Crossing the Lines (13 page)

When Henry paused longer than it took to sip his water and reached for a bookmark, she stuffed unspoken pleas to continue down her throat. He tucked the book in the nightstand drawer, his broad back a temptation limned in lantern light. Turning, he pursed his lips and cupped her cheek.

“Don’t look so sad, my dears. We’re only halfway through. We must save something to read tomorrow, hmm?” He leaned in and kissed her, a slow, sweet nibble of her lips. Jay received the same treatment. “Time for a snack, at any rate.”

He refused their assistance in the kitchen as he dressed. Something up his sleeve, no doubt. A Valentine’s surprise for Jay. Biding his time, waiting for her to suggest she needed to go do something, anything, to keep her out of their bed for a few hours.

She excused herself to the bathroom and dawdled, spending more time than she needed to in the frigid air, planning to…
I have no idea.

“Okay.” She lowered her voice. “Analyze away.” Best if neither of them heard her.

“Henry hasn’t said anything. He might not have special plans. If he did, he might move them to another night. He expects me to stay, or he wouldn’t have said he’d read to us tomorrow.”

Situation defined, she squirmed at the answer the mirror reflected in the hurricane lantern’s golden hue.

“It’s me. I’m the one with the problem. This holiday makes me crazy. All that pressure and fake happiness. They’re fine with me being here.”

Her toothbrush stood beside Jay’s and Henry’s in the holder. She traced the raised roundness of the antique bronze chain climbing the Grecian urn design. Henry’s decorating choices so often invited her touch. His artsy knickknacks. His soft linens. His Jay.

“Stop trying to outguess Henry. Trust he has this handled.”

She grasped the lantern. Henry had taken the other to the kitchen. Every minute she stood here equaled one Jay spent alone in the dark.
Sorry, Jay.

She returned to the bedroom calmer than she’d left. Jay took the lantern and disappeared into the bathroom.

Rolling over, she burrowed her face into Henry’s pillow.

Losing track of time came easy in darkness. She dozed, her mind providing an image of Henry to accompany his scent in her nose. He beckoned to her, and joy tickled her ribs. She’d go to Henry if he called her, wouldn’t she?

Her feet wouldn’t move. She couldn’t bring herself closer to Henry’s image, and he wouldn’t come to her.
She
had to be the one to step forward. But her feet wouldn’t move.

Blood thrummed in her ears. Where was Jay? She needed him to push her. He’d make the first step possible, break her paralysis and bring her to Henry.
I need Jay.

She shot up, the heat of the blankets suffocating, and shivered in the cooler air of the room, lost and disoriented. This wasn’t her bedroom. This wasn’t her bed.

She was alone.

Scrambling to free herself from the sheets and hunt down her men, she jumped as the door opened. The sudden light stung her eyes.

“Too bright? Sorry, Alice.” Jay shielded the lantern with his hand.

Back from the bathroom or wherever else he’d been. In the kitchen, seeking out the privacy unavailable in Henry’s bed?

Jealousy refused to rise to the bait. Their activities without her provoked happiness, not anxiety. What made Henry happy, what made Jay happy, those things intersected with her own contentment. Complementary. Odd. Warming.

“What’re you doing without the covers?” Jay set the lantern on the nightstand. “That’s silly. You’ll get all cold.”

Climbing onto the bed, he scooted in close. He surrounded her from the side, his legs folded up, one knee against her back and the other draped over her shins. Closing his arms around her shoulders, he dipped his mouth toward her ear.

“It’s kinda obvious you’re cold.” His low voice teased. “I mean, I know I’m good, but I don’t think I make your nipples hard from across the room in an instant.”

At her laugh, he squeezed her shoulders and continued in a louder, more thoughtful tone. “Henry might, though. I’ll keep an eye on that.”

“An eye on what, my boy?”

They turned their heads in unison toward the doorway. Henry came bearing a snack tray and the second lantern.

“Alice’s nipples,” Jay answered, with no discernible shame. She nudged his head with hers, and he pushed back.

“Has Alice agreed to be the subject of a study?” Henry balanced the tray and the lantern on the other nightstand.

The promise of a Henry-made snack had her leaning back for a glimpse. But he shed his robe and started on the pajama buttons, and no treat topped Henry. Solidly built, not so muscled as Jay, but an image that breathed masculine in her ears and other places. Broad chest. Strong arms.

Jay snickered. “We can hammer out details later. Maybe sooner. I’m gathering valuable data.”

“Doesn’t count,” she murmured. Henry held her mesmerized, running his thumbs along the top edge of his pajama pants. “It wasn’t from a flat start, and four feet isn’t across the room. Science isn’t your top field of study.”

“Nope.” He pecked her cheek, a brief kiss. “But you and Henry are. I’ll just reenroll in this class every semester. That’ll keep my GPA up.”

His cock brushed her thigh on its way toward fullness. No surprise, what with watching Henry undress.

“It’ll keep something up.” She shifted her leg to rub against Jay. “I’m gathering valuable data here, too.”

“I’m a fountain of valuable data.”

Laughing, she buried her face in his neck. The mattress rocked. Henry closed in beside her, leaning across her shoulder, his hand moving in slow circles on her back.

“You want to be a fountain, my boy?” He wedged her body between his torso and Jay’s. “I suspect we can arrange that.”

The muscles in Jay’s neck shifted under her cheek. Vibrations of almost subvocal whimpers tickled her as Henry kissed him.

“But first, a treat.” Henry pulled away.

She followed his movement, the precise pivot, the beautiful slope through his shoulder blade as he reached for the tray on the nightstand. He presented them with a square red plate covered with a thin layer of wax paper and a dozen chocolate-coated strawberries. Jay stretched across her knees to snatch one.

“Mind you don’t make too much of a mess, my boy. The chocolate’s just set.”

Mouth full and moaning with appreciation, Jay nodded.

She hesitated. “You made those? Just now?”

“It’s not so difficult, my dear. If the day weren’t cold and powerless, we might have had liquid chocolate for other things.” He handed off the plate to Jay, fingers brushing her arm, and she shivered at his touch. “As it is, hardening the shells seemed the better choice. Perhaps another day.”

She didn’t doubt his skills in the kitchen. Or the bedroom.
Yum.

Her incredulity stemmed from the notion that he’d gone to the trouble. He could’ve bought them in advance from the party place in Coolidge Corner or half-a-dozen other shops within walking distance. Instead, standing in a cold, dim kitchen for the better part of an hour, he’d made a romantic Valentine’s Day dessert himself.

Of course he did. That’s why he’s Henry.

“I apologize for the romantic trappings, Alice. I recognize your aversion to the…overblown falsity of the holiday, shall we say? But I cannot be faulted for the near candlelight in the room when the electricity is being finicky, can I?”

He winked and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “And for all his bluster and charm, Jay is quite the romantic. A few sweet words and soft kisses, perhaps a special Valentine’s Day dessert, and he’ll tumble right into bed for me.”

Jay looked up, accusingly, in mid-selection of another strawberry. “Lots of sweet words, thank you.”

Sheer exaggeration. Henry could say one word—Jay’s name, “bed,” any of the thousands of words in the English dictionary. So long as Henry used the tone Jay’s brain interpreted as lust or love or whatever he called it, he’d be naked and on his knees in two seconds, no question. As if she’d be any different with Henry seducing her.

Jay raised a strawberry and rubbed her lips. “Here, try it. You might like it, too.”

She sucked the berry into her mouth and teased the tips of his fingers with her tongue. Sinfully sweet milk chocolate melted almost instantly in her mouth. A burst of sugary strawberry juice drenched her. Henry deserved thanks for his craftsmanship.

The hunger in his eyes stopped her. Why wasn’t he kissing her, if he—

Unless I initiate
.
It’s not Friday.

He’d laid out the rule for Jay this morning. He’d told her last fall he held himself to a higher standard, one even more important when he had no one else to enforce it.

“Have you tasted them yet?” Her voice seemed lower to her ears. She’d tried sultry with a boyfriend once and gotten laughter in return. She banished the memory, because Henry shook his head at glacial speed and locked his gaze to hers. Little more than a whisper emerged from her throat. “You should.”

“Should I, sweet girl?” Curling his hand behind her head, he stroked her hair. “Do you know where I might find a sample?”

She pressed her mouth to his.

He nibbled at her lips, coaxed her mouth open, and thrust his tongue inside as if chasing the flavor of chocolate and strawberry. A season of growth, the freshness of summer in midwinter. “Mmm. A delicious suggestion, Alice. How thoughtful of you to offer.”

A hand rose in her peripheral vision. Chocolate swept across her lips.

“You should have another.” Jay’s voice. Close. Intimate. The firm heat of his cock brushed her thigh. “I’ve been listening when you talk about science at lunch. One’s not a good sample size, right?”

“Right,” she whispered. “Excellent attention to detail, Jay.”

His mouth touched her ear. “I’m a great listener when you’re talking.”

She sucked in the strawberry and its chocolate shell, twirling her tongue around Jay’s fingers until he moaned. Drowning in the richness of the thick coating, she welcomed the splash of juice and sucked sugared drops from Jay’s fingers.

Henry watched her. Her eyes. Her mouth. Jay’s fingers.

Power consumed her. She licked her lips to savor the rush again.

“Another, Henry?” Her voice aspired to steadiness. Her body didn’t make the effort.

Henry kissed her with more force. Pressing her back against Jay’s warm chest, he seduced her with his tongue and tugged at her lip after. “Still delicious. Might it be impossible for our Alice to taste anything but sweet, my boy?”

“I can’t say without more sampling. She’d tell me it’s bad science.”

“That’s easily remedied, isn’t it, Alice? You wouldn’t want to teach Jay bad science, would you?” Henry shifted her easily, pulling her to his chest with a light touch and rolling her in his lap to face Jay.

She wiggled to assess the situation.

Henry laid his hand against her stomach, holding her firm. “An experiment of your own?”

Hard and heated, he thrust against her back. He swept her hair aside as he kissed her neck. Fuck, he delivered suction like he meant to pull her into his body and trap her there, the intensity a painful, pleasurable delirium.

Jay seized the moment to capture her mouth.

Kissing Jay back harder, she took control with firm lips and a stroking tongue.
She
decided when the kiss was over.

Henry paused his nuzzling at her neck. “What conclusions can you draw, my dears?”

Jay, biting another strawberry, offered an enthusiastic
mmm
.

“Jay’s just as sweet,” she affirmed.

“A challenge to your own sweetness for the crown, my girl?”

“Not a challenge.” Henry sucked hard below her ear. She squirmed. He thrust against her back. She had to catch her breath, and Jay’s attention fastened to her breasts.

“A mutual admiration society,” she finished. “You should taste Jay, too. For comparison.”

“Would you like that, Alice?”

“Oh yeah.” She moaned the words, but sounding needy didn’t bother her now. Not when Henry stretched out his arm and pulled Jay to him with a hand on the back of his neck.