the sensations of another’s skin against mine. My mind had always worked overtime, something I felt made me good at what I did, but during sex, my mind was blissfully silent.
Sure, the pleasure part was good, but that always came second in my need for intimacy.
“We don’t want to pressure you,” Shade said, his dark eyes locked on me.
“You’re not. I don’t want to initiate this,” I admitted. “I want—no, Ineedone of you to do it for me. I don’t want to be the one controlling the relationship.”
It was something I wanted from all my partners but didn’t always get. Though with this discussion on the table, I might as well toss it out there. Especially since I had a feeling Shade would like that. He wanted to take control. Not to control me but to manage the situation, so everyone was safe, and I was taken care of.
Plus, these two, the way they took care of me and Gracie these few weeks, made me comfortable enough to say it all out loud.
“I want this,” I whispered.
“Okay.” I peered up through my lashes at Trap, whose hazel eyes were on Shade. “I gotta get back to work. You two going to the farm?” Shade nodded. “Oh, and there was a table of out-of-towners, construction workers from the way they were dressed, who were giving our girl a hard time.” Heat engulfed my chest at that term. “Though she won’t tell me exactly what one of them said.”
