Jaded (20 page)

“You’re asking me if I
want
chocolate cake?” Alek gave her a slight smile, but sadness still lingered in his eyes.

“I’ll get it.” Byron walked to the kitchen. “Mara just bought new coffee too. I’ll make some hot water for it. I can do at least that much in the kitchen on my own.”

She and Alek finished clearing the table. While they worked, Alek told her more about Evianna. How they’d met, what her parents had been like. Evianna Grusov had been born to a noble house that had originally made their money in the mining of precious gems. Heir to a vast fortune, Evianna hadn’t been required to do anything in life besides make a good marriage, yet her mind had been keen to explore the world. She’d caused her doting parents heartache with her headstrong and unconventional ways.

Eventually they’d allowed her to follow her passion—education—and had sent her to the university even though it had been against their wishes. She’d flourished there, fast carving a reputation for herself as a female with an exceptional mind.

Byron served up the cake and the three of them talked more about Evianna as they settled in to eat it. With every anecdote that Alek shared, his shoulders hunched less and his voice and body relaxed more. By the time only crumbs remained on their plates, they were all laughing at happier memories the two men had of her.

After the dessert dishes had been cleared, they went into a smaller sitting room at the back of the house since it was a very cold night and the fire warmed that room more efficiently than the library. A large, thick throw rug covered the stone floor and a fire burned bright and hot in the hearth.

Byron had finally given in to the rational reasons she and Alek had given for the hiring of people to do work in the house, but they were like phantoms and Lilya hardly ever caught sight of them. They ghosted here and there, lighting fires, clearing snow from the front steps, and completing other tasks that Byron had been doing himself. Someone had built this fire to a roaring, pleasant inferno while they’d been enjoying their cake.

Around the fireplace sat an overstuffed, comfortable-looking couch and two wingback chairs. Alek took a chair and she curled up on the couch with her feet up. Byron took the opposite end.

A contented smile playing around her mouth. She watched snowflakes fall against the velvet black of the sky beyond the window of the room while an easy silence descended over them. The evening had begun a little tense between the three of them because of the edge of rivalry the men seemed to have where she was concerned, but they’d found a good rhythm during dinner, all enjoying each other’s company. She was glad they had—she liked these men, both of them, more than she could remember liking anyone in a very long time. She hated being the cause of discord between them, no matter how transitory it might be.

The snow came down harder and the wind gusted. It was looking bad outside and getting worse, but here it was safe, warm, and comfortable. She snuggled back against the soft cushions of the couch and sighed in contentment.

“Do you remember the blizzard during our freshman year of university?” Alek asked Byron.

He nodded. “We were snowed in at our dorm for three days.”

Alek laughed. “We lived on stale crackers, old candy, and melted snow.”

“And you’re laughing about it?” Lilya asked.

Byron put his hand on her calf. “It wasn’t that bad. We had friends there. It turned into a big party.”

“Still, stale crackers and old candy. Yuck.” Though Joshui knew she’d lived on less for longer periods of time. She wouldn’t mention that fact since the evening was turning out to be so nice.

Byron rubbed the tension out of the muscles of her calf. “Well, we did have a little brandy too.”

“And whiskey.”

“Oh, yes, the whiskey.”

“We played strategia the whole time,” Alek added. “Marko cheated, remember? Tried to steal a whole pile of coin from you before we caught on.”

Byron made an angry sound in the back of his throat that made all the hair on Lilya’s nape raise. “I remember.”

“Remember Tamryn and how he used to . . .”

Byron and Alek took a stroll down memory lane and she rested her head on the cushion behind her, happy to walk along with them. Their younger years had been far more carefree than hers had been, and a small part of her was envious of that fact.

Her adolescent and teen years had been spent finding safe places to sleep, locating food, and avoiding the hands of men who wanted to use her ill. She’d been remarkably successful at the latter, up until she’d walked right into Ivan’s clutches. She couldn’t help but feel a pinch of jealousy that these men had gone to school, had friends, families to come home to on the weekends, and had never had to worry about food, medical care, avoiding harm, or finding shelter in the winter the way she had.

Mostly she tried not to think of those years of her life. They were a painful haze of survival in her mind, cut through with jagged tears of grief over her father’s death.

She could remember one winter in particular as being bad. She’d learned during her first winter that scrambling up high and living on roofs provided her the most protection. She’d found the warmth-radiating chimneys of cook shops were the best places to make wayward shelters, and had stolen bedding from people’s clotheslines to create makeshift walls and a roof that insulated the heat. If she managed to find the right chimney, out of the line of sight from people on the ground, she could go the whole winter in relative comfort—well, at least what had passed as “comfort” for her back then. Her standards had been low.

One winter she’d been ousted from her spot in the dead of night by a homeless boy who’d also discovered the secret world of rooftops. He’d been bigger than she and had kicked her out of her little hovel, down to the ground. When she’d fought him, she’d received a fat lip. She’d been lucky to keep her life.

Worse than losing her warm place had been the loss of her father’s scratched, broken pocket watch. It had been the only thing she’d had to remember him by. The night had been bitter cold and she’d curled up at the base of a wall in an alley and cried for the first time since he’d died. Losing the watch had been like losing him all over again.

She’d almost given up that night. Despair had sapped all her energy.

But the will to live was strong, and she’d known her father would have wanted her to make it through. Finally, she’d risen on numb legs, knowing that if she didn’t find shelter she’d get frostbite, and trudged off to find some kind of place to curl up until morning. She’d survived that night, survived to build another hovel from scratch—rebuild, as it was. She’d never see her father’s watch again, though.

 

 

The conversation had lulled them all into a comfortable space. Byron shifted his head to watch her, his eyes intense with the arousal she’d come to know so well. She returned his gaze, hungry for him, wanting to spend time with him, wanting to touch him.

How she wished she didn’t feel that way. She would much rather have her customary reserve and control. Being with him made her feel like she was in a free fall, nothing to hold on to and only pain to cushion the impact.

Feeling the pull of another set of eyes, she looked over at Alek and found a confusing mirror of her emotions. She was coming to care for Alek too, in a slower and softer way. Her feelings for the scholar weren’t as intense and explosive—although the sex certainly was—but what she felt for him was becoming richer, more nuanced . . .
deeper
with every passing day. She found she trusted Alek, which was not an easy emotion for her to achieve with men.

Confused, she looked at the fire so she didn’t have to face the truth of her feelings in both their faces—she was not only falling for Byron . . . but for Alek too.

Silence fell over the room as Byron and Alek finished their conversation and Lilya slipped into growing disquiet. The logs snapped in the hearth and the wind howled outside, buffeting snow against the thick windowpane.

She was just about to excuse herself and go to her room when Byron reached out and touched her. Her breathing quickened as he caught her ankle in his hand. He slipped one shoe off and then the other, and began to massage her foot. Her stomach clenched and then unraveled into slow warmth at the sensation of his hands on her. He moved up to her calf with his big, sure hands, massaging out all the tension until her muscles went soft and pliable. The entire time he touched her, his gaze, filled with erotic promise, held hers.

A
lek watched from the other side of the sitting room, his pupils growing darker. Lilya wasn’t sure if it was lust or anger that clouded his chocolate brown eyes. Was it that edge of competitiveness he possessed or was it desire? Either way, she felt something unidentifiable building in the room, like a storm gathering.

Her eyes widened as Byron moved up farther, dragging his hand over her knee and up to her thigh. Her breathing quickened and a haze settled over her mind as it did whenever he touched her. His motions were hidden by the layers of her skirt, but it was clear to all in the room where he was headed.

“Byron, what are you doing?” Her voice came out a tremulous whisper, an inquiry.

A glance at Alek showed her that his hands had clenched on the armrests of the chair. His gaze had narrowed to an intense focus on Byron and his hands on her. She now identified the look on his face as lust, not anger—though the two emotions seemed so often paired in him.

Byron moved up, his fingertips brushing the silk of her panties and delving between her upper thighs, rasping over her sex, which was becoming warmer and wetter with every passing second. Her breathing had deepened and her hardened nipples rasped against the material of her bodice with every tiny movement she made.

She had no defenses against Byron. He touched her, she responded. What he wanted from her, he got. It took away everything she’d thought she’d needed—control. Yet here Byron was, for all intents she could perceive, ready to make love to her with Alek as an audience . . . and she would let him. She would give up control to him and love it because she trusted him.

His thumb found her clit through her panties, pressing and rotating. Licking her lips, she closed her eyes, trying to fight the power he had over her and failing. Her clit grew under his finger, growing more and more deliciously sensitive.

Then Alek was there, unbuttoning the bodice of her gown and freeing her breasts to the gentle, warm air of the room. His face looked as tormented as hers as he lowered his head to her nipple and sucked it into his mouth, making a low moan rip from her throat. Her head fell back against the cushions and she closed her eyes, her fingers tangling in Alek’s hair. The sensation of both of them touching her at the same time was better than Joshui’s heaven.

Byron pulled her panties over her hips and down her legs, while Alek worked to pull her gown over her head and throw it aside. Soon she was bare between them, their clothing rasping over her skin and making her shiver.

Alek slanted his mouth across hers, delving his tongue between her lips as his hand roamed her breasts restlessly, brushing her nipples and sending little jolts of pleasure through her.

The question
“Why?”
was poised on her lips, but the sexual haze she was under prevented her from uttering it. Why were they doing this when each of them seemed jealous and competitive where she was concerned? Yet here they were, both of them touching her.

Wordlessly, Byron pulled her down onto the thick carpet in front of the fire and forced her thighs apart, dipping his head between them. All questions and wonderings left her brain and her body took over. Her breath came in fast pants as his lips closed over her clit, licking and sucking the sensitive, swollen bit of flesh. Pleasure radiated out in sweet waves over the rest of her body, making her shudder in sexual bliss.

Alek came down over her and laved and sucked each of her nipples to hard little peaks and soon Lilya was lost in a haze of ecstasy. Having both of them touching her was nearly more than she could handle. Her fingers caught in Alek’s hair, the pressure of her impending climax building inside her. Her back arched and she moaned, lost to their hands and mouths, her hands skating over the bunching muscles of Alek’s upper arms and shoulders.

Alek raised his head, his eyes dark with desire. “Are you going to come, sweet Lilya?”

Her back arched and her head fell back on a moan. The ecstasy of having them both touch her at once overwhelmed her.

Byron thrust two fingers inside her, stretching her inner muscles as his mouth sealed over her clit, tongue working. He knew just how to drive her over the edge. Her climax burst over her, sending waves of ecstasy through her body. Lilya bucked and moaned as she came. Alek was there to inhale the sounds of her pleasure into his mouth.